Delighting in Dogs

This week I choose to talk about a much simpler form of pleasure.  This would be the pleasure of pets, or more specifically, puppies.

I've always liked dogs, but my love of them has developed more recently in the past couple of years.  At the beginning of my sophomore year, my older brother, David, who lives in town took in a stray dog to see if he could become responsible enough to take care of it.  I'm not even kidding, he wanted to prove to himself that he could take care of a dog.  Keep in mind this boy has a pretty severe ADD, so he can either be extremely set on something or become very easily distracted.  Thankfully for his new dog, he took the task of training her very seriously.  Tommy (it was the name she responded to, so it stuck) quickly became one of the best behaved dogs I had ever met.

Soon, my mom and I fell in love.  Tommy was just such a GOOD dog.  She didn't need a leash to stay by your side when you walked her and she loved a good belly rub.  We looked forward to the times when my brother would have to leave her at our house for the weekend.  We got to pretend we had a dog for a couple of days.  We felt spoiled.

When my brother decided to pack up and move him and Tommy to Portland the following August (about a year after getting Tommy) we were obviously very sad.  I had never really lived without my brother, so it was a hard adjustment.  But I'm not going to lie, it was a lot harder to get used to the fact that I didn't have a dog any more.  It was a luxury that I wasn't done enjoying.

So a little over a year ago, I convinced my mom to adopt a dog from the humane society.  We ended up getting a really cute puppy of unknown origins.  Although she does have an unfortunate preference for eating mail, our new dog, whom we named Rosie, was just what I needed.  She's a great snuggler and she loves to play.  She's really cute and always wants to be with me.  She's the perfect size (a modest thirty pounds).  Her ears are too big for her head and flop around when she walks.  She's wonderful.

So what could make me happier than my new puppy?

The answer to this question is two puppies.  Okay, not puppies exactly, but my brother decided to move back to C-U in April of that same year and he brought Tommy back with him.  Now, every so often I get the pleasure of having both dogs with me at once.  I have two dogs to play with and two dogs to snuggle with.  I honestly couldn't imagine anything better.

I don't know what I would do without the unconditional love of my dogs.  They make me feel awesome!  Plus their really cute.  I hope that one day, all of you will have a similar experience.

Here are a couple of pictures so you can appreciate the cuteness: