Good Dogs—Small, Medium & Large

As Ginny and I worked in our garden this weekend, a flock of russet-capped sparrows swarmed around our birdfeeder. At one point Ginny counted 19 of the flighty creatures. We were happy to see the migration.

But today, I’m writing about dogs, not birds.

Back on March 18^th, I explained about posting photos of dogs on this site. Not everyone who buys my books has a blog or website of their own and they get a kick out of seeing their pets displayed on the internet, hence on my site.

That’s what’s going on.

For instance, here is a photo of JaNene’s tiny dog, Keila:

Alert little thing isn’t it?

JaNene owns copies of several of my books including her purchase last week of Heroes All, my history of firefighting in Jacksonville. JaNene says she is the Number One Fan of my books.

Here is a photo of JaNene’s daughter Nitaholding Keila:

Thinking about good dogs reminds me of the first dog Ginny and I ever owned. Walking though a New Mexico desert 40 years ago, back when we drove an 18-wheel, tractor-trailer truck over the road, we spotted this odd lump near a lonely highway. On investigation, we discovered a puppy that someone had coated with tar and thrown out to die in the wilderness.

Even the puppy’s legs were stuck together with tar so it could not walk. And frostbite had taken off one of the puppy’s ears.

We gathered it up and took it to a truck stop garage where the mechanics let us bathe the puppy in solvent. We had to cut a lot of fur off before ending up with a presentable looking border collie. One of the mechanics nicknamed the dog Engine, but because we’d found it near a pueblo ruin, everybody around the truck stop started saying Injune.

Here is a 1971 photo of the noble, grown-up Injune in his Dog of Destiny pose on a roc outcrop in Texas. This medium-sized dog was one of those dogs who “smile” showing all his teeth when wanted to play. Injune lived with us for many years and traveled in the truck with us all over the country:

Later, we acquired Sheba,. a mostly Black Lab, who lived with us for 17 years. Here is a photo of her, oddly enough, it’s the only photo of her that we have:

Although a huge dog which intimidated visitors on first sight, Sheba never met a stranger. She loved everybody. In fact, in all the years she lived with us, I only heard her growl once—that was when Ginny and I were horse-playing in the kitchen and Ginny squeaked as I dropped an icecube down the neck of her blouse; Sheba charged into the kitchen with bared teeth and growled at me as she protected her beloved Ginny.

Many, many years later, killing Sheba was the third hardest thing I’ve ever done in my life.

I mentioned it in a biographical speech I was once asked to give at a church.

If you like, you can read my talk—the title is Guts, Feathers and All—at http://www.cowart.info/Gutsspeech/GutsFeathers.htm