SUMMARY: Amber photos.
We got a puppy when I was a kid (Sam, who lived to be 13 or so), but that's not the same thing as having my own puppy when I grew up and moved out on my own. Amber was my first dog and my first puppy. (Boost is my 6th dog but only my 2nd real puppy.)Just had a ton of old slides scanned. None seem to be really sharp and clear, but it's what I've got!
She was so tiny when she came home with me--just 6 weeks. I have so few photos of her as a very small puppy, and she grew so fast!
This is my first-ever photo of her, Christmas Eve 1978, the first day that she came home with me. That night I slept on the floor of my parents' house so I could be with her and with my family, too. This was wayyyyyy before I had a clue about crates.
This is my next-ever photo of her, sometime in the next 4 weeks--taken at the apartment complex where I lived but had to give notice and move out because they didn't allow dogs.
So we moved in with my parents for a while, while the townhouse I bought was still being built.
She loved her peanut can!
But Sam hated having a puppy around; growled at her, sniped at her, ignored her. Until one day when my Mom and I were upstairs and the dogs were outside and Mom called me over to the window--
As soon as I stepped outside, though, Sam went back to growling and being hostile.
Anyway, Amber grew up so fast! My parents had a huge sandbox in their yard at that time and Amber loved to dig in it and play with her can.
She had the most amazingly expressive face, already showing up at maybe 3 months old or so--the classic wrinkled forehead of concern:
Me can has can fun!
Me see green thing!
Eventually the townhouse was ready and we moved in. Here she is at 14 months--still a scrawny teenager. My girl!
(Photo credits-- erm -- some mine, some my parents')
Awww...what a sweetie!
ReplyDeleteHow many hundreds of dollars have you spent since then on dog toys? And all it really takes is a peanut can! She was beyond adorable and I'm so glad you shared her with us.
ReplyDeleteVirginia (a fan in Texas who shares your pain so often!)
I know! And Remington loved cardboard boxes!
DeleteWhat an adorable girl! You're so lucky to have the photos. Bet you still miss her...
ReplyDeleteI do still miss her, but in a funny way. Her death was so painful that it was 2 years before I could even bear the thought of another dog in the house. When I did get another dog, it was Remington, and it was because he looked almost exactly like her. (Of course, their personalities were quite different.) While Remington was fatally ill 8 years later, I realized that I couldn't remember much of anything at all about Amber except for a few little things here and there. But the day after Rem died, as I drove 2 hours to an agility trial, every little thing about Amber came flooding back into my mind.
DeleteThen, a week later, I couldn't remember any of it again. Had I realized how fleeting it all was, I'd have written it down right there and then.
The mind is an odd thing.