We had a little picnic at the Matson Line loading docks after droping off the car, then off to the airport.

Our flight was delayed and Heather’s frequent inquiries regarding pet status prompted airline employees to bring Shadow up to the gate. When it was time to go back Shadow was yelping and whimpering as she was lead away which really made it worse for Heather. Needless to say the flight to Honolulu was a stressful one and this was only the beginning of the ordeal. Two days hold in Honolulu to process and she wouldn’t poop the entire time. They expected her to go in the kennel run which had a concrete floor and Shadow was too well trained to do it. Heather and I bought a patch of sod grass from a local hardware store but it wouldn’t do. Our vet on Maui got the worst of it, he was required to pick her up at the airport and she evacuated on the inter island flight. I guess the flight literally scared the crap out of her. We vowed then and there that Shadow would live out her life on Maui. We wouldn’t put her through that again.

              We had done the necessary work for shortening the quarantine period from three months and had gained permission to board her on Maui but there were still 27 days of it to be done at Kahului Animal Hospital. We saw her every weekend and more. The payoff finally came when we brought her home to the condo in Kihei and took her for the first walk to the beach from her new home. We lived just 2 blocks from the beach that first year and made the walk almost every night after work. We felt we owed it to Shadow and it was good for us as well. This stretch of beach was home to sand pipers and Shadow loved to chase them. She would run as close to the waves as possible and sometimes run through a little water. One such occasion, when the ocean was very still, the sand pipers took a sharp turn to sea so Shadow ran into the ocean after them and her forward speed carried her out so that her feet didn’t touch bottom. That day she learned to swim and she hated it. Her face was just above water and her eyes were bulging so it looked as if they could buoy her up. We were never too tired to walk that beach. I’ve missed those days since moving to Wailuku.

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