Column: Goodbye to Canelo, my family’s chocolate Labrador. He was love

One summer day in 2011, my dad showed up to our family home in Anaheim with the most gorgeous chocolate Labrador retriever you could ever imagine.

He was about 5 months old but already huge — only his face gave any indication he was still a puppy. His ears were as soft as leather. His coat was a beautiful brown. His eyes shone.

My mom took one look at him and declared, “Tienes ojos de canela.” You have eyes like cinnamon. So she named him Canelo.

He was a wreck.

A man from my dad’s Alcoholics Anonymous chapter found Canelo on the side of the 5 Freeway, near the Calzona Street exit in Boyle Heights. He was skinny, skittish and had scars — the vet speculated he was a bait dog who had escaped. Whatever his origins, Canelo’s traumas affected him for years.

His anxiety laid waste to indoor moldings, which he gnawed on like bubble gum. Every Fourth of July, he howled in terror and rampaged through our house no matter how many different sedatives my siblings gave him. One year, he hopped over our 6-foot fence and was lost for a couple of days. When he finally returned, his paws were so bloodied and bruised from the fence climbing that he wore medical socks for weeks.

We loved him unconditionally.

Canelo had a sweet disposition, unless you were a cat or a small dog. We called him Canelito (Little Canelo), and I’d always refer to him as a travieso Pokémon — a mischievous Pokémon.

When I visited my parents’ house, Canelo’s barking began the moment he heard my car engine. Our ritual was always the same. I sang nonsense songs that bugged everyone else while he ran around my parents’ front yard. We played a game of fetch with a chewed-up bean bag. He always turned his head when he walked back to me, forcing me to wrestle the toy from his mouth. I tossed him some strands of cheese every time I made quesadillas, which was every time I visited.

We didn’t grow up with dogs, so Canelo taught all of us patience and kindness. He rewarded us with devotion that only grew once my mom was diagnosed with ovarian cancer in late 2017.

I still have the video my sister took of the last time Mami came home. A visibly worried Canelo ran into our living room and sat attentively. “¡Canelito!” Mami exclaimed. She asked him to stand up and greet her. He silently put his paws on her chest, his tail happily wagging.

He provided solace to her through unbearable pain. But his sad barks didn’t allow her to rest.

We tried to place him with family members for her final weeks. He wouldn’t have it. He broke down the garage door of one cousin’s home in Garden Grove and caused such a ruckus at another cousin’s ranch in Mira Loma that my dad couldn’t even drive away. He wanted to be with us in our time of need.

The day Mami died at home in spring 2019, Canelo ran around and cried into the early morning as dozens of family members arrived to pay their respects. When the medics rolled out her body on a gurney, Canelo froze in attention, as if the finality of her death finally hit him.

He was depressed for days. Only the love of my younger cousins who came for the nine days of rosaries we held in our front yard brought him back to his old self. He helped our mourning, a reminder of what unconditional love can do.

Canelo after a rosary in Anaheim in 2019, surrounded by the younger cousins of columnist Gustavo Arellano.

(Arellano family)

As he got older, Canelo became less anxious. He calmed down enough so that we could take him to a dog hotel for the days around the Fourth of July. My dad began to take him to dog parks, which he loved. My dad and siblings would turn on the radio to KFWB-AM (980) La Mera Mera, the Mexican ranchera station that my mom listened to religiously, whenever they left the house, to remind him of her.

I took over walking duties once Canelo proved too strong for my dad. Whenever Dad visited Mexico, I tried to work from our family home during the day so Canelo wouldn’t be alone. This summer, the two of us swam almost daily.

About a month and a half ago, I noticed Canelo was straining more than he should when he tried to relieve himself. I figured his diet needed to change, but then I realized there was a growth protruding from his behind.

It was cancer. It was inoperable.

His spirit remained strong, but Canelo began to rapidly lose weight. Flecks of dandruff appeared in his magnificent coat. He pooped all the time, inside and outside, even though he was potty trained. I prayed he would get better, or at least not deteriorate any further until my dad could see him one last time.

This Monday, my brother texted my sisters and me that it was time to say goodbye to Canelo. I volunteered to put him down and said we should do it at home.

When I called my father to let him know, Papi at first accepted it stoically. “You don’t want to like dogs,” he said, “but you end up loving them like your own children.”

He then wept.

Canelo with his favorite chew toy, a week before he died.

(Gustavo Arellano / Los Angeles Times)

Canelo was petrified of vet offices, because he had always been so healthy that visits were few and far between. At home, he would leave us in the place that brought him peace.

I made sure my last day with Canelo was like any other. We played. I gave him an extra helping of cheese while I made my quesadilla, then made another quesadilla just so he could get even more cheese. I let him lick my face nonstop. The only time he would leave my side was to go outside, to try to go to the bathroom.

My brother and sister had said their goodbyes that morning. The veterinarian came around 3 in the afternoon. Canelo happily greeted her, and she remarked how beautiful he was — and how loving we were for not letting him suffer any further.

She injected Canelo with a sedative to calm him before administering the euthanasia. As he lay in his bed in the living room, I held his head and told Canelo through tears in English and in Spanish that he was a good boy. He looked at me with his big cinnamon eyes and put his paw on my chest. Then he began to snore until he didn’t snore anymore.

Canelo died steps away from where my mom drew her last breaths, in front of a large photo of her in her early 20s, radiant and smiling. I helped the vet carry his body into a waiting van and tucked his chew toy between his paws.

Then I texted my siblings that our sweet, sweet Canelo had joined our Mami in the great beyond.