Chapter 161: Guardians in Fur — The Stories of Iris and Ginger
Iris
I’ve always had a profound affinity for dogs. Growing up, they were woven into the rhythm of family life, with our parents ensuring these loyal companions were always well-cared for. Yet, as I transitioned into adulthood, life’s demands and distractions prevented me from bringing a dog into my own home. That changed in 2001, when a remarkable being named Iris entered my life and forever altered its course.
Iris wasn’t just any dog. She was an ethereal presence, a luminous white German Shepherd who emerged, almost mythologically, from the Clackamas Wilderness. Discovered by my sister and a Forest Ranger, she and her mother had been wandering the rugged terrain, survivors in every sense of the word. While her mother eluded capture, Iris chose a different path. At ten months old, she approached the humans who found her with a blend of curiosity and trust, as if guided by some higher wisdom that knew her destiny was entwined with ours.
When my sister brought Iris to visit us, I was hesitant. My wife Sharon and I both had full-time careers that left little room for the responsibilities a dog demands. But Iris had other plans. From the very first visit, she moved through our home not as a guest but as though she had finally arrived where she was meant to be. Her calm, knowing demeanor tugged fiercely at my heart. She belonged with us—I felt it deeply. That night, when she left with my sister, I couldn’t get her out of my mind. The sense of connection was immediate and profound.
Naming her “Iris” felt like destiny, both for her striking beauty and for a shared love that Sharon and I had for the flower of the same name. The name carried weight, symbolic of hope and renewal, emotions that would come to define our relationship with her.
From the moment she joined our family, Iris proved she was no ordinary companion. A superb athlete, she moved with unparalleled grace, her agility a testament to her time surviving in the wild. On one memorable day, she leapt nearly seven feet into a tree to chase a squirrel, her survival instincts honed to perfection during her formative time in the wilderness. But her physical prowess was equaled only by her gentle, sensitive spirit. Whether bounding ahead on a trail or curling up by our feet at home, she existed as both protector and nurturer.
Our adventures together remain some of the most cherished memories of my life. Iris accompanied me on many of my local runs through the countryside, delighting in running beside me before sprinting far ahead to wait for her slower friend to catch up. She was an adventurer at heart, joining Sharon and me on hikes through the Oregon Coast, Mt. Hood National Forest, the Columbia River Gorge, Eastern Oregon’s deserts, and even the towering California Redwoods. There was a quiet magic in the way she led our hikes, scouting ahead and returning to ensure our safety. Her innate protectiveness revealed itself most poignantly during these wilderness journeys—she seemed to understand the balance between nature’s beauty and its dangers, once even steering Sharon away from a precarious area she hadn’t noticed. Iris was far more than a companion; she was a guardian, steadfast and intuitive.
Her loyalty wasn’t limited to outdoor excursions. At home, she nestled into our lives, providing comfort and joy. She had an impeccable ability to read human emotion, responding with an almost miraculous sensitivity. She slept serenely beside our bed, always present, always offering the kind of companionship only a dog like Iris could provide. She welcomed strangers, befriended other animals, and watched over our grandsons as though they were her own pack.
Iris also carried a mysterious, almost otherworldly quality. This was never clearer than the day she saved my life. Fallen trees had threatened to collapse our roof, and Iris and I walked into the compromised house while arborists worked overhead on manlifts, attempting to lift two cottonwood trees clear. One of the men accidentally dropped a six-foot section of a thirty-inch-diameter trunk. As I stood in front of Iris, she barked frantically, signaling me to step back to where she stood—just moments before that massive section of tree came crashing down exactly where I had been standing. Her timing, her instinct, was nothing short of miraculous. In forty-two years of work, that arborist had never lost a load before. I would have been crushed.
We lost Iris in December 2007. She passed unexpectedly beside our bed in the early morning hours, with Sharon and me at her side. The cry that marked her departure is forever etched in my soul—a sound that held the full weight of goodbye. I held her as she took her final breath, heartbroken, yet grateful we were there for her, just as she had so often been there for us.
Her departure left a void that felt immense and unbearable, and for a long time I carried a crushing guilt, blaming my recent struggles with addiction and human frailty for her passing. It took time, healing, and reflection to see the truth: that Iris, in her infinite love and grace, had given us gifts that far outweighed the sorrow of losing her.
Even in her absence, she continued to touch our lives. Exactly one year to the moment of her death, Rocky—my father’s dog and Iris’s dear friend—howled mournfully in the night. It was the only time he ever howled while my father slept. A quiet reminder that love and connection extend far beyond physical presence.
Iris was an angel in every sense of the word. She brought order to chaos, light to our darkest moments, and an unshakable reminder of what unconditional love truly means. To this day I carry her spirit with me, a living signal of what love and life can offer when we’re paying attention.
Ginger
Ginger came into our lives two years after Iris’s death, a dog whose path to us was markedly different from Iris’s, yet whose impact on our family ran just as deep.
Her first home, though well-intentioned, couldn’t give her the nutrition and care she needed to thrive. Poor nutrition left her weak, and illness settled into her early life like an unwelcome shadow. By the time her health had deteriorated enough to raise concern, she was surrendered to a shelter, one more hopeful soul waiting among many for a second chance.
Sharon and I found her there. The first thing we did was take her for a walk, and when she broke into a run, we both joined her instinctively—neither of us able to resist her energy. We were told she had experienced some kidney issues as a puppy, but that she’d likely outgrow them. It didn’t matter. Something about her presence told us she was already ours.
The timing of her arrival mattered. I was carrying grief that had settled into me like a second skin—loss that showed up in my movements, my voice, the long pauses when my mind would drift to memories I couldn’t quite release. Ginger seemed to sense this. In the simplest acts—a nudge when silence grew too heavy, a romp through the wilderness that pulled me out of my own head, the steady rhythm of our daily walks—she became part of how I found my footing again. My father, Beryl, who had recently lost his wife (my mother) unexpectedly, gave Ginger extra attention during his visits, and she returned it in kind, as though she understood exactly what was needed of her.
Sharon was woven into this healing too. Her laughter, her tenderness toward Ginger, filled the spaces between our harder days. Between the three of us, something like a sanctuary took shape.
As the years passed, Ginger’s boundless energy slowly gave way to the wear that time leaves on every living thing. Her steps grew slower, though her spirit never dimmed. I watched her health decline even as I balanced the responsibility of caring for my own aging father, and in the middle of all of it, I made sure there was always time to sit with her, to really see her. A hike we took in training for our Andes 25 miles trail experience in 2014 where we hiked from Larch Mountain to Multnomah Falls showed her limitations, and were it not for the creeks that ran alongside several of the trails, Ginger may have died from heat exhaustion due to the failure of her kidneys.
When her condition worsened, our devotion to her only deepened—visits to a kind veterinarian, injections of water under her skin to help with fluids and ease her discomfort, the quiet work of keeping her comfortable as her body failed her. We loved her the way people love a creature they know they’re going to lose: fully, and with an ache that starts before the goodbye ever arrives.
On her final night, she lay beside our creek, just watching the water pass her by. We watched her for awhile, knowing that this was probably her last day. It started becoming dark, and Sharon and I walked up to our home, and left the deck door open, in case she somehow made it back to the house. She was so weak, we assumed she would just die by the creek. We went to bed, not knowing when Ginger would pass away. When we awoke, Ginger was laying beside us, having passed away in the night, in the exact same spot where Iris had once lain in her final hours.
A Shared Thread
Iris and Ginger arrived in different ways, carried different histories, and left at different times. But both found their way to us, did the quiet work of healing what needed healing, and left behind a kind of evidence that love doesn’t require explanation to be real. Their absence still visits in small, ordinary moments—a trail we once walked together, a dog passing by with the same colors, gait or profile, the particular quality of light on a late afternoon.
They’re gone in the way that bodies are gone.
What they gave us is not.
