The Sundance Kid

I did not mean for today to become a pet-centric post day. However, earlier, I realized my new found love for my newly adopted kitty, and about an hour ago, I found out that my 15 year old min-pin died today at a doggy boarding kennel. He was the small, ankle-biting, yapping type of dog I mentioned in my earlier post, and I loved him dearly. He was my dog.

When I was in 3rd grade, my PE teacher’s dog had puppies, and my parents decided that now was a great time to get me a dog, since I had been begging for one since I was old enough to talk. When we got there, my mom fell completely in love with the runt of the litter. He was tiny, prissy, and would only let you hold him for about 2 minutes before he would suddenly jump down and go do something more important. My mom had to have him. I fell in love with the chubbiest, silliest and laziest of the litter. I picked him up when we first got there, and he was content to just sit in my lap. Forever. I could not leave without this puppy. So, my mom did what any mother would do when confronted with this situation: She got both. Her only condition for this was that she got to name them. And I didn’t mind, she was much more creative in that department than I would ever be anyway. She named them Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid. See, I told you.

When I first got him, my mom tried to tell me he couldn’t sleep with me, but I would sneak him up to my room every night (and always be too lazy to wake up early in the morning to take him back downstairs). After awhile, she just gave in. He had this adorable habit of laying under the covers in between my legs. That was his spot. And I could move him, kick him (accidentally, in my sleep, of course) and uncover him, and he would not move. Then when my dad would come to wake me up in the morning, he would growl from his warm hidey-hole under my covers, but not move. Not once. It’s a good thing the person coming into my room was my dad and not a burgler or a kidnapper, cuz Dancer wasn’t going to be doing anything about it.

Through the next 15 years, Sundance would be there…when I was in 4th grade and had a cast on during Spring Break and couldn’t do anything. In 5th grade when I won a trip to a beach house because I sold 800 boxes of Girl Scout Cookies, but couldn’t go because of chicken pox. In 7th grade when I changed schools and had no friends. In 8th grade during my first “real” crush. In highschool, before I could drive, and I was at home during Friday night football games because I lived a half an hour away from school and my parents didn’t want to take me. He was there for me to lay on, to cuddle with and who would listen to me rant during fights with friends, boyfriends, and parents.

It was my first experience with unconditional love.

And I will miss him.