We’ve been talking about dogs on #blogshares tonight and it forces me reluctantly to remember Taffy…half golden retriever, half boarder collie, she at about 7 years old got epilepsy…and as I couldn’t find anyone to take her was forced to put her “down”, an action I have always regretted, but as I had a 4 year old daughter at the time and that the affliction had caused a change in temperament, a mean streak had developed I had no choice…a choice I regret…I choice I wish I hadn’t had to make, but there you are…

When we got her from the ASPCA she was a pup, short haired and small, what we didn’t know was that she had a skin worm and when cured she ended up long haired and 110 pounds…of crazy dog…you didn’t walk that dog…you ran that dog…but she loved my kid…until the epilepsy invaded her body and her personality…

When the daughter was outside with the dog, no force on earth could harm her (that is the daughter)…the dog watched over her like the boarder collie in her would have watched over the flock…if anyone came within 100 yards of the yard there were the 3 barks to alert us of the fact, daughter was shepherded to the front stoop and the dog followed the person on the sidewalk as they pasted the house and GD help them if they put a foot on the front yard…when left alone for 8 hours one time the dog ate a pillow chair I had…ah well…the dog loved my mom…it was cupboard love… but love none the less…mom would always bring it a knuckle bone or some other variety of beef bone …and the dog loved her…if my mom was coming all we had to say to the dog was “ grandma is coming” and the dang dog would run window to window until mom arrived…and then would get so excited that it would piddle on the floor…the 5 of us, dad, mom, wife, child and I would be playing cards…well the kid at that age would be on one of our laps kibitzing…and the dang dog would have it’s head in my mom’s lap the whole time…

Dang…why did I think about that tonight… I miss my mom…she’s been gone the last 7+ years…and I miss her…she had a stroke…a massive one….but hung on for several months…died just short of Christmas, just short of her 81^st birthday (she was a new years baby)…dang…I miss that dear sweet lady…she loved a white Christmas…and we hadn’t had any snow to speak of, and the day she died it snowed to beat the band …in fact as I was trying to finish the few things I really needed to do at work after finding out about her passing I skidded the company SUV into a curb and destroyed the rim on one of the wheels…(dang…that’s the first time I’ve even remembered that in over 7 years)

The weird part of the whole deal was we had the services and calling hours the day after Christmas…one of my bud’s as he passed the receiving line said to me “Bud (the name I’m know by in the real world) don’t be surprised if A doesn’t come to your mom’s calling hours (I’ve know A for years through war gaming)…they found his dad dead of heart attack Christmas morning…oh hell…one of the hardest things I have ever done was to go to the calling hours of friend A’s father, the next day after my mom’s calling hours…with the same funeral home doing the arrangements…as I walked into the home ( we had the complete calling hours and services at the home church) the staff at the home just looked at me and I could see the honest pity in their eyes( as in what the hell are you doing here…friend A’s dad died 3 days after my mom…I rather be any other place in the world but…)…like what are you doing here…the weird thing is that the fellow who told me about A that is the Big R…I’ve know the R-man since I’ve moved to Watertown almost 40 years ago and I had just been to his dad’s calling hours 2 weeks before…2 weeks in my life I’d rather not repeat…but the A-man…as I shook his hand and gave my regrets broken down…he said…”B I’m so sorry I wasn’t there for you yesterday but I wasn’t in my right mind” I said “ don’t worry about it man, we knew it was coming for 6 months, you had no idea that your dad was even sick, I understand”…

Nite all