My Life with Pets

Today I was watching an Oprah rerun.  It was an episode I heard about when it originally aired and I really wanted to see it, but I’d missed it.  It was about animals–how smart they are, how they communicate, what they can learn, and a couple of feel good stories for good measure regarding their companionship with humans.  And, I most definitely cried during some of the more heartfelt stories.  Not all that shocking because I hold a special place in my heart for animals. 

When I was a kid, I thought I wanted to be a veterinarian because of my intense love for animals.  My grandma lived in Mississippi and always had a ton of animals on her property including cows, horses, goats, chickens, a rumored alligator and a fox or two.  And of course cats and dogs.  But, I remember one particular cow that I spent hours with trying to get it to trust me enough so that it would take the feed directly from my hand.   I would make a lot of progress, get to the point where I thought it was just about to eat from my hand and then someone would come out and tell me lunch was ready or some other comment, and the cow would get nervous all over again.  Finally, I got it to trust me enough to eat from my hand. 

Growing up we always had animals at our house too.  We had cats, dogs, hamsters, ducks, turtles, frogs, rabbits, and of course some fish.  But we didn’t have all of these at the same time.   I’m pretty sure we asked our parents for a new pet monthly.   Most of the time they said no, but every once in a while we would break them down and they would say yes.  Then we’d spend some time contemplating names for our new pets.  My brother was the youngest and would often come up with what we considered ridiculous names, like toothpaste.   We still make fun of him for that.

So now we have our pets.   Sean says they lucked out big time since we picked them from the shelter.  Molly has what you might call a wee bit of an anxiety problem, and we work with her to ease it.  She’s also the smartest dog I’ve ever had.  And Belle came from a high kill shelter.  And now they get to things like this with their white lab friend:

So, this was my long-winded way of saying if you’re contemplating a new pet, I highly recommend getting a rescue.  They are the sweetest, snuggliest pets!