Forever family

 

Every greyhound that came to Greyhound Gardens was part of the family, lock, stock and barrel. We loved them like they were our own.

I've always done my best to keep track with as many as possible. This is Dude. He was young, handsome and big.

 

He went on to be the best service dog ever and was renamed Gilly. Still is. 

He had this fabulous overbite. Talk about a nice dog.

 

And then there was Otis. Oh to be da dog. Another young, very gentle giant. Unless of course you were small and furry.

We placed him in a home with a couple in their 40s. Apparently, that wasn't what he had in mind. He came back two weeks later because he howled all night long. Now that was news to me, he slept like a baby here.

This family with four children came along. Otis wanted kids. He loved those kids. They had a boy with autism and he was the perfect companion.

Shortly after we placed him, we got a call from the mom. She wanted to know if she would ever go to the bathroom alone again.

Oops, open door policy.

Otis totally rocked that families world. Including the dad. One Saturday morning the dad was having coffee on the back deck while Dude was doing his morning racetrack routine around the back yard. He finished running, went up onto the deck, started having a seizure and died before anything could be done. The dad even tried canine CPR.

That was a heart breaker, Otis was young, only 3 years old.

 

Ah yes, be still my beating heart Danté. All greyhounds are beautiful, but secretly, I adore the cow dogs. There is just something about white and black.

For all of his beautiful white and black, Dante´s personality was a match. What a cool dog. I seriously tried to hide him in my closet. I never ever mentioned his name when I talked to the president of the group, hoping that she would forget I had him.

 

Wasn't meant to be. Danté went to a wonderful home, he was a prince among princes and lived like a king. He was renamed Darby. At a very young nine years old, Darby lost his fight to osteo.

I'm not gonna lie, I cried right along with his dads.

 

 

The president of the adoption group knew me, knew me well and knew how to work me. She knew it was gonna be hard getting Danté's leash out of my tight grip.

Very coyly she slipped Gracie's leash into my hand as she firmly snagged Danté's leash.

Gracie was ten. She clearly was not happy with her momma's work situation and made her statement in the house. Since we are such home bodies, we agreed to take her and see if she behaved a little differently. 

She was ours and oh how we loved her. A dear friend of ours described her as a classy dog and she was.

We were robbed, 14 very short months osteo once again reared it's ugly head. We were devastated and still miss our little Gracie girl.

Hang in there, I have a reason for my walk down memory lane. You'll just have to come back to find out why.