Growing up I never remember a time we didn’t have dogs. Even before I was born we had dogs and after I was born and they were dead my sisters and mother and father still talked about our dogs. Greta, was the favorite, that was when they were a family. I was not there yet. I was not really a part of them. Like now. Greta was a doberman pincer, someone once offered my mother 1000 dollars for her she said “not for sale” the next day Greta was hit by a car and killed. that says alot about something but I’m still not sure what. Nana had dogs too , but nana’s dogs had to stay outside. Nana told me once they had a dog named, Butch and she begged papa to bring Butch in one very cold night, he refused, after that nana never wanted another dog. We had a poodle once, a toy poodle we called Coco. Coco had chocolate brown curls. After a while we gave Coco to my mother’s high school friend , Marsha, who was a vet. We also had a gray hound that someone abandoned and brought to us, we had a German shepherd, we called Casey, I would crawl into her cage when I felt lonely. Casey had a few litters of pups and out of the first litter came, Jax. Dad named Jax and took him to live with him. We had King Arthur and Queen Guinevere, they were Jack Russells, my mother liked the idea of them because they were horse dogs and we also had horses. We tried to breed them but King Arthur kept killing the pups in the barn at night. Anna was my mother’s baby she had brown and white spots.
My Dad had Rottweilers that my step mother used to train and show, Bear and Val. Dogs were like people coming and going in my life, eventually I stopped getting attached. Now my parents have different dogs. Mom has two dachshunds; Rubeun and Rizah – her babies. She does not leave home without them. Once she called me to tell me one of the dogs had diarrhea all over her car while she was in the Walmart. “Mom why on earth did you bring the dogs to Walmart?” I questioned, “oh honey they feel bad if I leave them at home.” My dad also has in the past few years replaced us with Mac. Mac is a pure bread German shepherd. Mac gets Macdonald’s when he is a good boy and salami and cheese snacks before bed. He is a service dog. They are training him, so as long as he has his vest on he is permitted everywhere they go. He is always a good boy and when they bring him out to dinner, the waitresses don’t even know there is a dog under the table. My sister Caren has at least two dogs, a few years ago she got tangled up in their leashes when she was walking them and fell damaging her leg, she still walks with a limp, at least that is what I heard. Tammy, my other sister, I was just informed now has three dogs, dachshunds as well. What is it with dogs and my family?
Protection, maybe. Companionship. Something to pour care into. Something that loves you without requiring explanation, or perfection or conversation, something that is needy without being emotional.
Once I got bit in the face by a dog, that dog along with all her puppies were put to sleep afterwards. once I saw a dog get hit by a car. My mother actually hit and killed a dog with her car when she first moved to Maine.
Dogs are herd animals. A herd is a group existing together as a unit, though never permanently. Members leave. New ones enter. Some are pushed out. The group adjusts and continues. I think people act more like herd animals than dogs do. Anyway,
I’m a cat person.
My Faith Place 