I’m watching my dog run on the beach. She’s running alongside the waves. She stops every few moments to stare.
She’s not, too sure about waves.
It’s Father’s Day, and I’m a father—well, almost. I have a fifteen-week-old bloodhound named Thelma Lou. That’s almost like being a father. The only difference, of course, is that human babies don’t chew your wallet then poop inside your boot.
You read that right. My dog didn’t poop ON my boot—as in: the exterior. She did her business INSIDE my boot. The basic physics behind this acrobatic marvel are astounding. I only wish I could’ve captured it on video, it would’ve been worth millions.
So poop in a boot, that makes me a father. At least this is what I’m going with.
People without kids, like me, still have the same amount of love parents have. That love has to go somewhere. That’s where dogs come in.
My first dog was a border collie. My father bought it. We named it Pooch. Pooch was bred to herd sheep, but since there were no sheep
around, he herded redheads.
When my mother yelled my name, Pooch would dart off the porch like a bullet. He’d circle me, yelping, nipping. When he died, I thought a piece of me died.
My next dog was Goldie. A retriever. Long, pretty hair, happy face. I raised her from a pup.
Goldie was Hell on Wheels. She lived beside me. She slept while I did homework, she chased baseballs. In the woods, when I was busy with little-boy things, like catching frogs, or swinging limbs, she watched over me.
Cody was next. She was my father’s dog. She was a chocolate retriever who loved my father. I can close my eyes and see him strolling from the barn to the shed, Cody trailing two feet behind him.
When he died, she laid on a pile of his clothes for…