We chose his name as something of a joke.

Before we’d met Walter, before he was even born, my wife Lauren and I were figuring out a name for the bulldog we someday wanted to get. Bulldogs are kind of like babies with wrinkled faces, and “Walter” struck us as a perfect old-man-type name. (Apologies to all the young Walters out there.)

I’d wanted an English bulldog, and Lauren favored a Frenchie. We ended up finding one that was a perfect 50/50 mix, otherwise known as a freelance bulldog: the ears of the French, and the girth, protruding underbite and tough stubbornness of the English.

In other words, Walter was perfect. Being born in May 2013, nine months after Lauren and I got married, we called Walter our honeymoon baby. And since we were a few years away from having a human child, Walter was in all respects our son — our first teacher in the ways of parenthood.

We had to put Walter down June 20. He’d been diagnosed with cancer and partial heart failure last August and given a matter of weeks to live, but with the help of medication and that aforementioned stubbornness, Walter defied his prognosis as long as he could.

The decision to end his life was the hardest I’ve ever had to face. Who were we to play God? Our respective parents had made the tough call about pets when Lauren and I were kids, but now it was upon us as Walter’s parents to decide when his quality of life had eroded to the point where putting him down was the best thing we could do.

Walter wasn’t a large dog, but he was dense. His 55-pound frame was covered in fleece-like fur, wrapped around a musclebound body that housed a rock-like skeleton.

He was like a concrete block with four legs. He had a bowling ball butt that he rested on people he liked, which was pretty much everyone. His rugged torso rumbled like a bass drum when you patted it.

Dad loved the sound of that drum. He loved how, when he got up in the morning, Walter would grab a toy and bring it to him.

I never saw Dad smile so big as when he first met Walter.

Walter was there the night Dad died, also of cancer. Their ashes now sit next to each other.

Our daughter Alaina, almost 6, was born nearly a year to the day after Dad died. I regret that Dad never got to meet her, but I’m happy that thanks to Walter, Dad got to be a grandfather.

A ROSE BY ANY OTHER NAME

Walter Wrinkleton Lear had many nicknames: Bubs, Bubby, Puppy Face, Mr. Wrinkles, Walter Pants, Chub Town, Charlie Chubbington … the list goes on.

I’d often call him Sweet Bear, too, particularly when saying goodnight to him, and kissing the arrow-shaped wrinkle on his forehead.

“Goodnight, Sweet Bear” … a nod to Shakespeare’s “goodnight, sweet prince.”

He was always my little baby boy. I would carry him up the stairs to bed in the beginning, when he was too small to climb them. And I carried him in the end, when he was too old and sore to do so himself.

Walter nearly died as a puppy from parvovirus, which a vet told me kills 60% of canines who contract it, regardless of treatment. But as always, Bubs defied the odds.

One night, soon after we’d first brought Walter home, I was bemoaning the mounting medical costs. Walter, sensing my consternation, came over on the bed and planted his back against mine, like he was apologizing and didn’t want to be a burden. I now regret worrying about those costs, and making Walter feel that way.

Moreover, I truly fell in love with him that night. He’d demonstrated an empathy I’d rarely seen in dogs.

Many folks came to love Walter along the way. Like at the “Pat-a-Pet” area during Bath’s annual Kindness Day, where he was the star of the show and rolled on the ground so that people could rub his tummy and wrinkles; I think that was the best day of his life.

Or like my cousin’s wedding, where Walter sauntered to the front of the line in front of the bride and her son as they walked up the aisle.

Walter was my co-pilot, my wingman. He’d stand up on the center console in my Jeep so that he could look around, bracing for the bumps. He loved road trips, even into the vet’s office, where he’d flirt with the staff, who called him “the best boy.”

He bounded off the couch whenever he knew we were going up to my parents’ house on the lake; he enjoyed swimming and looking for frogs, and staring out over the water like a wizened old man.

We used to wrestle a lot, and I’d give him a bunch of kisses as I stayed just out of reach of his formidable (yet gentle) jaws. He’d lay his head on my leg as we watched TV, and somehow all his weight shifted to his skull. I would often sing Walter the handful of tunes I’d come up with for him.

Walter had the run of the backyard … he knew that the trees that marked the property line formed his personal boundary, and that all within was his kingdom. He enjoyed sitting in the grass, watching nature doing what nature does, just as he loved gazing at the lake.

Oftentimes when I’d open the sliding glass door to let Walter out into that backyard, he would stop and turn around, as if seeing if I wanted to come out with him. Sometimes I’d shoo him along, since it was late and I wanted him to do his business before we all went upstairs to bed.

But sometimes I would follow him out there. We’d breathe in the night air and look at the stars, aging guys together.

The night Dad died, I went outside and looked at those same stars, wondering if Dad was now a new light among them. Years later I told Alaina that story.

When we left the vet’s office the day Walter died, Alaina remembered that as she spoke to Mum:

“Now Walter is a star.”

THE NEXT JOURNEY

After Walter died I posted a short tribute to him on Facebook. Hundreds of comments poured in, many from people who’d known him and more from those who’d come to love Walter solely from photos and videos on social media.

One that particularly resonated: “Now cracks a noble heart… And flights of angels sing thee to thy rest.”

Moved by those lines, I looked them up and found them to be from Hamlet. And couched between those two sentences, the line: “Good night, sweet prince.”

Wow. It all comes back around.

We chose his name as something of a joke. And yet it became one of the sweetest names I’ll ever know. When I hear it now I’m reminded of that gentle person who graced nine years of my life.

If humans are said to have souls, one wonders why our beloved pets — who think, feel, emote and remember just as we do — wouldn’t have them, too. I wonder if, in departing, Walter might not have turned around one last time, as he used to on that deck, to see if I’d join him on his next journey.

I pray that someday our paths will cross again. Until then … goodbye, Walter.

Good night, Sweet Bear.

Alex Lear can be reached at alear@sunjournal.com.