Old Friends Senior Dogs: Toby

At almost 11 years old, and 120 pounds, Toby came to us in early 2011 when we got an urgent email from a neighbor concerned about a large golden who was wandering the neighborhood after his owner was put in a nursing home. Toby was crossing a busy road to visit with friends on the other side and would be completely homeless in a day or two when his owner's caretakers were going to move out.
Although the plea came to the Middle Tennessee Golden Retriever Rescue email, no surrender form was forthcoming because the owner in the nursing home had to be contacted. He was not aware that he would probably never leave the nursing home and was not anxious to surrender his dog. We agreed to take Toby in right away, to keep him safe until we could get a surrender form and put him in the MTGRR program.
Toby came in like a hurricane, he barked at everything, growled randomly, humped the furniture, ate holes in the linens and was a general pain in the neck. He got along well with everyone, but we couldn't wait until we could move him along and on his way.
Then, on about the second week, Toby caught wind of the fact that he was going to be moving on as soon as his paperwork came through. Overnight, Toby figured out the rules and became a civilized Golden Retriever. A few days later when his surrender form came in, we agreed to keep Toby until he found his forever family.
After we got the surrender form, we took Toby to visit Les, his former owner in the nursing home. Toby was a complete gentleman when we visited. Les was in very bad health and was relieved to see that Toby was being cared for, was happy and doing well. Les asked us to please keep Toby with us and, happily and with no regrets, we will keep that promise we made to him. Toby became a permanent part of our family. Les passed away about a month after we adopted Toby.
He may be twelve, but he acts like he is half that. Gracie teases him relentlessly, which he loves. She will walk by him with a toy and bat her eyes and he's off after her. He'll follow and make grabs for the toy and finally, in the end she'll give it up. For some reason, Toby is obsessed with paper and envelopes. We have to be careful to keep the mail away from him. He thinks it's all his. He has a way of talking we call his a-grrs. It may sound like growling to the casual observer, but it's his way of communication, no aggression there.
Last time we weighed, Toby was at a svelte 104 pounds. Dr. B said that he should be around 100 so we think that he's doing pretty good. He's on the Gracie exercise plan, so we know that he'll stay fit.
Toby answers to "Big Guy" as well as he answers to his name. He's a needful guy, loves his cuddling and is always right there beside us if he's not after Gracie. He is happy and comical and we are so happy that he stayed here. We have brought Toby to several MTGRR events to show people just how friendly and energetic a senior golden can be.