Yes there is truly nothing better than a good dog....dogs are not cats, they hang on your every word, they follow you around looking for guidance, they view you as their queen. I've had some great dogs in my years, not as many dogs as cats because they are definitely higher maintenance (you can't just leave them alone for hours on end).
The first dog I considered my own and not a family pet was Anthony. I got him for my 16th birthday from my then boyfriend. A friend of ours had 3-4 mini adult poodles at his house and there were 2 litters of maybe 6-8 puppies within a week. I wasn't fond of poodles and if I was going to get one, I wanted a black one, but I went over to my friend Steve's house and there were these 10 or so puppies all jumping up in the air at him. It was a pretty funny scene,and Steve was a big guy (he passed away a year or so ago to kidney cancer). All the black ones were spoken for but there was this all dark brown one and I took him. I think my boyfriend paid $10 for him because of the bill for having his tail docked. Well I didn't know a lot about dogs, we'd always had one but I'd never had to bother with it. We had a fenced in yard and would just let them out. First thing, he needed a name. He would just follow me around with no leash on (he was maybe 8 weeks old when I got him) and we had this friend who we would yell 'Anthony' when he drove by in his souped up car (his name was not Anthony and his car sounded like a dishwasher). My little puppy looked up at me, so that is how he got his name. He went everywhere with me and he slept on my bed, though he would get off some time during the night, but was always back by the time I woke up in the morning. He knew a lot of tricks. He would whack at you if you put his bowl on your head and say 'where's my hat'...he knew how to sneeze, he loved his hartz flexi crockie best.
I went off to college and though initially I did take him with me, it wasn't fair to him to be in a dorm room all day (trust me, nobody knew he was there, it just wasn't fair to him) so he went back home. Freshman year my dad died suddenly and I had gotten home and was upset, I remember sitting on the stairs inside and crying and Anthony proceeded to bring me, one by one, every last one of his toys, and finally just putting his chin on me and looking up at me. I swear he cried as well.
I moved off campus after that and he came with me. He was alone a lot and though I think I could leave him for DAYS and he'd never do anything in the house (I never did that, but there were times I'd be gone for hours and he'd wait til I got home). I decided to get him a 'friend'. I was down at a pound in South County someplace and there was this tiny puppy. I brought her home and named her Gretchun, no idea why, I think she just looked like a Gretchun. As smart as Anthony was, so was she, but she didn't use it for good, only evil. Unlike Anthony, she would pee on the floor at the drop of a hat. She learned to move the chair across the floor so she could open the cupboards and steal all the food. She once ate a box of Good and Plenty, then hurled them all over the pillows on the bed. She once ate an entire Gingerbread house and ended up spending Thanksgiving at my vet's house. She also auditioned for the David Letterman show's stupid pet tricks because she could peel a banana and then eat it (she freaked at doing it in front of an audience).
One day Anthony didn't seem to feel very well and it turned out he had kidney failure. There wasn't anything you could do. You can't make a dog drink more water so he was relegated to special food and an under the skin infusion of lactated ringers solution, 1x per day and towards the end 2x. He lived a great life for another 4 years and died when he was 16.
Gretchun, not being a great dog, needed a friend. I got Muff'n about then. She was of mixed breed (Gretchun was Chihuahua and terrier, a white long haired, didn't look like a chihuahua) terrier mix. Muff was a great dog as well, though not as bright as some other dogs I've had. She was great with the kids, larger than Ant or Gretch (both well under 10 pounds). Gretchun went into a seizure one day, I think she was around 12 and died from that.
Muff was an only dog for a long time (not counting the cat population in this story). One day, Sophie came to stay. Sophie was as dumb as a box o' rocks. She was a red shepherd mix. She would retrieve the ball until the cows came home and my kids would throw it for hours. One day when Bec was maybe 2, she was waving the ball in the air and Sophie jumped up to get it, knocked Bec down and as she stepped over her to get the ball, she ripped her face with her nails...over 100 stitches later, I couldn't look at Bec and Sophie, she's the only animal I've ever given back to the pound, but with the understanding they find her a home and not euthanize her. Though not truly her fault, she needed to be a home with older kids in it.
Muff was like having furniture for a pet. Not a mean bone in her body, but not really an active family member. She died at the old age of 16.
I waited a few weeks, but it was summer and summer is always a good time to get a puppy (I'm home a lot in the summer) so I started scouting the pounds, didn't want to drag the kids around to them and things had changed, though the internet wasn't really up and running as an adoption place, pounds were getting more rigid with just who they would give an animal to. I'd go to one place and fill out this huge form and wait, I'm not good at waiting. Finally I saw this 6 month old puppy and brought the kids to see her. She had been thrown out of a car in front of the pound. Stupid people left her tags on and got charged with it. Took her home (after she drooled, hyperventilated and heaved in the car the whole way). She already had a name, Shelby, and she seemed to know it, so the name stayed. That was almost 13 years ago now.
Shelby is a good dog, she also does not have a mean bone in her body (to be honest, Muff'n only tolerated the kids, especially as she got older). It took me over a year to be able to get her into a car. She couldn't even walk by it without heaving. One day I was showing her photo to a friend and she asked if her name was Shelby. I said yes, she then asked her birthdate, which I knew because I had contacted the vet where her tags were from (to find out shots, etc. and had asked about her birthday). Turns out my friend had taken her brother and sister from another rescue. There had been 3 puppies but she took 2 (and felt badly about leaving the 3rd one but 2 was enough).
She does some cool tricks. She sneezes on command, actually all my dogs have done that. My mom taught Anthony. Gretchun (nicknamed the 'weasal' btw) learned that if Anthony sneezed he got a biscuit so she learned. Muff'n learned. Shelby not only does that, but because she is a shepherd mix, they 'snap' their jaws when they get excited, we called that 'crocking' and she does that on command. She also falls to the floor if you yell bang at her (the kids taught her that).
She's 13 next week and really though groan-y and a little limpy, does really well. She can keep up with Ozzy, in fact, she can outrun him to the frisbee (though not this week, she hurt her 'shoulder' last week and has to take it easy for a bit). I got Ozzy because I know 13 is old for a dog, especially a large dog like Shelby (60# of large dog) but she's been blessed with decent health and gets her vet visit tomorrow (though she was there last week for her injury).
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