Mojo Breaks on Through to the Other Side

Mojo, our beloved German Shepherd-Rottweiler-Malamute-wolf mix, came to us in February of 1994. We had gone to New Mexico to escape the relentless aftershocks of the L.A. earthquake, and ended up snowed in in Albuquerque. Looking through the pet section of a local paper, we saw an ad for wolf hybrids. Out of curiosity and a lack of anything more exciting to do, we went to see the pups. They were very low wolf content, and extremely adorable. The breeders had named each little black and tan fuzzball in the litter after a character in the Addams Family.

We’d been searching for a companion for Soko, our 11-month-old German Shepherd, for some time, and decided to adopt one of the pups. After long consideration, we chose a pup, did the paperwork, got in the car, and drove way. Chatting as we drove, we soon realized that neither of us could get that other feisty puppy named Fester (yes, Fester!) out of our minds. We turned around, went back and exchanged pups, and the rest is history.

We promptly renamed the wildly affectionate pup Mojo (Doors fans will recognized the Mr. Mojo Risin’ reference). At only 8 weeks old he weighed in at 16 pounds. The standard small crate we’d purchased to ship him home in left him scrunched in with tufts of hair sticking out wildly in all directions, and we had to swap at the airport for a medium sized carrier. He was a little tank puppy!

On his first day home he immediately began teasing Soko, who was four times his size but very submissive. Soko’s favorite thing in life was to chase a tennis ball, and as Mojo grew, whenever Soko chased the ball, he would chase her, grab her by the collar, and try to drag her down! (I eventually taught him that my throwing the ball was his cue to come to me instead.)

Mojo lived in three different houses with us as we moved further out of the city of Los Angeles, lastly in this desert home we purchased ten years ago. Through every one of the seven books I’ve written in the last ten years, Mojo was laying faithfully by my side. Each day when I had my morning cereal, he got half my banana, which he was crazy about. In the afternoons when I’d take a break he would lay nearby on his dog bed, periodically giving me the “Mom, look at these big brown eyes. You know you want to come cuddle me” look. And I would. He loved to go to the beach with my husband and me, and although Soko loved the water, Mojo never liked to get his paws wet. Funny for a 120-pound dog who some people found frightening-looking! He also hated the heat, a trait we shared and which made us both grateful for air conditioning in the 100-plus degree summer days.

Although it’s impossible to be objective, Mojo was actually quite beautiful. He was taller and longer in the body than most dogs, and slightly wolfy looking with mostly black fur, and amber eyes. (His “publicity photo” with me makes him look goofy and doesn’t do him justice!) People would constantly cross the street to come and ask questions about him and pet him wherever we went. Those of our friends who came to know him absolutely adored him. He had a certain kind of canine charisma that few dogs I’ve ever seen have – he was a rock star. He had fans!

Mojo lived life full throttle. When he got excited, he got REALLY excited, racing around like a force of nature. At one of our old houses, we had a dog door that was built into a glass panel that inserts next to a sliding glass door. One day I looked over and Mojo was out running around the yard with the dog door wedged around him, the entire glass panel still attached! And once as a young pup he found his way into a bag of Innova and started to eat his way down. Have I mentioned the appetite? He ate faster than any puppy we’d ever seen, and didn’t discriminate. He’d eat pretty much anything, and we used to laugh about how he’d “wolf” down his food. He particularly loved his stuffed Kongs (with banana as one ingredient, of course), marrow bones, and in later years, Frosty Paws doggy ice cream treats.

Mojo earned the nickname The Mighty Mojo Man, as he was not only physically strong with a bigger-than-life personality, but survived three surgeries; one for severe hip dysplasia at six months, another for a torn cruciate ligament at the age of 10 years, and one for emergency bloat surgery at 14. (I truly believe that a combination of good genetics and nutrition, hands-on energy healing, and weekly hydrotherapy helped to keep him in as good shape as he was. Oh yes, and lots of love and tummy rubs.)

Even with the degenerative myelopathy that made getting around progressively more difficult, Mojo had a lust for life. His eyes sparkled and his whole body wagged whenever me or my husband would come home. He’d relax and sigh deeply when he was petted or massaged, especially when I did hands-on healing work on him or laid next to him on his dog bed and cuddled him, or when my husband would do that special knuckle-in-the-ear thing that drove him crazy. As I said, Mojo lived full throttle--that’s the best way to describe him.

Mojo would have had his 15th birthday on December 18th. But his health had been degenerating and when he stopped eating yesterday, we knew it was time. We took turns at home holding him, petting him, and saying all that we wanted to tell him. At the vet’s office, we held him together. I gently cupped the sides of his face and looked lovingly into his eyes as he passed, and told him I’d see him on the other side. And I know I will. There is nothing we didn’t do for Mojo over the last 15 years, and we were so blessed to have shared our lives with him. He was our child, our best friend, and our soul dog. Surely he knows how much he was loved, and that’s all any of us can hope for in the end.