I had to Have it

I had to Have it

Authors Note

English is not my first language, prepare to dance through a few mispronunciations and misspellings.

As long as I can remember all I could dream of as a child was to have my own puppy to nurture. When my step dad brought home a black lab puppy that we named Bobby.

I was in heaven!

That joy only lasted a few short lived months.. I came home one day from school and the puppy was gone!

My parents had decided it was not convenient to have a dog with our schedules and he would be better off in the country side…

How about mentioning to your kids about your plans? I cried for a month straight. I was so attached to this puppy….

As time went by I started to knock on random peoples homes and ask them to dog sit and walk their dogs all to keep the momentum of having my own dog..

The years flew by and my memory faded from the loss of my puppy, but there was always that thought in my head that

I had to have it!

At 20 years old I had just gotten into a serious relationship and we were celebrating Christmas with my boyfriend’s entire family.

His youngest sister who was very sad that their older dog had just recently died wanted a new dog.

My boyfriend and I were assigned to go and pick out a puppy at the Breeders, the decision was to find a Rottweiler..

I will never forget that day when I saw my little puppy for the first time..

I had to have it!

She sat there against the fence starring right at me,with such intensity in her eyes, piercing right through my heart.

She was the smallest little runt in the litter, her paw was resting on the fence like a little lady, while all the other pups were running around showing off all their moves playing tug a war!

She just sat there with confidence mocking anyone that would come close to her.

I fell in love with the attitude and confidence that she demonstrated, it was pure intelligence shining through her with such arrogance and class!

I had to have her!

The only drawback was:

We were there to pick out a puppy for my boyfriends sister!

And I was not in any position to buy a dog! we had recently moved in together and moved up north to start our lives.. the money was tight!

I had to have her!

For the next three days the puppy and I were unseperable.

She came with me everywhere, my job was to hide her until Christmas morning, I carried her around in my jacket, we would even sneak her into the movies, the smell of puppy was heavenly..

She made me so happy….

I had to have her!

Christmas morning arrived and I was anxious… I didn’t want to let go of her.

It was with a heavy heart and I forced myself to bring her up to the house put her in a decorated box, sit myself down, hide the tears that were slowly rolling down my cheeks and watch his sister unwrap the box scream with joy hold the puppy for a few moments then look at me and say:

Can you watch her for me while I open all my other christmas presents? My boyfriend who later became my husband for many years, came from a family that spoiled the kids rotten with tons of presents.. It would take some time to unwrap all those presents!

The only thing I cared about that day was how much

I had to have her!

What could I do to keep her for myself? How could I convince my boyfriend we needed her? I was going mad for the next few hours watching them open presents holding on to my puppy so tight!

I had to have her!

The solution came when his sister asked me to dog sit the puppy while she went to her friends house..

In that moment I knew she was not worthy of this beautiful puppy, she didn’t desire her like I did!

She was only six years old and was not ready to take on the task to be in charge of a big dog that this puppy was going to grow into! The puppy was smart as a whip and would become a problem if she did not get the right guidance and training!

I looked at my boyfriend and I cried, I told him my thoughts and I suggested we go back to the same breeder pick up another puppy and exchange them and pretend we had gotten the urge to get one to!

He did not argue with me, we jumped into the car, drove out to the breeder, picked out the laziest dog we could find, brought her back and pretended she was the original Christmas gift.

Until this day no one knows we exchanged the dogs!

Ours was the clever, smart, athletic, well trained dog. Theirs became a little spoiled, untrained, and slow dog. My plan was flawless.

My puppy was named Toscana, she lived with us for nine years until we lost her to bone cancer. She was one of my biggest loves ever…

Visit Us On LinkedinVisit Us On TwitterVisit Us On FacebookVisit Us On PinterestVisit Us On Youtube