Mid-Atlantic Gardening: Mid-Alantic Pets, 1 by aspenhill

aspenhill wrote:
This is the first time my home has been without a dog since the mid 1980s. I have such compassion for dogs, and in a way I have cherished my dogs (especially Jordan) the way people cherish their children. Never having children myself, it is the closest thing I can imagine how a parent feels.

When I was a child, I persisted with a 5 year long campaign to my parents to let me have a dog. My dad had never had a dog when he was being raised, and wasn't a "dog" person. It was my first realization that if you really want something that isn't happening easily, you have to work at it and never give up. They suprised me on my 13th birthday with a long ride from the suburbs of DC out to Winchester, VA. Even back then I knew the rural life was for me. I was thrilled to be riding the "back roads" and thought that was my present. We stopped at someone's home - I initially thought that it was a friend of my dad's from work - but it was actually from an ad in the paper of someone who had border collie pups for sale. I held that pup in my arms the whole way home, and it was the first time I experienced actual crying from feeling so overwhelmingly happy. The poor little guy was so carsick, threw up on me multiple times, and I knew then how compassionate I would feel towards dogs my whole life. I named him Winchester.