Crack Out Your Party Hats!

November 3, 2006 a very special litter of eight puppies was born. They may not have been the most spectacular of racers, but my understanding is that all of them have made outstanding pets. A year and a half ago, we were lucky enough to bring one of these puppies to our house as our own. After our first greyhound, Treat, passed away, we were just heartbroken. She was a certified therapy dog amongst many of her other accomplishements. I knew that I wanted to continue to do nursing home visits and therapy in some capacity, and also that if I was going to do this, I was going to have to find a new greyhound to do it with. Hawk and Lilac were both too old to really enjoy doing the visits anymore and Blueberry is very much my husband's girl. I thought that I would find a new greyhound around the age of four years old. If you have been around greyhounds much, you know that this is the magical age when their brains usually grow in and they settle down into wonderful and amazing dogs. We met many dogs. I wanted the same magical connection I'd felt when Treat had chosen us. I knew that it was unlikely that the first dog I met would be the perfect one, but as we met dog after dog, I admit that I became discouraged. Finally, the volunteer we were working with told us that they had a new little girl in, but she hadn't been cat tested or anything and was very new. On impulse, I asked to meet her anyway. Bunny walked in the visiting room, wagged her tail and leaned against my leg. I was a goner! So, we signed up to bring home an eighteen month old puppy instead. During the weeks that we had to wait for her spay surgery to be completed, I ran through a wide array of emotions, worries and doubts. What if she turned out to be a hellion? Was I being disloyal to Treat, who was one of a kind and irreplacable in my eyes? Would she be too much for the older hounds to deal with?

The day we went back to the kennel and picked her up, I forgot about all of my worries and doubts. Bunny will never be Treat, but she is truly a perfect and wonderful little bundle of perfection in her own rite. Truth be told, she might even be sweeter than Treat was. It wasn't until after we brought her home that we learned that she was supposed to go to someone else. She'd been preadopted with her littermate sister, Valentina, by a lady who'd learned they were very attached to each other. She called the day after we chose Bunny as our own. When she heard how we'd lost Treat and that we planned for Bunny to do nursing home visits, she gave us her blessing. I am thankful every day that we brought Bunny here with us. She has really helped to heal our hearts and I often forget how young she is, because she is very well behaved, a stark contrast to Blueberry and her naughty ways as a youngster. (Although I freely admit that we laughed at every one of Blueberry's antics over the years!)

Today, Bunny turns three years old. We have presents and treats waiting for her. We do have to spoil her some, even if she is a total sweetheart. She does have her diva moments. Her most noticable character trait is still her sweetness. She lives for attention and petting. Her most important job seems to be keeping me safe on the couch and she does that job very well. She also seems to think that she should always be closest to me, and if my husband gets closer to me than she is, she will give him the stink eye until he moves. Believe me, she can say a lot with that stink eye! She's so darned cute, though, that you have to give in and let her have what she wants. We decided to start celebrating her birthday early, so we cracked out some treats last night and tried to the the girls to pose for a few pictures.

Husband: Girls! I've got treats!

Blueberry: I'm sitting! Look at me! I'm sitting!

Husband: Good sit, Blue! Now look at the camera girls!

Lilac: I'm old! I don't have time for these shenanigans! Hand over the loot!

Husband: No! No! Blue, over here! Lilac! Bunny, come closer, don't back up!

Bunny: I'm ready for my close up, Mr. DeMille!

Husband: Bunny, you have to come up here by Lilac and Blueberry!

Bunny: Sharing the photo op is not in my contract!

Husband: Look! I have fancy peanut butter treats!

Blueberry: Why are you wasting your time with those two? I've got a perfect sit going on here! Treat, please!

Lilac: I'm not getting any younger here! My bed's getting cold!

Husband: Just one more shot! Everybody look at me!

Blueberry looks at Bunny and I could have sworn I saw her shrug and whisper in Lilac's ear. Finally, all three of them humored him and looked at the camera at once. You have to celebrate those divas!

Happy Birthday, puppy girl! We hope you celebrate many more of them with us! We'd also like to wish her littermates a happy birthday as well, wherever they may be!

Lilac, It's Daylight Savings Time!

Lilac has always been a quirky hound who liked to do things her own way. I suspect she might be left-handed, since when she lays on the couch, she always does it backwards. She also likes to walk on the opposite side of me when I walk all the dogs together, usually resulting in me getting tangled in her leash and having to pull her around behind my body. I've always just chalked it up to the fact that she marches to the beat of her own drummer. The last couple of weeks have made me wonder, however.

A week before daylight savings time went into effect, Lilac started getting up an hour early. Everyone else would still be sound asleep if it weren't for her insistent ways. I am starting to suspect that it's something she does just to mess with us. It always starts the same way. Lilac gets up and paces around a little bit. My husband hides his head under the pillow.

Lilac: (bark, bark) Hey you! Get up and take me out!

Husband: Do you know what o'dark thirty is?

Lilac: I don't know and I don't care!

Husband: It's too early! I'm not taking you out! Go back to bed!

Lilac: Don't make me pull out the cold nose!

Husband: You can't get to me with the cold nose! Blueberry is sleeping over here beside me!

Lilac: Very funny! You think you're so clever! Fine, I'll just go here on the floor...

Husband: *grumbling* Fine! Let's go! You'd better make it quick!

Lilac: Come on everybody! Time to go out!

Bunny: Let's go! Let's go! Let's go!

Blueberry: We can not be related! I'm having a good dream about chasing a rabbit. Wake me when the sun starts shining.

Lilac: I win again! Out we go!

Husband: One of these days...

Me: Will you just take them out already?

Husband: I'm working on it!

Me: You're not working on it! You're still hiding your head under the pillow!

Husband: Do you know what time it is?

Me: I do now -- it's o'dark thirty! Fine, I'll take them out!

At this point, my husband always gets up, slips on his shoes and stomps out with the girls. Even Blueberry can't sleep through the production, so she gets up and tromps out to the pen with them. They come in and have their breakfast and then Lilac lays down for her early morning nap. Too bad some of us have to go to work and earn money for kibble!

Reminiscing

I would like to start by offering a huge thank you to everyone who has expressed their condolences to us over Hawk's passing. It has been a great comfort, especially since we just weren't expecting to lose him. He was almost thirteen years old and I didn't think he'd live forever, but I thought he'd bounce back and be with us for a while longer. I feel mostly at peace with our decision to let him go, but we miss him greatly. As I read through messages that people sent to us, I kept thinking to myself, "Oh, I should have mentioned that, or that, and I can't believe I didn't tell that story."

There was the time he fell asleep and scared himself with his own fart. We laughed so hard over that, but perhaps it wouldn't have been the best story to tell in his eulogy. There was the story about him with our crazy cat, Blizzard. That cat put the fear of God into more foster greyhounds that we had than I can count, and he got his bluff on over Hawk from the minute the poor guy set foot in our house. There's the story about the time Hawk and Treat appeared in a professional ballet production, all in the name of helping other greyhounds get adopted. He put up with a lot of silliness from us. He looks so GQ in all of the pictures we have of him, but the truth is, he was really a lovable goofball who was very protective of his toys. He'd sit on them to protect them from our fosters if he had to. He was deathly afraid of the camera, certain it would steal his soul with that crazy flash, and so he'd never look directly at it, hence the reason he always appeared so dignified in his photos. There was also his deep love of popcorn and the fact that for the last seven years we have not been able to say "potty" or anything that remotely sounds like it without making a trip to the back door, even if we just came in. All blog stories for a rainy day, perhaps.

He really loved his girls, and that included Treat, first and foremost, and me, but he also felt the need to take Blueberry and Bunny under his wing. He and Lilac got along, but perhaps he realized that our sassy little mama dog could take care of herself better than he could. They were never particularly chummy, but they seemed to have an understanding. He was happy when we brought Bunny home and one thing I wish I'd gotten a picture of were the times Bunny would walk underneath him, but this always happened at the back door at turn out time. He must have liked her, because nobody else could ever have pulled that off. He'd look at her and sort of shake his head as if to say, "Kids, what can you do with them."

He also loved to go on trips with us, and surprisingly, was a model hound whenever we went somewhere away from home. Apparently, there was no danger of the sky falling when we weren't in our own quiet little town. Either that or he was too busy making sure Treat and I didn't fall in the ocean or fall victims to some other disaster.

And now that we've celebrated his life, we're going to do our best to look forward. We have a very important event coming up on Tuesday that involves a certain little puppy here and we're excited about that. More than anything, Hawk would want us to remember him with a smile and a laugh, not with tears, and that's what we plan to do. He was a one of a kind, a dog who would have been a long, tall cowboy if he'd been human, and we'll always remember him with gratitude that he came into our lives. We thank everyone for enjoying hime with us!

Happy Trails to You, Til We Meet Again

Today was the end of a journey, one that took a lifetime of almost thirteen years to complete. January 30, 1997 Stat US Hawk came into this world as a member of a large litter of puppies. Tonight, he left to move on to a better place, where old bodies don't give out, there's no danger of the sky ever falling and there are endless morning scratches and treats. If I'm honest with myself, he was ready to go when Treat left us a year and a half ago. He grieved for her almost as badly as I did, perhaps more in some ways, but I have a feeling he was torn. In his world, things were perfect when we were all together. When we were at home, everyone was supposed to be in the same room so he could keep track of them. He would never stand up for himself, but he was fiercely protective of Treat and me. I think he would have lay down and gone right along with her when she died, but he felt that he had to continue to do his job and keep the rest of us all together. Every night when it was time for bed, he couldn't rest until every person and dog was secure in the bedroom. If one of the girls didn't come to bed, he had to pace restlessly back and forth from the bedroom to the living room.

He wasn't an easy greyhound. We got Treat and she came into our lives as effortlessly as if she'd always been here. Hawk bit me three weeks after we brought him home, and we learned about things like fear biting. When he'd bite, it was because he felt cornered, and he was a very nervous sort of guy. When we went to the kennel to choose a second greyhound, Treat made her preference clear. When Hawk came in the room, she played for the first time since we'd adopted her months before. Several others came in and she was completely indifferent to them. Hawk came back in and she was playing again. We'd thought a new dog would make her feel safe and confident on walks. As it turned out, she stepped up because she realized he needed to be protected from the world. He was happy to be at home with his toys and his family, and he really didn't care to go anywhere else.

A year after we brought him home, we enrolled in a greyhounds only obedience class, partially because we wanted to start doing nursing home visits with Treat and partly because we thought it would give Hawk some much needed confidence. He excelled at obedience -- at home. For the class, I took Hawk while my husband took Treat. We would practice all week and Hawk was spot on. Treat would turn her head and ignore my husband completely, much to his irritation. Then, we'd go to class. Hawk was convinced that our instructor was a devil in disguise and he wanted nothing to do with her. He refused to do anything in class besides the recall, which he did excellently, running from the instructor to find me as if the hounds of hell were at his heels. He was so good at obedience that one day when he slipped his collar because he was afraid of a neighbor of ours and ran for home that I yelled "sit" and he sat at the intersection and waited for me instead of crossing into the street.

He didn't ever really mind the weather, but he loved this time of year in particular, when my husband would start bringing his quilt out to lay on the floor. In the first year we had him, he was so jumpy that we couldn't lay down near him. Then, one day he decided it was okay and came over to lay down beside me, resting against my leg. It was a moment I'll always remember. He became quite a snuggle hound in his older age. As soon as he saw someone with a quilt or blanket, he was pacing, waiting to get to the dog bed nearest that quilt first so he didn't miss out. I can't begin to count the number of days I've come out of the shower in the morning to see Hawk's nose and my husband's feet sticking out from beneath the quilt.

I can remember the first Christmas we had with them. We got a snowman toy for him that sang "Jingle Bells" and it drove him crazy. My husband's grandmother was in the hospital, so a short while after giving him the toy, we ran out to visit the hospital. When we came home, it was Christmas Carnage. Instead of two happy hounds greeting us at the back door, they came creeping towards us, guilt and terror on their faces. Our best guess is that the snowman got too close to the Christmas tree and then he got something caught in the tree lights. The tree was entirely down, ornaments were strewn about and two very nervous greyhounds awaited us. Then the cat peed on the tree to add insult to injury. Things with that tree just kept getting worse. We laugh about that every year at Christmas when we pull out the few surviving ornaments.

We often took Hawk to the nursing home when he was younger. He had a repertoire of tricks that he would do to entertain the residents because he wasn't always the most social with people. Yet, he always had a knack for finding the one person off in the corner alone who needed a quiet presence to lean against them. One woman in the Alzheimer's ward asked me every month what his name was. Then she'd turn and announce to the others "This is my dog Spot" as she gripped his leash between me and him. He always stood there patiently, waiting for me to disentangle him so we could move along.

Hawk taught me so many lessons about patience and perseverance, I can never count them all. I thought in the beginning that I was teaching him how to be a good dog, but the truth is, he was busy teaching me how to be a good person. In my heart, I can imagine him already running, his ball in his mouth with Treat running at warp speed behind him, the way they often did here at the baseball diamond. No doubt they have a lot of catching up to do. I know that I have been blessed to have them touch me in with all their perfect imperfections. Hawk, you wonderful, soft hearted mama's boy, I miss you so much already. Run free and be well!

Wordless Wednesday 11/04 -- Can You See It?

Can you spot what's extra special about our Berry girl?