Those of you who have been reading Thoughtprints for a long time know very well how much I love my dogs. I’ve never made a secret out of how much I value the friendship of a dog. In my opinion, dogs can make better friends than a lot of people I know. They love unconditionally, are loyal to a fault, and are completely and wholly devoted to the humans who love them. The following is a story of such devotion.

Gary Lorenz was a 1967 graduate of the Air Force Academy here in Colorado, and was a skilled F-4 pilot. He had flown missions over Vietnam, and then returned to the Academy in later years to be a squadron commander. Over the following years he had been promoted to colonel and had served as the vice-commandant of cadets. Then the most cruel of diseases struck: Alzheimer’s.

On September 24th, Gary went missing. No one had seen him wander away from his home, but they knew he wasn’t alone. His two Golden Retrievers, Merry and Pippin, were with him. The search for Gary started only a few hours later in the hills north of Cotopaxi after he disappeared that day, but days and weeks of searching had turned up nothing.

Gary’s daughter, Deanna, was sitting in her Dad’s livingroom when, on October 20th, the neighbors knocked on the door. They were there to tell her a hunter had found her father’s body. But that wasn’t all they had found. “And the dogs” they said, “the dogs are alive”.

Eventually, the news from the coroner arrived; the news about the time and date of Gary Lorenz’s death. That’s when they put it all together. The dogs were with Gary when he died. And they had stayed with him for another three weeks, guarding his body from who knows what. They had never left his side.

When the hunter came upon Gary’s body back in October, it was Pippin who was the most protective. “Pippin was right by dad and wouldn’t allow anyone close to him,” said Deanna. These days Pippin appears to be the most changed by the entire experience. He used to be a little aloof, says Deanna, now he’s more stoic, more disciplined.

Sandee Lorenz, Gary’s widow, calls the two dogs her “angels”.

“I truly believe that had the hunter not found them, the dogs would have stayed (with Gary) until they had taken their last breath,” she said.

So that, my friends, is the devotion of a dog. So much more than just an animal. The next time you hear that a dog is “man’s best friend”, remember Gary and his service to this country, and his two best friends and their service to the human they loved most.

Dogs. Man’s best friend, indeed.

Gary Lorenz, Dogs, Man’s Best Friend, Golden Retrievers