Why I Love Dogs, the Wonderful, Loveable Canines!

When I was a little boy, I had a dog named, Tyler. He was mostly a bird dog. He had black and brown spots on his short white fur. He was definitely my best childhood friend. I would walk through the fields of Franklin County Indiana and Tyler would always walk in front of me.

Many times, I followed him through the tall grass back to the woods. Now and then, I would see a snake fly up in the air out of the grass. Tyler would be barking and growling while jumping after the snake. Sometimes he would kill the snake and sometimes the snake would get away.

He was always protecting me. I use to put an old WW I Army pack on and play Army with Corporal Tyler. I was usually a Captain or General. We would attack the enemy in the hayfield and Tyler was my front-line soldier. After we defeated our foe, I would give Tyler a snack and he would give me licks all over my face.

Tyler added a lot of love to my childhood and a wonderful memory of my best friend.

Later, my little sister, Velvet, had a Border Collie named, Nubbins. She gave her the name because Nubbins would move things around with her nose. One day an old farmer was picking up some equipment from the barn. I was sitting on the porch and heard him laughing and yelling for me to look at the dog.

He was sitting on his tractor, busting a gut and still pointing at Nubbins. I walked around the tractor and saw Nubbins sitting on our old yellow Tomcat. You could just see the cat's head poking out from under her fuzzy butt. Nubbins had a look of contentment on her face. The cat, dare not move!

Nubbins also had a strange habit of burying her food bowls. I bet there were fifty bowls buried in our yard. She was a wonderful-natured dog and always gave us a smile to remember.

Many years ago, we got our son, Larkin, a puppy for his birthday. He named her " Buffy." She was such an adorable dog. She would always come up to me and expect me to scratch her butt, (Just behind the top of her tail.) Most of the time, I gave in.

One night, she was growling and softly barking. She was doing it loud enough to wake me up. I got angry and called her an idiot for being noisy so late at night. She went back to her corner with a few more short growls. The next morning, I found that my car had been broken into and valuable things were missing.

Guess who was the idiot now? Beffy was trying to tell me that something was wrong outside. I think I can translate those few last little growls into, "we'll see who the idiot is in the morning?" Yes, I did apologize to Beffy. She received extra hot dogs for being the smarter being.

We had Beffy with us for eight years. She passed away in the winter and It was snowing when we buried her She loved the snow. I have never missed a dog so much. She was such a joyful and loving part of our family. She will forever be a part of our fondest memories.

We haven't had a dog for a long while now. I'm retired and we own a small farm in the country. It would be the perfect place to raise a dog but the road is straight and long in front of our property. We have quite a few people that drive 70 + MPH in their vehicles. Our daughter lives not far away and her German Shepard was killed on our road.

We do have two barn cats who adopted us a couple of years ago. They were more than likely dumped close to our place. We named one Cooper and the other Ozzy. They are both older black tomcats. We feed and water them. We pet them and they follow us when we take evening walks.

Cats are loveable when they want to be. Dogs are always loveable. We treasure the memories we had with our dogs. They are part of our lives, part of our loves, and part of our families.