Sarah's CircleFriends are blessings that sustain our journeys. |
I've always liked dogs of every sort. Big, hairy, short haired, short legs, doesn't matter. They all seem to speak my language. Hands down though, the Golden retrievers were my favorites. Lonnie brought home the first one. It was a very large, very old, dog that had gotten lost in a storm and wandered up to a co-worker's home. the fellow emailed everyone at their office; this was when Lonnie worked at MCI, about this fine old fellow that his family could not keep. They had 3 small children and could not take on anything else. Lonnie took a look at that dignified old face and couldn't let him go to the pound. Funny thing was, Lonnie wasn't really a dog person, but Nimbus (for the storm clouds) spoke to his heart. And Nimbus was a treat for us for some time. It was a little like adopting a sick old uncle, lots of vet bills along the way, but he paid us back with affection. When the time came to let him go it was really hard. Later, Cirrus (again for the clouds) came to us as a rescue. He was fully grown and had not been raised in a family, so he did not know how to play with toys or doggie things. He did love chew bones and knew how to appreciate them! He and I worked our way through Obedience Training and he passed the test to be a Therapy dog. He was the Friendly Visitor type of therapy dog. He was big enough that he could walk up to a person in a wheelchair and lay his head in their lap. He loved visiting nursing homes and being with people. Our instructor told me the needed skills for visiting could be taught to any dog, but the personality couldn't, and he had personality plus. Cirrus was my companion dog, even after Sunshine (a smaller, blond Golden) came into our home, he didn't quit following me and being in the same room with me. One of my favorite things to do with the Goldens was to take them over to the walking path by Mingo Creek and let them run. Cirrus was a dark red and Sunny was a light blond, together they were poetry in motion running in the sun. It was an undeveloped area in some ways and had lots of small wild life to chase. Once they even chased a fox! The fox ran toward the water, then turned on a dime and ran back under them and disappeared into the bushes. The dogs were really surprised by that. Another treat with these guys was to take them to McDonalds for a small ice cream cone. Cirrus would carefully lick his ice cream all the way down the cone then eat the cone. Sunshine would chomp hers down in seconds; ice cream, cone and all. I want to believe I will have Cirrus with me in Heaven. If not , I'm not going. --donna
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January 2022
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