In Our House, Dogs=Family

Good people would worry what their snobby neighbors who never wave to the young couple think, but not this girl.

I have ran down the sidewalk in my gorgeous maxi style nightgown that can occasionally show a ta-ta while chasing a dog.
I have called on neighbors to look for my missing 2 ½ half year old and his accomplices known as bad dog #1 (Jackson) and bad dog #2 (Boris). TWICE.
I have snapped at sweet neighbor girl who insists on ringing the doorbell on weekends during nap time to see “if I need any help around the house.” Just a note – do I ooze some sort of scent that screams this crazy mom of 1 toddler and 2 gigantic dogs needs help around the house??? Is it because I don’t get dressed while I go out to feed the dogs??? Well EXCUUUUUUSE me, if I don’t wanna put a shirt on while I bend over to pour food in a dog dish, and you see me, is that my fault?
I am sure each neighbor has heard my lame attempt to threaten my dogs, “QUIT BARKING RIGHT NOW OR I WILL SEND YOU TO CHINA! DO YOU KNOW WHAT THEY DO TO DOGS IN CHINA?!?”
I have screamed their names at 11pm for them to come back home from across the street.
I have seen the faces of terror as neighbors slowly walk to the other side of the street when I am in the front with my dogs. Even I admit the sight of those 2 can be alarming.

No wonder none of them wave to me. I don’t care.

Being in my backyard this summer with a toddler and 2 naughty dogs was wonderful. It was such a great place for our family to hang out and our son grew so close to his dogs. I just love that relationship. Poor Boris laying there as if he will die any second from the heat while my son lays on him, sings to him, throws golf balls at him or whatever else he can find. Lately it has been plums. Jackson got to take it easy this summer because of his TPLO surgery. Our son was so understanding and would be so sweet to him, even hand feeding him his food when I wasn’t looking saying, “here little buddy, eat the food.” So sweet.

My son and my dogs are simply the best, and I just love, love, love them and the relationship they have with each other.

That is why I am still caught off guard when I see people giving away their family dogs on a facebook page I am member of called SheridanUpCycle. I get that sometimes life happens. But wow. Almost every week there are animals on there who are going to be given to strangers simply because one dog doesn’t like the other, or they’re moving. Even if the big man himself told me to get rid of my dogs, I would have to give a big fat NO as an answer. I am being judgmental, I know. I just don’t get it.

I have the same shock after I have told someone about Jackson’s TPLO surgery and they say to me, “I would have just put him down.” Excuse me? This surgery is almost 99% successful and I have proof of that in my dog who is back in full force chasing birds 14 weeks after the procedure and you would have just said, “meh, oh well, kill him.” I get so mad.

And if you know me at all, you know my stance on animal cruelty. So I won’t even go into that here…yet.

I hope every single person who ever owns a dog or wants to own a dog – any animal for that matter- can give that animal a little respect for all the joy they are capable of bringing to a family.

I don’t care what my neighbors think, and I don’t care if they like me. But I hope they know that this crazy young lady who lives down the road from them loves her animals. She would chase them to the moon and back in her nightgown and slippers. They should be lucky I even have those 2 items on ;-)