My children often begged for a dog. My answer was always, NO. We had our share of pets such as fish, hermit crabs, hamsters, even a three toed box turtle. I would often comment that we had a mini "boot-hill" on the side of our property that included many demised pets. Thirteen years ago I was home schooling my three oldest children. One afternoon my 11 year old son answered the phone at lunch time and when I asked who was on the phone, he said, "I don't know, but were supposed to pick someone up by the cafeteria." Curious as to whom/what someone could be, I further questioned my son. He honestly didn't know. I informed him to let me get the next phone call. Sure enough, one hour later I was answering the phone. A lady informed me I needed to come and get "Muffin" over by the school cafeteria ... and that she had already called animal control. Baffled as to why a total stranger would call me with such a message, I stated: "Excuse me, there must be some mistake as I don't have a dog named Muffin. Is this 265-8612? Yes" ... I replied. She even rattled off my address and said my dog needed to be picked up. I kept insisting to the lady that I certainly did not have a dog named Muffin. Very confused, I started grilling my dear children to see what their story was about this dog. Finally my eight year old daughter confessed that she had taken two of her scrunchy headbands and stapled a paper tag on each band and placed them around the necks of two pretty golden dogs that she had been playing with earlier in front of our house. She got a lecture about how you can't just take someone elses dog and claim it as your own. End of story, right? Wrong. Apparantly, one of the dogs eluded the dog catcher and made its way back to our home. I allowed the kids to borrow a few cups of dog food from a neighbor ... you know, just until we found her owner. Days went by ... then weeks. We ran ads in the paper, and read every lost dog ad too. We took her to the pound to be scanned for a micro-chip and to see if anyone had been trying to find her. No such luck. The shelter said that after running an ad for so many days, and if no one responded, we could claim her as our own. And that is how our beautiful golden retriever, Missy, came to be ours. She was about nine when she wondered into our lives and we enjoyed and loved her for three more years. I still tear up when I think about that special friend of mine. Not sure what ever happened to poor Muffin.
5 comments:
How cute that you daughter would do that.. That is so funny!
Oh my goodness, what a funny story! And you know? That sounds exactly like something I would do as a kid!
That's got to be one of the best dog stories I've ever read. Your daughter is bordering on genius!
I understand the teary eyes, we had a Brittany for many years, and when she went to doggie heaven, lots of tears were shed. She still makes us get all misty to think about her. No more for us..not now anyway, it hurts so bad to lose them. Also, it's nice not to have the doggie clean up responsibility and freedom to take off without worrying about boarding her. My hubby says when he's so old the possibility of him out living the dog is no longer an issue, then he'll get another one!
Now that's wierd..your kids must have been praying for a dog...:) reminds me of the first and only cat we've ever owned. my daughter had been praying and begging for a cat for several years, she was about 7 I guess. We were considering it however we didnt' tell her...we wanted to be careful to chose the right cat and be sure the it would "go" with the rest of our animals...Out of the blue one of our cat lovin friends called us to say a breeder friend of hers had 2 Red persian kittens (very expensive)and was leaving for a cat show on the west coast..the kittens were getting too big to sell so would we want one. We went and looked and the rest is history. That cat was gorgeous and sweet and fit perfectly into our house for the next 9 yrs.
My daughter was elated! :)
Animal friends have a way getting into our hearts, don't they! btw...Mr. Hedgehog is still intact. Son wanted to sample his tail end but I held out...but for how long...grin.
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