In Memory of Elmo Jo DeChantal
September 18 1997 – October 25 2011
Elmo came into our life in late 1997. My son Justin and I went and picked him out at a kennel. He was nothing but a 6 week old fur ball with eyes. He was born with a hernia, had a scratch through one eye and a heart murmur…. he was perfect!
I tucked him inside my coat and we brought him home to surprise the family. We all loved Elmo from day one… he was just what our family needed.
In 1999, while talking to the boys at the dinner table one January evening, we discovered
that Elmo had got off the leash while outside and he was gone. I followed his tracks in the snow down our driveway where I could see he had been in the ditch and then I seen where a car had pulled over and picked him up. I was devastated and unable to go to work the next two days. The boys and I made signs and hung them up from the bar down the road all the way to every business all the way to the Casino which is about 40 miles away. Four days later my husband took a phone call while I was at work from a bartender down the road. He said a woman had stopped in earlier in the week and said she had just picked up a dog on the highway and she was going to take him to her daughter who worked at the casino. Later that same night a second phone call came in from a
girl who worked at the casino but claimed she found him wandering the streets around the casino. She had taken him in, fed him from the buffet at the casino and took him home to Peirz Minnesota (about 40 miles away in a different direction). Al loaded up the boys and went and paid the reward we had offered to get Elmo back. What a miracle!
In 2000 while I was at work the boys were home from school one June and left the door to the deck open. Sure enough, I get home from work and Elmo is gone! I jump in my car driving up and down the roads near us, not knowing how long he had been gone or what direction he had went. I spoke to my aunt who lives down the road and an hour later she called me – he had been found down the road on the other side of the
busy highway about 4 houses down.. they were bringing him back to me now. Again, we got lucky.
In 2009, I was cleaning the house one weekend and Elmo must have followed me outside when I took the garbage out. Soon after my neighbor is knocking at my back deck door trying to be heard over my vacuuming, she had Elmo in her arms and said he had just been hit by a car. I rushed him to the vet as he was bleeding from the mouth and after being checked over he was discovered to have…. road rash. That’s it. This 10 pound dog survived being hit by a car!
I share these stories with you because Elmo truly was a miracle in our lives. We all loved him and he was truly the best dog I have ever – or will ever have. Letting him go this afternoon was one of the hardest things I have ever had to do and I am a wreck.
Our boys are now 21 and 23… that shows you how long Elmo has been with us.
He completed our family. He was my constant reading companion. I will miss him forever.
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