I adopted Madison when I was 24. Our family had a history with dogs but Madison was the first I considered "my" dog. I was living in Chicago at the time. My brother and I (mostly my brother) had just purchased a small multi-unit building in Chicago's Bucktown neighborhood. As the landlord, we got to set the pet policy and pets were to be very welcome at our building. (Despite being pet-friendly, my brother was less than enthusiastic when I decided to adopt a dog of my own. Today, 11 years later, he cried as much as anybody when we had to say goodbye to Madison.) Madison had been found on the streets on the southside of Chicago and brought to Animal Welfare League in Chicago Ridge. My friend Terese went with me to Animal Welfare League on a Sunday afternoon. We quickly narrowed down our choices to two. We asked to spend time with both of them. AWL has you sit in a private room and they bring the dogs to you. The first dog was a timid German Shepherd mix. As we were sitting there waiting for the next dog, I could see out the door's window and remember seeing a red ball of fur (believed to be a Chow/Golden mix) that couldn't have weighed more than 15 pounds pulling the full-grown shelter volunteer around the corner, feet scampering on the shelter's concrete floor. She burst into the room and immediately rolled over on her back in perfect belly rub position. My heart was stolen. I told the volunteer I wanted to take that red ball of fur home with me. She left only to return a short time later with some bad news. Somebody else had seen the red ball of fur earlier that day and also wanted her. However, they were teenagers and needed their parents permission. They had been given 24 hours to obtain it. I could wait and see what happened or I could choose another dog. I decided to wait and hope for the best. I called the next day and got the good news - for me at least: the teenagers' parents said no and the red ball of fur was mine. By the time I got down to AWL that evening after work, I was told another family had been waiting just in case I hadn't shown up and they were going to take the red ball of fur home. I remember thinking at the time that maybe, since it was obvious that the red ball of fur was not going to have trouble finding a home, I should let the family have her and I could choose another dog. Today, I cannot imagine what my life would have been like without my red ball of fur. At my mother's suggestion, the red ball of fur was named Madison, after my hometown in Indiana (which, by the way, is a great place for a small town getaway, especially for fans of 19th-century American history). She was approximately six months old when I adopted her but I brought her home on the same day as my grandmother's birthday, July 16, and we always celebrated that day as Madison's birthday too. Madison would eventually grow to be nearly 70 pounds. Children loved her (some said she looked like a big teddy bear) but their parents were sometimes intimidated by her size. She was a gentle soul, however, and loved to lick the faces of small children. For older children, she was always willing to stop for a quick pet. Madison was also very much a lady. She hated to get dirty and would go to great lengths to avoid stepping in water puddles or walking through mud. In fact, the first time I took her to the neighborhood little league field that doubled as an unofficial dog park, she got some mud on her paw and, much to everybody's amazement, proceeded to wash it off at the water fountain by sticking her paw under the water stream. Of course, her insistence on lady-like behavior could be frustrating at times, especially during Chicago's notorious winters. She was very particular about where she went to the bathroom and refused to go anywhere where it was wet. Dry spots are hard to find in the middle of a Chicago winter so we would go on long walks in the freezing cold looking for a bridge overpass or a large bush she could crawl in under. Madison was very smart and had a great memory. She knew where every dog in a three-block radius lived and she would get excited and start pulling you a good 1/2 block before you got to their house. She always seemed so disappointed when they weren't home to bark and/or paw at the windows when we passed by. I remember there was one building around the corner from us that had some dogs living on the third floor. They would always bark at us. They must have moved out because the barking stopped but for months afterwards Madison would always stop and stare up at their window, waiting for them to greet her. I guess eventually she figured out what had happened. I guess this would be the place to bring up the infamous "Bravo" incident that resulted in Madison going for aggressive dog training but I don't think we need to go into great detail. Suffice to say, Madison was a good judge of character and so clearly Bravo must have been a very bad dog. After two years, she got a brother, Java. She was a great big sister, very protective of her brother, but always made sure he knew who was in charge. Here is a picture of the three of us together. ( Java, it turns out, is not a big fan of noise, making my San Diego residence near both the airport and Sea World's nightly fireworks display a less-than-ideal location, and currently lives with his grandmother in Indiana where he is Chief of Security in charge of her personal protection.)

In 2002 I accepted a voluntary lay-off from a dot-com and decided to take an opportunity to travel and do some volunteer work. I went to Barcelona for six weeks, traveled throughout Ecuador and Peru for four months, and then spent two weeks volunteering for General Wesley Clark's presidential campaign in New Hampshire. When I was in Ecuador and Peru, I lost a lot of weight and developed a deep tan. When I walked into my Chicago apartment for the first time, Java treated me like an intruder and Madison approached me very cautiously. However, as soon as I opened my mouth and they recognized my voice, I was given the returning hero's welcome. In 2004, my next career opportunity took me to San Diego. Given how much she despises the rain, it's hard to imagine a better location for Madison to live. She adapted very well. Although she never did become a big fan of the beach, she did at least become comfortable enough around the ocean to wade out into it. Still, she always seemed to prefer looking at the water to actually being in it.

I think the only thing that Madison didn't enjoy about San Diego was Jack In the Box. It didn't have anything to do with their food. It was the antenna balls they give away and that adorn car antennas throughout So Cal. After we moved to San Diego, Madison developed the weirdest obsession with car antenna decorations (balls, flags, ribbons -- anything tied to or placed on a car antenna). She would go absolutely nuts whenever she spotted one -- and she was very, very good at spotting them. It would sometimes take me a full minute or two to see what she was seeing but when she sounded the alarm I always knew there had to be one somewhere because she was never wrong. Over the last 18 months that I have been working from home, Madison went with me almost everywhere. I always dreaded getting stuck at a red light with an antenna ball within sight. We used to get some very strange and perplexed looks from people trying to figure out why my dog was barking like crazy at them. I wish dogs could speak so that she could have explained to me what drove her obsession with antenna balls. Most people assume she liked to chase balls and that's what got her so excited but she showed no interest whatsoever in any balls except those adorning car antennas. I don't won't to dwell too much on the end of the story. You already know the ultimate outcome. But here's a quick summary. A little over a year ago Madison started to lose her fur. The vet thought it was due to allergies. It seemed like a strange diagnosis to me because she was 10 years old and had never had allergies before. They said it was likely that as she was getting older her body was losing its ability to fight off the allergens. Made sense since my brother's dog, Liberty, developed allergic reactions at age seven. Plus, San Diego County is one of the worst places for allergens in the entire country. Things didn't improve and she developed several new symptoms (frequent diarrhea, bloody stool, etc) but everything, I was told, could be the result of allergic reactions. Eventually we did a full allergy panel test and discovered she was allergic to a number of different foods (chicken, rice, etc) and environmental factors (dust mites, pollen, etc) and started her on allergy shots. She showed no signs of improvement but the vet told me to give it more time. But I grew increasingly concerned about her condition. Deep down, I knew something more serious was going on with my red ball of fur. A father can sense these things. I called the vet and scheduled an appointment for later in the week. The morning of the appointment she wouldn't take her pill - as always, wrapped in a dollop of peanut butter. Turning down peanut butter? Very unlike Madison. This was confirmation something else was going on. I took her to the vet. He said there was a hard growth pushing out her liver 1 1/2 inches. We scheduled an ultrasound for the next day. He didn't raise false hope. We both knew it was going to be bad news. The ultrasound showed a tumor that had already taken over most of her liver, gall bladder and part of her spleen. The doctor who did the ultrasound said she couldn't believe Madison wasn't more debilitated considering the size of the tumor. I was told there was nothing medically we could do for her. At this point, my only concern was about Madison's well being and comfort. The doctors said they didn't know how long she had but it probably wasn't long. I was determined to be strong and make the right decision. I was going to have to say goodbye to my best friend. But first there were some other people back in Indiana that needed to say goodbye. I decided to drive her back to Indiana so my mom, brothers and Java could say goodbye. I was never comfortable with the idea of putting my dogs in the cargo hold of an airplane and she had made the 2,200-mile trip from Indiana to San Diego car trip three times before (moving to San Diego and a round-trip visit in 2008 -- this was the trip upon which Java stayed in Indiana). The three days in the car, while exhausting, were also therapeutic. This was all happening very quickly and I needed some time to come to grips with it. Plus, it afforded plenty of petting opportunities. We arrived in Indiana a week ago and everybody got to spend some quality time with Madison before we had to say goodbye late this afternoon. It was a very, very sad day. It was especially hard because she looked relatively healthy on the outside but I knew she was being torn apart on the inside -- as evidenced by her lack of eating and heavy breathing. In the end, she was surrounded by love (my mom, two brothers and I) and we all got to hold her and comfort her as she drifted off into that final permanent nap of eternal peace. Thank you for reading. It was very helpful to put all this down in writing.