One Dog, Two Dogs, Three Dogs, Four...

“You wrote a book about Holly, why don’t you write one about Jennie?”

This was from my wife, Stella. She had come into the living room and found me sleeping on the floor beside the couch. When I awoke, startled by her entrance, she greeted me with this admonition.

I looked around.

There lying on the floor less than a foot from me was Jennie, our old gray Weimaraner sound asleep, snoring quietly, but managing to stay as close to me as she could. On the other hand, Holly, our black tomcat, was on the other side of the room doing his cat thing, lying in the warm sun near the sliding glass door to the porch, probably wanting to go out.

I sat up, leaned my back against the couch, and looked at the two. She was right, of course. I had written a book about the first four years of my association with Holly. Its title, Holly!!, aptly describes those four years. The fact that Holly was across the room, while Jennie was sound asleep beside me during my nap, speaks a lot about the relationship of the three of us.

When I take a nap during the day, I usually take it on the living room floor and Jennie usually joins me, lying close to me and staying there till I wake up. Her doing this is an interesting phenomenon. When we had other dogs, they did this as well. I’ll write about this later in this book. But it’s Stella’s rebuke that I’m addressing here, and it goes a great deal to explaining this book.

Let me set the stage a little. This book covers a period when Stella, Holly, Jenny, and I lived in a small Mississippi town. Our house then was a large sprawling beach house bordering the waters of the Mississippi Sound. It was a tranquil life and one that Stella and I over a period of more than thirty years enjoyed. Part of that enjoyment was because we had the close wonderful company of Jennie and several other dogs that preceded her. There are many ways to spend that many years, but we believe our way was exceptionally nice.

It is this intimate closeness with these dogs that’s really my answer to Stella’s question. It’s a little hard to explain, but let me try.

Look at the frontispiece of this book. The dog pictured is Jennie, but it could be any of the several dogs we have had. In the picture, there is no question of what Jennie is thinking. Clearly written on her face is all the charisma that is her. It shows her demeanor, her spirit, and her willingness to do whatever is asked. It shows exactly what she is: a wonderful, kind, selfless companion that Stella and I treasured and will remember all the years of our lives. All of our several dogs were like that.

Cats are different. The book that I wrote about Holly also pictures him in the frontispiece. The demeanor of the young cat that stares back at you from the page is starkly different from the open, friendly face of Jennie. What you see is an enigma that if viewed at the end of the four-year period covered in the book would still project the same mystique.

The day a friend handed me a cat and, telling me it was a nice cat, walked me out the door of her shop, I found I was the owner of an exotic animal that I knew nothing about. In the years that followed and still today, I have found that my knowledge of cats has not increased one iota.

In effect this was why I wrote Holly!! I found that with Holly, I was exploring unknown territory, regions that were blank in my experience, and with the book, I wanted to provide documentation of that experience.

Not so with Jennie. Jennie was a known entity, a familiar being whose presence was part of our everyday life, a being whose thoughts and loves were simple and devoid of the slightest wile. To write about her would be as if I were writing about a good book, a nice meal, or a rather pleasant day. Writing about the everyday intimacies I shared with Jennie would be far different than writing about the exotic antics of Holly.

But reflecting on Stella’s comment, I found that in the past several years I had written short stories that included Jennie as well as our other dogs. These stories, scattered in other media, were my attempt to portray the wonderful everyday life Stella and I had living in that beach house in that small south Mississippi town on the shore of the Mississippi Sound.

The stories containing the dogs provided the essence of those times. So I have gathered these scattered stories together into this anthology to give a sense of the joy we have had with these dogs, as well as to reflect on those times.

As I write this, Stella and I are at a hiatus in our lives. For us to have another Weimaraner is impractical at this time; the beach house is gone, totally washed away by Hurricane Katrina’s storm surge. In the years that lie ahead, we plan to settle again in spacious surroundings that will allow us to have another of those wonderful dogs that for so many years enriched our lives.

Note that, although the several dogs were all Weimaraners, each was endowed with very special, very distinct characteristics. Their differences are part of the charm of these stories, and I have set them down in this book in the sequence that they entered and departed our lives.

In the pages ahead, please enjoy meeting and getting to know Gretal, Heron, Lillie, and Jennie, as well as spending a few short moments with Heidi, Annabelle, and Nancy. I hope their antics as we and they lived together in the beach house will please you as much they pleased Stella and me.

“You wrote a book about our cat, Holly, why not one about Jennie?”

Stella looked at me dozing on the couch. Lying on the floor beside me was Jennie, our old gray Weimaraner, snoring quietly. Conversely, Holly, our tomcat, was lying in the sun across the room, ignoring everything.

I have written a book called Holly!! I knew nothing about cats and in Holly!! I wanted to document my experiences. Why not Jennie? Well, to me, Jennie was a known entity, a friend whose thoughts and loves were simple, devoid of wile. To write about her would be as if I were writing about a nice meal, a pleasant day. Writing about the everyday intimacies I shared with Jennie would be far different than writing about the exotic antics of Holly.

But on reflection, I found that in the past I had written stories about Jennie as well as our other dogs. Scattered in other media, these stories, portrayed the wonderful life Stella and I had living in a beach house on the Mississippi Sound. My stories of the several dogs that shared our life provide the essence of those times.

So, I have gathered them together in this anthology to give a sense of the joy Stella and I have had with living with these wonderful dogs, as well as to reflect on those times. Stories that convey what I feel when I and my dogs walk on the beach the wonderment of those times.