I first met Vixen when she was four weeks old. I knew then as she sat on her brother's head to better get to mother Melissa's teat that she was a piece of work. Foolishly? perhaps, we told Carol the breeder, "yes, that's the one we want!" Uh little did we know how "special" our 13 years with her would be.
Five weeks later, we drove Vixen home from Davidsonville, MD to Fairfax, VA and she was squealing the entire time. Exhausted from her journey, I put her on my lap for a nap. Unfortunately I had a bad chest cold and started coughing. Oh boy if looks could kill, "Hellllloooo I'm taking a nap, be quiet!"
Puppy kindergarden was no different. She was The Boss. Oh boy did our trainer tell us we had a handful and would need to work on her from day one. Sure she was a tiny four month old sheltie but she was getting the Rottie, the German Shepherd and the trainer's Greater Swiss Mountain Dogs to go belly up for her.
Our trainer's advice? "But the bark on command, that way you can turn it off". Well that never worked but it was way cool that Vixen would do her Dobermann impression on command. The trainer OTOH never stopped laughing and enjoying Vixen's reaction to sneezes -- she hated them. You sneeze in front of her and she comes running and barks at you.
Lest you think that Vixen just a nasty dog -- far from it. She was sweet as pie -- she had a Canine Good Citizen Certificate and visited the local rest homes where she willingly got ear rubs and back scratching from the residents.
When we brought Thunder home, she was the mother he needed to school him right <g>. Heck she even put up with Raleigh's studd muffin act when he arrived -- I suspect she secretly like the attention even as she was chewing the poor guy out.
And the funniest event was the time she was runner up in a Lassie look alike contest at a local pet store. Nevermind that she was a Sheltie, not a Collie!
But Vixen really, really found her life's work through the brithday gift her trainer gave to my sis -- entry in a herding instinct test:
http://users.erols.com/...
Until old age forced her retirement, Vixen was literally a sheep junkie. I do think she'd rob a bank or pass secrets to terrorists to get more sheep time.
After retirement, Vixen mellowed with age. She bossed Raliegh and Thunder less and less. The daily walkies were no longer with Raleigh and Thunder -- instead she got a three blook stroll. But she really really enjoyed birdwatching while sitting on the deck -- even in cold snowy whether we'd have to beg her to come back inside.
The end was pretty quick I'm glad to say -- she started having some kidney problems about two weeks ago and only this past weekend did she start to seem a bit far away and not there. Today we think she had a stroke while at my mom's, she couldn't stand or recognize us or even muster an angry reaction to a sneeze, so we tearfully knew the end had come. Surrounded by her family and the gang at the vet who loved her too (including her old trainer actually!) Vixen left us.
I sneezed tonight -- it wasn't the same. Thunder and Raleigh came running just looking at me but they do not have the commanding authority Vixen had in her War Against Sneezing.
I do know that for the rest of my life whenever I sneeze I will hear Vixen somewhere up there barking her little head off at me....