FAT CHARLIE

Never in my wildest imagining did I think I would be living with 7, 8, or 9 dogs in our house. When asked about this my usual response is…”I don’t love dogs, but I love my wife”, which is only half true. On my own, I would not be living with any dogs in my house, but dogs, raising them, showing them, racing them, loving them, and writing about them is my dear wife’s passion, and that makes them mine…well…almost mine. Ninety nine percent of the time I am either content or enthusiastic with our canine family, and one percent of the time I’m ready to give them all away.

And then there are those moments when I am alone with one of the whippets and something special happens, as it did just moments before I began writing this. Fat Charlie has been lying on “my” chair in the dining room while I’ve been eating dinner and listening to Johnny Cash radio. When I finished I took the dish to Charlie for the routine canine pre rinse cycle, sitting on the floor while he completed the task before him, something I’ve done countless times before. I removed the clean dish, and Charlie raised his head and looked at me; and I found myself looking into the dark pools of his eye, directly at the one of the gentlest souls God has ever sent to us. In that moment I knew unconditional love, and my heart belonged to him.



Tonight it was Charlie, tomorrow it may be Mama Pajama, or Delia, or William, or one of the other whippets. These are the magical moments that wash away all of the stress, anger, and frustration, and make living with our canine family possible.