Goodbye Sha'ash Ginee

He left us yesterday and took parts of our hearts with him.  He was able to withstand tumors and the horrible medication just so far, and as our friends told us, would tell us when it was time to go.  He told us and we didn't believe, second guessing all the time, but then we had to let him go.
This was a dog that had loyalty down to a fine art, allowing Robert to carry him up the steps and onto the boat when he couldn't do it himself.  He didn't complain of pain, being too busy being the best guard dog and best friend anyone could have.  From the time he lept into my lap as a baby to yesterday, this dog was on point.  He had a way of looking at you with his wolves' eyes, measuring whether or not to take a large bite of your body or allow you in the same room with his owner's. 
As a puppy,  he strutted into our house in Arizona, letting three other dogs know he was there with a huge voice. We didn't realize that his huge ego was going to capture our lives.  He was the boss and yet, he would giggle in submission.  Jake immediately bit him on the nose and then ignored him, and Bailey decided he was going to be his best friend, but Koa had that position, after a long sulk.
The wrestling matches on the lawn were motions of beauty with the two shepherds.
When Koa jumped off the boat at Lake Saguaro,  Sha'ash followed, submerged and rose back up thrashing his puppy legs,  but if Koa could do it, then he could do it.  But the expression on his face was more, "what the hell just happened".  From that day on, he loved the water, didn't really mind waves like wussy Koa and went underwater to collect rocks. Chasing rocks in a river brought him to ecstacy of more, more, more until we had to hold him calmly to rest.  His great heart drove him.
A man at the vet's  office here in PV told us of how his wife would fall apart when one of their farm animals would die.  He brought her around to to another way of thinking in telling her, and us, with the story, that animals were gifts for a short while and we were to live and love them for that time of the gift.  He said he could see us suffering with Sha'ash and later came over to the car to wish us luck.  He was right, as Sha'ash was a givt for the seven plus years we had him and a gift that right now br us heartbreak, but when the grieving ends, a gift that will remind us of the joy he brought us in the past.  He was a giant spirit of a dog and at times a real pain in the butt, but he was our pain in the butt.  And we loved him fiercely.