Jasper.

I recently got an email asking if we had any pets (besides the one-eared cat). I realized that I've never introduced you properly to my first child – Jasper. My loyal, gentle, sweet, affectionate, patient Jasper.

Jasper is the fourth dog I've referred to as "my dog" in this lifetime. He the second dog to join Pete and I as a young family, and the only surviving canine in our clan. And Jasper is my first true-love pup since Mutzie, our childhood mutt. Jasper is, as my mom put it, my "forever dog."

Jasper has been with us since I met him at the humane society when he was a puppy twelve years ago. I had no intention of getting a dog. Just a half-hour to burn before an appointment. But really, I think he called me there.

He was lying on his side in a big raucous pen of puppies, quietly gnawing on a tennis ball as his brothers and sisters barked, romped, jumped, stepped on his head, played, rolled, and made rowdy mischief all around him.

"That is my dog." I said out loud. When I lifted him out of the pen he let out a great sigh and rested his puppy head on my shoulder.

He was my dog, and I was his person.

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I love you, Jasper. Thanks for being tolerant to the parades of cats, kids, and mail carriers all these years. I hope you stick around to scare the UPS guy for a long time to come.

 

12 thoughts on “Jasper.

  1. kathy says:

    We, too, had a Jasper when I was a kid. Like all our other dogs, he was a Lab, but we suspected he had a bit of mutt in him due to the white blaze on his chest. Anyhow, he was more mischievous than we could properly handle (including the time he chewed my eyeglasses to pieces), so I think he went to live with another family eventually. It’s good to see that your Jasper is so loved and steady.

  2. Rachel Wolf says:

    Kathy,
    Your Jasper sounds like our Shilo. A white-chest spot lab mix with so much spunk. She was the first dog that Pete and I adopted into our family; the dog that Jasper came to play with (and mellow out, we erroneously hoped). Shilos fate came when she followed us to town one day and was hit by a car two miles from our house. Amazingly we found her just before she died. It was dark out and we drove by her and Pete said There was a jacket or something in the road. Can we go back? She got to be with us before she moved on. She was a honey, but a HANDFUL in the way that only a type-A personality lab can be. And so now its just our Jasper.

    ~ Rachel

  3. kendra says:

    we’ve pretended she is a carolina dog! but really she’s just a mutt. and even though she is only 30 lbs, she has two dew claws on one of her back paws! (one on the other). i’ve been told she looks like every street dog in india. ha!

  4. Danielle says:

    I’m such a sucker for this kind of stuff, and I won’t lie–this post made me a little misty-eyed. It’s so heartbreaking to think about how we can never know what kinds of lives rescue pets lived before we brought them home or how they ended up at the humane society in the first place.

  5. Rachel Wolf says:

    Danielle,
    He came in with a whole litter. After they weaned they dropped off the lot of them. Seven I think. We had a rescue dog when I was a kid who had some seemingly irrational fears. But she lived a long and happy – and safe – life with us.

    Rachel

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