Our friends recently got a new puppy and have had a dickens of a time settling on a name for her. They tried a tricky name.....Ency....based on N.C. the state in which they got her. But try as they may they just could not help themselves from defaulting to the name of one of their beloved dogs from the past....Dutchess. So, I guess, Dutchess she is. I was thinking about how dog names go in and out of vogue just as names for humans do. Do you know any current Spots....or Sheps?? I don't. But I do remember a very special Shep in my life. Actually, I think that was the only dog that I truly trusted and felt totally bonded to. I was born when Shep was dog king of my grandfather's farm. My mother and I lived in a new house my young newly married parents had built on the edge of my grandpa's property.......about a city block's length from the homestead. My dad was living off Uncle Sam in Hawaii during the war.

Shep was a big yellow sheep dog. Don't see many of those around these parts anymore either. His hair was long and many times not well groomed. I can still smell his doggy stink after he had taken a nice cool swim in the ditch on a hot summer day. My description does not present him as well as he deserved.

It was common in the days, when I was born, to put babies out in buggies or carriages for their afternoon nap. When the weather was condusive, my mother would set me out on the east side of the house where there was some shade and there I would restore my energy for the rest of the day. Somehow Shep came to know that I was all alone out in the yard and he began his practice of strolling down the country dirt road just after lunch each day to sit beneath my buggy. He was a quiet presence but let anyone try to tamper with the baby and he would become fierce. I don't think it ever happened but I know Shep. As I grew up, Shep and I became pals. He was so patient with me. When I climbed on his back and treated him like my horse, he complied.

I spent hours and hours at my grandparent's home. I am not sure which house felt more like home. I received liberal amounts of love next door at the place where my mother grew up. I never doubted my grandparents love for me. It was a fairy tale childhood. I worked right along side both grandparents. I was taught how to get a drink from the pump in the milkhouse with my little tin cup. I learned how to hold a plow pulled by a tractor. (A few years before I was born, Grandpa graduated from horse to tractor). Grandma taught me to make lye soap, cook Dutch dishes, grow worms for fishing, make wine from the Concord grapes in her garden. What a rich heritage.

When I hear of children whose childhoods were/are filled with abuse.....I feel somewhat guilty for the blessings I enjoyed. I do know, though, that God intended childhood to be what I experienced and not what some live with and through. Thank you, Lord, for the blessings you granted an undeserving little girl in northwest Indiana.....she didn't have much money and so wasn't very rich by the world's standards, but rich beyond comparison with people that loved her and treated her with respect. Money can't buy those treasures.