Saturday Night Challenge: Family Pet

Last week's challenge from Randy Seaver's GeneaMusings. Hey! I'm only a week behind!

Here is your assignment if you choose to play along (cue the Mission Impossible music, please!):

1) What were your family pets?  What were their names?  How long did they live?  What stories do you have about them?

There have been a few cats over the years. However the one that stands out in my mind is the dog that I didn’t have.

Mikey was a mutt, a fox terrier and many other breeds mixed together. He was not my pet, but rather I was “his human.”

I know from other family members that he was adopted from the SPCA a couple years before I was born. The director told my Dad what a good dog he was, but that an overly strict man had raised him. When Mikey first came home, he would not so much as enter the living room without permission.

In my lifetime, he would never beg for scraps from the table. In fact, he had been so well trained as a puppy that if you accidentally dropped something on the floor during a meal, he wouldn’t take it. He would sit in his spot near the table, look at it and then look up at my Dad. The expression on his face seemed to say: “Can I have that, Dad please?” Dad would quickly give him permission and then he would go get the tasty morsel he so desperately wanted.

He was good with my two brothers, but they were teenagers and older. My parents worried before I was born how he would do with a baby in the house. This was answered the day I arrived home from the hospital as a newborn. Mikey met us at the back door and sniffed up at the bundle in Mom’s arms. He followed us into the living room where she placed me in the bassinet she had ready for me. Mikey lay down on the floor nearby and went to sleep.

A short time later, some of the neighbors stopped by to see the new baby. Up came Mikey wide-awake from his nap. Situated between the bassinet and them, he stood in a stance that said, do not pass and growled. Dad quickly told Mikey it was all right and to lay down, which he did.

That was the end of wondering if he would accept the baby. He had apparently thought something along the lines of: “Hmm, baby, she’s helpless. It’s my job to protect her.” My parents never needed to worry about me when Mikey was around. He was the watchdog of not only me, but the house as well.

In fact, my oldest brother would have a bit of trouble when he came home from college. He had a routine he would follow upon reaching the back door. He would open the door and thrust his suitcase in, telling the dog it was him before he would follow his suitcase inside. Otherwise, Mikey, not realizing who was coming in, was there growling and barking to defend the house.