Happy Thanksgiving everyone!
Some of you know my husband GreyHawk, he of "The Woo Tales", his chronicle of Missy the Malamute and my mother. However, the tales, in my opinion, seem to neglect Ember, aka "Little Woo". She's not really a woo dog. She's part shepherd, part border collie. And maybe part something else. Or not. We've never been sure, to tell you the truth. But she definitely does have some shepherd in her.
Right now I'm in a weekly writing contest at another site. Every week we receive a prompt, we all submit our entries, and we all vote on those we liked best. This week's topic is "The Giving Of Thanks". Ember couldn't help but respond to it:
Dear Daddy,
Did you ever notice me before I started coming into the yard? I was always in the bushes hiding from men with big sticks and shovels and brooms. I think you saw me at behind the BBQ place where I was catching the bugs flying around the big metal thing that had all the interesting smells. Maybe it wasn't you. But I like to think it was.
All I wanted that summer was somewhere where it wasn't too hot. Your porch seemed like a nice place with the stairs and it overlooked the big fenced yard where The Big Dog was. The Big Dog looked like a wolf. She didn't like me. She always barked and made woo-woo noises and slammed herself against the fence whenever she saw me. It's a good thing I'm little -- I could just scoot by her and hide under the stairs. It was cool and dark there and I could finally curl up and sleep and not worry about anyone yelling or throwing things at me.
I think you liked me. You knew I was hiding under the stairs but I was afraid to come out. So before you went to work you brought me out a dish of water and some of The Big Dog's food. You didn't yell at me. You said, "I'll see you later", so I stayed there until I had to go potty, which was pretty hard to do without The Big Dog seeing me.
I don't remember when I started sitting on the porch. Maybe it was when The Big Dog stopped barking at me and let me sniff along the fence. In the morning when you opened the door, there I was, sitting and wagging my tail. I waited for you to come walking up to the porch at lunchtime. In the evening I sat on the top step wriggling and wagging when I saw you.
One day you put me in your car and took me to that big noisy place with all the other dogs and people in uniforms. You told the nice lady behind the desk that you didn't know who I belonged to and that you already had a dog. She said that if someone didn't come get me in a few days something would happen. I remember your face going sad when the lady said that and my tail drooped because I didn't want you to be sad. You then went away and the lady put me in a cage. I didn't know what to do so I lay down and stared at all the feet coming and going.
Nobody came to see me. I didn't know where you were. I couldn't cry because all the other dogs were crying and I was little and they were bigger than me. So I lay down and watched everything. Nobody yelled at me but nobody spoke to me either. I wondered if The Big Dog knew where I was.
Then you appeared one morning. You had a big smile and you put your arms out as another lady unlocked the cage. I hurled myself at you, licking your face and your hands and wagging my tail so hard that I thought it was going to fall off. You lifted me off the ground and hugged me. I squirmed. You called me "my little girl." You put me in the car and we drove back to the porch and The Big Dog who kept woo-wooing and yelping when she saw us. Still holding me, you unlocked the front door and put me down. I took one step into this big dark space. Then another. I sniffed everything. You went into a room and I followed you. You sat down on a big stuffed long thing. I jumped up beside you and curled up. You scritched my head. I licked your hand.
Thank you Daddy.
Love,
Ember