[at-l] Man's best friend

[Rich kook]

This kinda off subject but I've seen some real "off subject" stuff up here before...
 
So I figure a decent stereotype for the general hiking community is a love for dogs
 
(not dogs in shelters, not dogs that constantly bark, and especially not dogs that take a dook near camp) By love, I mean the joy and companionship your dog gives you: watching him run past right past the tennis ball, letting them lick your ice-cream cone, or when you just know she’s smiling at you
 
I guess it’s fitting to write this on here seeing that I’m not on a dog-lover list-serv.
 
Anyways, I’ve had 2 dogs for around 7 years now.  The older is a Yellow Lab (Maggie) and the younger was a Retriever/Newfee mix (Guss).  We live in the boonies of rural North Georgia; hence, no fences, leashes, or muzzles on dogs in the area, which is a risk the owner takes when letting his/her dogs run free, but it’s hard to deny the open acres to breeds such as these.  With much time and effort, we had them fairly well trained to not leave yard and to ALWAYS listen, although they would wander from time to time but very rarely.
 
After having both the dogs with me in and out at college (UGA), and seeing them at home for 6-7 years, I departed to Washington D.C. this past August to take a job – my dogs stayed home which was/is difficult; I can pick up a phone or email friends and relatives but that’s not so compatible with canines.
 
At home during Thanksgiving, Guss went missing; he was in the yard warming his black coat that afternoon, then we never saw him again.  Our neighbors told us their dog had been attacked either by a pack of dogs or coyotes and was real banged up, but we never found Guss.  I returned to D.C. in the middle of looking for him/figuring out what happened.  A few weeks later I flew back home to surprise my mother to watch her Dance School perform the Nutcracker ballet.  She was thrilled and when I got into the car in Atlanta a little black fuzz-ball of a pup jumped into my lap. We called him Jack.
 
Jack was a mutt.  A beautiful mix - curious but shy – black, fluffy rescue dog who was found in a storm drain (apparently their owner ditched them!) with his 3 brothers and sisters.  As Jack started growing, he reminded my Mother her Dance School associates (she took him to work) more and more of our former black mix Guss.  He had Guss’ personality, his looks, and interacted with humans the same way.  I had a great chance to get to know Jack over Christmas break when I took my vacation, and I could see the resemblance as well.  But even then I wasn’t sure if it was healthy to closely associate the two dogs -  as if Jack were replacing the memories of Guss, but I’ve had friends who simply keep buying Collies or Black Labs, and even give them the same name.  So I guess we let that association happen.  My question would be is that okay?  Does anyone have a similar story/imput that is positive to doing this? Or should we just get a new breed and put the others in the
 past?
 
This past month my mother and step-dad spent lots of time training Jack around the yard, with people, not going to the road, and giving him a more freedom bit by bit.  Well strange things happen, and Mom was home yesterday morning by herself and had let Jack outside with Maggie.  Fifteen minutes later she hears Maggie barking at the door (which doesn’t happen unless someone pulls up the driveway), she goes outside, Maggie takes off toward the road, and she leads my mother to the roadside where Jack was lying.  He must have been killed on impact because of the small window of time and he didn’t have any exposed marks.
My question is still the same about association of dogs.  The last thing we are thinking about right now is getting another dog, but it will happen one day.  Perhaps we should have mourned Guss longer but the situation wasn’t in our hands.  We took Jack in.  I understand that life sometimes just isn’t fair.  I couldn’t imagine if this was a human situation, and I deeply apologize to anyone who has been in that situation for writing this.  My motive was not for others to feel remorse, but to question a problem in which I have absolutely no Earthly clue – in hopes of finding an answer.
 
Thanks, it really felt great to get this off my chest and hopefully I figure something out – I’m sorry for bugging ya’ll.
Rich Georgia à Maine 46 days.


 
____________________________________________________________________________________
No need to miss a message. Get email on-the-go 
with Yahoo! Mail for Mobile. Get started.
http://mobile.yahoo.com/mail