Gizmo

Name: Gizmo

Date of Passing: 04/01/2023

Message to Gizmo: Gizzy, we miss you every day. You were so loved, even when you were being a little pain in the butt. Saying goodbye to you was one of the hardest things we've ever had to do, but we will treasure those last few days we got to spend showering you with love, time outside with the wind in your hair, and absolutely anything you were willing to eat. Rest easy, little friend.

Tell us about Gizmo: I (Gizmo's mom) got him when he was a puppy and I was 25, single, and living in the city. Housebreaking a puppy by myself from the 21st floor of a high rise was a challenge, and there were many elevator clean-ups and scary 3 am potty breaks before we finally got the hang of it. He also graduated from puppy school and was the best little fluffy companion, often sleeping on my head and cuddling in my lap. One year later, Gizmo's human dad came into my life, and Giz decided to unlearn all of his training in protest. Eventually we got him back under control and they forged a reluctant relationship, with his dad learning to appreciate his quirks like his "frustrated dance" and his inability to figure out how to push open doors that weren't cracked wide enough for him to squeeze through. Gizmo was an integral part of the family through it all - our years of dating, marriage, moving to the suburbs, and having our first child. His life changed quite a bit when his human sister came along, and he initially seemed to fear that he was being replaced. Eventually, Gizmo realized that he was going to get to stick around, and he became protective of his sister, often barking at us to help her as soon as she would start crying and wanting to rush to her room first thing in the morning. Even though he didn't really play with his own toys anymore by then, he liked to crawl through her tunnels and into her ball pit or try to get in on the fun when we would play with her parachute! We had lots of nicknames for Gizmo, and for a little while our daughter thought his name was either "Dude" or "Dimmo." As he became less mobile in his later years, he relied on us to carry him around the house as we moved from floor to floor and room to room, always wanting to be a part of whatever the family was doing. He was just a month shy of his 16th birthday, and even 15+ years wasn't enough time with our feisty, sometimes sweet/sometimes grumpy, always funny old man.