Foxy dawg update

Most who know me also know about Foxy, the matriarch of my little kennel.

Foxy has quite a history. In her glory days, she led 950 miles of the 2002 Yukon Quest for a musher named Wayne Hall out of Eagle, Alaska.

Foxy is really the kind of dog most people come across once in a lifetime. Super intelligent, loyal and strong, Foxy now spends most of her time cleaning up the food bucket after feeding time or trying to chase cats and other small animals. At nearly fourteen years old, Foxy is fully retired and enjoying her retirement. We named our kennel after her four years ago because, even then, she seemed to feel she "did her time" on the trail and wanted only to lounge lazily on our sofa.

Last January, on the coldest night of the season, Chris let her out to go potty before we went to bed. In a real fluke because Foxy never left our yard without us before this, she broke through our kennel fencing in hot pursuit, we think, of some small critter. Just a quarter mile from our house, at 1 a.m., a vehicle hit her, breaking her pelvis and section of her right hip. We were devastated.

Many, including our vet, suggested putting her down. But we could see the will to live in her eyes, and the strength she possessed.


Foxy during her recovery period

It was a rough month or so. Foxy is no small dog. I spent every day carrying her and all her 62 pounds outside to use the bathroom. I fed her painkillers throughout the day and night, and nursed her back to health with pans of water at her "bedside" and good food for her to lap up.

Amazingly, she pulled through incredibly well! Most cannot even tell she was ever injured.

Today, I recorded a short video of her running! When I take the dogs out for runs, she still gets excited when she sees the harnesses come out. And it makes me so happy to see the happiness in her eyes and her tail wagging for meaty bones - Foxy loves to eat!

Her birthday will be this coming December 28 - what Wayne and Scarlett Hall reported was the coldest day of the year in Eagle at negative 50-something. No wonder Foxy felt spry that night she broke out of the fence here: it was negative 18 that night, and the temperatures were perfectly suited to a retired Quest dog! Click on the video below to see Foxy in action, following me around the backyard today.