Do you remember this beautiful high school senior I recently did senior portraits for?

Last week, I met up with her family for their Christmas portraits.

They brought their two dogs along for the shoot.

It was so sweet to watch them interact so lovingly with their dogs.  It started me thinking along the pet path.  I have never thought of myself as a pet person.  When I was 7 years old, my family moved out to the “country”.  My Dad built a custom home on an acre of land.  Throughout the years, we had several different pets off and on.  We had rabbits at one point.  They were cute, but one hot summer day, they all died of heat stroke.  For awhile, we boarded my Uncle’s horse.  That was neat.  But, the horse was a wild mustang so we couldn’t actually ride it.  I do remember going out and feeding it apples or carrots and even leading it around by a rope.  Once a large turtle wandered into our backyard and we took care of it until we were able to locate it’s owners.  That was pretty cool.  We had goats for awhile.  I could not get excited about the goats.  My little sister was allergic to cow’s milk so my parents bought a goat so we could have goat’s milk for her.  So, at least there was a function for that pet.  At some point, my Dad got a dog from the pound.  My Dad worked 24 hour shifts, so we were supposed to be in charge of feeding Cody when my Dad was at work.  Often, we would forget to feed him until we were all ready for school .  At that point, we didn’t want to go outside to feed him because he would inevitably jump up on us and get our clothes all muddy. I think he ended up back at the pound.

Well, then I move out.  Get married.  Have kids. Like most kids, my kids love animals.  Especially Mae Mae.  It is like they are therapeutic for her.  So, a couple of years ago, BJ and I decided to get a dog for our kids.  But, we had some stipulations.  My requirements:  It must be an outside dog.  It must be an attractive dog.  BJ’s requirements:  The dog must love to run and be a great running partner.  So, we settled on a lab.  We found a breeder who was selling pure-bred black lab 4-month old puppies.  We bought one.  We really liked her.  But, we had issues.  First of all.  She lived in our backyard in Arizona.  While we never kept her long enough to live through a torturous summer of 115 degree weather, I was worried about her out there.  We would go outside to play with her and she would get so excited that her tail would start wagging.  Because she was so big, she would knock the Foof right over!  Plus, she chewed up everything!  The hose, her bowl, her water dispenser, the trampoline, the kids shoes, etc.  Then, the big problem.  We didn’t know this, but apparently, she barked incessantly whenever we were not at home.  None of our neighbors complained or let us know about the problem until it all blew up one night.  It was during the Christmas season.  We were out late at a party and came home to craziness.  We had notes on our garage and our front door, neighbors confronting us, etc.  Apparently, one of our neighbors was having a party that night as well.  In his backyard, which bordered our backyard.  There was alcohol and some loud, raucous behavior.  Well, of course, Jetta was barking.   Probably even more than normal.  Well, they were mad (and probably a little drunk).  They started throwing stuff at her.  And yelling at her.  One of our neighbors was watching from her upstairs window and called her husband on his cell phone panicking that someone was going to kill our dog.  Scary!  Once we were aware of the barking issue, we had to start putting her in her kennel in the garage when we would leave.  Well, it got to be too much.  Too stressful.  Too sad for her.  Finally, we found a new home for her with a previous photography client who loved black labs.  Their lab had died of old age about a year earlier.  They wanted to keep her inside and love her.

And…that is the extent of my life with pets.  But, once again I am finding myself thinking about getting a pet.  However, if I were to get a pet now, I would go about it totally differently.  I would get a tiny, little, cute dog that we could keep inside.  That could become part of the family.  That the kids could snuggle when they felt sad.  I have this idyllic image in my head of the family watching a movie and our little puffball falling asleep while we stroke it’s soft hair.  It just seems really sweet.  I know the kids would be in heaven.  Maybe I could become a pet lover after all