I want to welcome you again to my blog.
I wrote a first blog when the Butch Book was published. This page will have those blog entries.
I hope that you enjoy the book about the little unattractive dog whose feelings were hurt by unkind words but was happy when gratitude was shown. After all, we are all special.
Blog Post #1
In The Beginning
Butch was born in the Rio Grande Valley of Texas in 1969 to a registered daschund mother and a traveling man of unknown lineage. Butch never knew his Daddy. The encounter produced a litter of mixed breed puppies which the family could not sell.
Our youngest son went to school with one of the boys in the family. He came home from school and said that they were giving away the puppies… We happened to be dogless at that time, so we gathered everyone into the car and went to pick a puppy. The children picked Butch because he looked like his mother.
Little did we know how he was going to change. As Butch grew his daschund body became more rounded and chubby, but he kept his short legs and rather long nose. In adolescence he began turning brindle in color. His brown coat had black streaks. He became a brindle weenie dog.
He was definitely not attractive. More than one person stopped in their tracks, took a second look at him, and remarked, “I believe that is the ugliest dog I have ever seen.”
In the original story I called him an ugly dog, but I decided that was unkind as he couldn’t help how he looked. What he lacked in looks, he made up in personality.
We got the goat shortly after we got Butch, and the two were inseparable. We were a few miles out of town, and they had plenty of room to romp and play. They were a happy pair. You never saw one without the other.
The neighbors soon grew accustomed to seeing the dog and the goat playing together in the yard. The children joined them after school for good times.
Note: The original story was written in 1972 and was aimed at 3rd to 5th graders. It remained in a box of “stuff” until about 3 years ago when I decided to change it to a picture book format.
Blog Post #2
Habits
A paved county road was in front of the house where we lived when we got Butch and Nanny. Traffic was sparse and consisted of a few cars and also tractors pulling farm implements. There was no fenced yard, but the pair seemed to always be close to the house.
The children came in one afternoon and reported that Butch had chased a car. We planned what to do the next time this happened. This was dangerous and needed to be stopped. Soon a neighbor saw both the dog and the goat running after a car..
They had found a new game. We set up a watch and finally caught them in the act. Butch was spanked with a rolled up newspaper and scolded with a strong “No.” We had no idea how to discipline a goat and had to hope that if the dog was stopped, that the goat would stop too. We were persistent, and after a while it ceased – at least when we were home.
It was funny to see, but it was unsafe. One of the neighbors said he was always temped to drive by just to see that goat running down the road behind the dog..
Goats have an instinct to climb. Nanny soon started surveying the world around her from the top of the butane tank which was in the yard. Butch didn’t sit on the ground very long before he joined her. His little legs were short, but he was becoming a jumper. He jumped right up beside her and they would stand together looking around. Butch usually tired of this game before Nanny and would jump down. He would sit and wait patiently for her to join him.
Blog Post #3
First Grade Class
I went to East Elementary in Breckenridge on Tuesday and read to a first grade class. They were a chatty, fun group and most had something they wanted to say.
We almost immediately got off tract with the fact that I am a grandmother, actually a great grandmother. Hands went up immediately. I was ready to explain the great grandmother thing, when a little boy said that his grandpa had to go to the hospital. Then I knew where it was going. Sure enough, his grandpa died. Hands were still up. Before I could say anything a little girl blurted out that her grandma died. Stop right there! I asked the teacher if I had time to address this. I thought that it was important. So, I put on my counselor hat for a few minutes and talked in 6 year old terms about the life cycle from babies to old age. We all die and that makes everyone sad. After a while we remember the fun things and good times, and we have good memories of that person.
I stopped there and got back to Butch. They were very attentive and really followed the story. They all wanted to talk about their pets. Most of them had dogs and kitties Sure enough two of them had “weenie” dogs.
We would be there yet if time had not run out.
Blog Post #4
The Goatnapper
We went upstate for Christmas in 1970. While we were gone someone built a road and moved a mobile home into one of the few wooded areas around us. The house was not visible from the road.
Our telephone service was an 8 party line. Shortly after midnight on Jan. 1 the phone rang. When we answered, no one was one the line. There were no extensions or cordless phones, so the phone was in a hallway. This continued every 5 or 10 minutes for several calls. Phone service in the RGV (Rio Grande Valley) at that time was not good. We had begun to worry that someone was trying unsuccessfully to get through to us when this obviously drunk male told us to stop hanging up on him. Ken told him that he had the wrong number. The man hung up and immediately called back and again told Ken to stop answering. We could not take the receiver off the hook as it would disable the other 7 phones and someone might have an emergency. The time between calls increased but they continued all night. About 6 AM I got up and made coffee as sleep was impossible. I answered and the guy cussed me out in spades. Ken answered the next time, hung up and began calling all of General Telephone’s emergency numbers. He was told that no one was working on New Year’s Day therefore they could do nothing. Ken was persistent. He went from one supervisor to another until they finally decided that he wasn’t going to give up. About 7 AM the manager of General Telephone for South Texas called and got information on what was happening. He started checking. He called back and told us the problem and assured us that it would be fixed immediately even though it was a holiday. While we were gone the new neighbor had accidently been given our telephone number and our ring.
A few weeks passed and the children and I came home from school one afternoon. Butch was waiting for us, but there was no goat.
We checked with all of the neighbors and drove down every country road around us. There was no goat to be found. I did not tell the children but I was fearful someone had stolen her for cabrito. (barbecued kid goat)
When Ken came home we told him that we had checked everywhere except at the new neighbor’s. We watched as he went down the road and disappeared into the wooded area. The children kept watching. Thirty minutes passed and I became mildly worried. Could this man be dangerous? After an hour passed I began to seriously worry. Another thirty minutes passed and I had decided to alert a neighbor and tell him that I was going to check on Ken. If I wasn’t back in 10 minutes the children would call him. I had just gotten my “nerve up” when Ken drove up with Nanny.
The guy had Nanny tied to a tree. Ken said that he got out, walked up to the guy and said, “I am your telephone neighbor and that is my goat.” He must have had “rehab counselor” written across his forehead, because the guy began to apologize and then tell him his sad story. He and his wife were having trouble and she would not go with him on New Year’s Eve. He went alone, got very drunk, and started calling home. At first she hung up on him, thus there was no one on the line when we answered. Then she totally ignored the phone as he kept calling. She had since moved out and he gave Ken more details than he wanted to know. Ken kept listening as the story got sadder and sadder.
Ken did not ask if the animals had wandered into his yard or if he had passed by and taken her. He certainly wasn’t looking for her owners. I suspect that he was thinking barbecue, but we will never know.
He moved shortly thereafter.
Blog Post #5
A New Home
We moved to a larger house when Butch was about a year old. It is actually the house described in the book. It had a tropical yard surrounded by hedges on two sides. On the third side and across the driveway was a citrus grove. A fenced pasture was in back. It had wonderful places to explore. The animals and the children loved it. The adults in our life enjoyed it too as was evidenced by backyard barbecues almost every weekend.
The dog and goat developed a new route for their morning walk. As in the book, they walked down a narrow sandy road surrounded by commercial citrus groves toward an irrigation canal. They walked beside the canal to another road which brought them to the road in front of the house and thus back home. The neighbors said that they could almost set their clocks by the time at which Butch and Nanny passed by every morning.
Our oldest son had an incubator and soon there were baby chicks. We built a chicken house and pen in the grove. The next project was to build a corral in the pasture and bring two horses down from Abilene, a bay quarter horse named Little Britches and an Appaloosa mare named Dolly. Next to join the animal family was an aged, retired King Ranch work horse named Mister. Then one Sunday morning Dolly had a colt which the children named Sunday Surprise. This completed our animal family at that location.
Butch barked at the horses for a time before finally giving up that they were going to stay. One of the children’s cousins, a city girl, found the horses fascinating. Ken promised her that she could have Mister’s first colt. To her delight, her parents agreed to that arrangement. Eventually she came to the realization that Mister would never have a colt. She is now the mom to two teenagers and still tells Ken that she thinks he was unkind to keep her waiting years for her colt.
Blog Post #6
First Dog
Our first family dog was a female Weimaraner officially named Kevin’s Miss Schultz and referred to as Schultzie. She was a gift from dear friends to our first son, Kevin. My first thought was: “Just what I need, a baby and a puppy.” However, she quickly won my affection and it did not take us long to realize that weimars really do think they are people. She was definitely one of the family. When Kevin started to walk, she thought she should take every step that he did. When he would start to fall, he would grab her. She would stand very still until he regained his balance.
When Kevin was about two years old, we decided to have a picture made with him and Schultzie and use the picture on our Christmas cards. Schultzie had been obedience trained and when she was told to stay, she stayed. The photographer decided he wanted her sitting with Kevin beside her. She sat and she stayed. The toddler did not want to “stay.” The photographer would say, “Now, don’t move.” Then I would reinforce by telling him not to move, to stay right beside Schultzie, etc. It didn’t work. Finally, we took a break and they guy said, “We just have to get a good picture. That dog is SO good.”
Schultzie also knew the meaning of the word no. The toddler was learning, but he was a little obstinate at times. One evening he was determined to get an object off the coffee table and Ken kept telling him “ no.” Schultzie was sitting beside Ken taking it all in. Finally Kevin gave Ken a defiant look and grabbed for the object. Ken raised his arm to administer a little love tap when Schultzie grabbed his arm in midair. She never bit him, just used her soft bird dog mouth to stop him. Then, when he turned to look at her, she gave him an “oops” look, and released his arm. She was just taking care of her baby.
She continued to be protective of Kevin as he grew older. When he was about 4 years old, he went with Ken to feed the cattle at the farm west of Abilene. Kevin and Schultzie were running around while Ken fed. When Schultzie kept barking Ken looked and saw her leap to the side. He looked again and realized that she was between Kevin and a rattlesnake. She would crouch, and as the snake struck, she would jump to the side. The snake would recoil and strike again, she would again jump to the side. Kevin was about ten feet from her watching it all. Ken believes to this day that she knew exactly what she was doing in keeping the snake away from Kevin.
She had a love for green tomatoes. Ken had a garden outside the fenced area of the back yard. He left the back gate open whenever he worked in his garden. Schultzie was usually right with him. He kept complaining that his tomatoes would get almost ripe and then disappear. He thought that there was a tomato thief getting them. I was watching her one afternoon and saw her get a tomato and take it behind her dog house. She quickly went for another one. Yep, she was the tomato thief. She would stock pile them behind her dog house, then lay down and enjoy them.
Schultzie was large enough that children often wanted to ride her. She would indulge them just so long. When she got tired of the game, she would sit very straight and wait until they got close to her. The she would raise one leg and whack them with her paw. She was large enough and strong enough to shove them back.
She lived a long life and made the move with us to Tucson when Kevin was eight years old and she had two more children to watch, Charles and Cynthia. We all loved the desert. We often took a picnic supper into the desert to watch the sunset. She went on all outings. In those days you could drive into Sabino Canyon (now closed to traffic and go in on a tram). She and the children played in the water and climbed over the rocks. Ken had a jeep and he and the boys went out almost every Saturday. She loved riding in the jeep down the washes, up into the mountains, over the rocks, etc. She lived out her life there and we buried her out in the desert. I cried more than the children.
Blog Post #7
A New Friend
We had a friend who had a beautiful young German Shepherd named Princess. She brought the dog along with her to one of our weekend pot lucks. Princess was a friendly dog and got along well with Butch, Nanny and the children present that afternoon. They had fun frolicking on the lawns around the house and the surrounding citrus grove.
We soon found out why she had asked if it would be OK if the dog came with her that afternoon. She was preparing to move from a house into an apartment and did not want to confine the dog to the small space. She was scoping us out for a possible new home for Princess. We liked animals and had the space, so we agreed to take her. Princess adapted very quickly and soon fit into the routines of country living. She went on the morning runs with Butch and Nanny and was always eager to play with the children after school.
We now had two dogs, a goat, and four horses plus chickens outside, plus Sam inside.
That was enough to teach the children responsibility for animals. Kevin took care of his chickens and both boys helped feed the horses. All of them helped with the dogs and the bird. The least liked chore was probably cleaning the bird cage.
All of us shared the enjoyment of the animals.
Blog Post #8
Goodbye Nanny
Big changes were in store for the animals. As owner’s lives change, so do the lives of their pets.
In the spring of 1972, Ken accepted the opportunity to move into the central office of the Texas Rehabilitation Commission. The transition began as soon as he chose his replacement in Harlingen. He spent his weeks between Harlingen and Austin. He was training his replacement and becoming oriented to his duties in Austin. We gathered information about schools, property and more advice than we needed. We decided on the Georgetown area. This meant that our country dogs were going to become town dogs and there would be no place for Nanny.
We spent days composing an ad to place in the newspaper. The finished ad described a pet goat that must have a good home, would remain a pet and never be barbecued. The ad drew comments and amusement from the employees at the Valley Morning Star in Harlingen as well as many who read it.
We screened several who responded and decided on a lady who already had a couple of goats and several other animals. She needed to enlarge her goat pen and would come for Nanny when she got the work done. We were all there to bid Nanny goodbye on the Saturday morning when she left. We thought that the lady might come back in a pickup. She showed up in her brand new four door Chrysler car. She told us that we could visit Nanny anytime and this made the children feel better. Our farewells were said and the lady put Nanny into the back seat of her car. Ken told the children that they could be assured that anyone who would put a goat into the back seat of a new car was going to take good care of her.
We went by to see her couple of times before we moved and felt confident that she had a good home and was happy.
Blog Post #9
Goodbye South Texas
The day came when we were ready to leave the only home the little dog Butch had ever known. We were ready to head north to Georgetown. Goodbyes had been said to friends and coworkers. The house had been emptied and cleaned.
Moving day dawned cloudy and misty. Our plan called for Ken to drive a truck and for the two dogs to ride with him. The children and I would follow in our station wagon with Sam, the parrot. Sam was a seasoned traveler and had his own travel cage. It was small to keep the bird from being jostled from movement of the car. Sam never seemed to mind being confined. The top of the little cage came off for entry. It had been used for both long and short trips and somewhere along the way the screw holding the top had been lost. A makeshift closure had been rigged up. (I don’t remember what was used, but knowing Ken, it was probably baling wire.)
By the time the last minute lists had been double checked, the mist was changing to light drizzle. The dogs were situated quickly so that Ken would not be subjected to the smell of “wet dog.” The children decided to make a dash to the car rather than don raincoats. One of the boys was carrying the cage with Sam when he stumbled and dropped the cage. The top came off the cage and out flew the bird. Sam flew onto a branch of the nearest tree. Fortunately it was a mesquite tree with low limbs.
Talk about trauma! The children knew that Sam would not survive if we did not retrieve him. I quieted the children’s alarmed voices while eyeing a nearby palm tree trying to remember the last time we had clipped Sam’s wings. He would be out of reach if he made it to the palm tree. Ken went into action and quickly climbed onto a limb, holding out his hand and calling for Sam to come to him. Sam looked at him for a few seconds, and then went to a slightly higher limb. He liked this game. Sam was just beyond Ken’s reach. Kevin grabbed a stick and passed it up hoping Sam would get on the stick. No such luck. He just backed farther up on the limb. Ken kept trying to coach him down with no luck. I gasped as Ken took his other hand off the tree, gave a leap and grabbed for Sam with both hands. He got him and fortunately regained his balance without falling. Ken was soaked, but Sam got all the attention. We dried the bird and put a cover over the cage to keep him from getting chilled.
Ken said, “I nearly killed myself getting that bird and no one even asked if I was OK.” That was actually the truth
And so began the long drive north. Fortunately there were no more adventures along the way.
Blog Post #10
Giving Thanks
Gratitude should be expressed constantly, not just on a special day. Gratitude not only brings happiness to the one receiving it, but also to the one extending it.
Butch went from being a sad little dog to being happy when the children and their friends praised him.
We will gather this week with family and friends to give thanks to God for our many blessings. Our family has many things to be grateful for. When we list those things, animals are not on the list. Perhaps they should be.
First on my personal animal list would be the dairy cows that made a living for our family when I was growing up. The sale of their milk provided me with the necessities and the comforts of my youth.
I cannot remember a time when I did not have and enjoy pets. I always had a dog. There were cats from time to time, and there were two special horses. The cows also provided the means to make this possible.
On this Thanksgiving Ken and I have two dogs, a cat and a donkey. They may not be at the top of our list, but we enjoy and value them. When our children were small we always had a dog and at other times other animals. We certainly enjoyed Butch and Nanny. I will be writing about some of the other animals from time to time.
HAPPY THANKSGIVING TO ALL.
Blog Post #11
The Day the Dogs Were Shot
Note: This is the way I wrote this in 1972 in Georgetown, Texas. I would not recommend it for young children.
I can’t sleep for trying to think of answers to the questions that came today and that will come again tomorrow. The farmer shot their dog. She is gone. Nothing will bring her back. They have accepted that fact. But the whys will come again tomorrow as they try to reconcile the facts with the man’s actions and words.
They went looking for her this morning when their other dog (Butch) came home alone with a bullet wound. They were soon back, hurt, sad and angry. Without a word the younger one got on his bike and rode around and around the block to have time to control the tears. The older one immediately released his anger verbally.
Did the man really use those words and talk to them so ugly? I thought perhaps I was hearing an adolescent outburst of emotion. When the younger boy got off his bike, I asked to be told what the man said.
Yes, he was ugly to them. He was angry and let them know it. He said she (Princess) deserved to die because she was running on his land. Then he ordered them to get of his land.
“Mom, he said damn and all those other bad words to us. He probably never had a dog when he was a little boy and hates dogs now.” Then he asked, “Can a dog kill a cow.”
“No, but a dog can chase a cow and cause it to get hurt.
“Did daddy ever shoot a dog for chasing cows when we had cows?”
“No, we never had any trouble with dogs.”
I think back to my childhood and remember that packs of stray dogs some times bothered the baby calves. But our dog and the mother cows usually took care of the situation. When my father took out the gun it was to shoot a skunk in the chicken house or a rattlesnake. This was a necessity to him and he never hunted wild animals for sport.
The children reminded me of a time last spring before we moved when we lived in the country. A dog kept being a nuisance at night. Princess and Butch would chase him off and he would promptly return. After several nights of turned over trash, holes around the chicken pen fence and barking dogs, their Dad tried to catch the dog. The dog was the faster runner. The next night he sprayed buck shot in the dog’s direction. That didn’t work either. Finally one night the dog came early. Their Dad quietly followed him home and talked to his owners.
“Why didn’t that man tell us if he saw her chasing his cows?”
“I don’t know?”
Do I tell I tell them that maybe the man thought most people would not do anything about it? Do I think that most people would do anything about it? I only know what we would have done.
They remember that we kept our dogs on a stake in the yard for over a week when we moved into the new house and we planned for a fence to go up before we released them. They know their Dad would have staked her again and put up a temporary fence immediately had the man talked to us.
After a few days in the new neighborhood we met our neighbors. Almost without exception they had a dog. Our small subdivision is separated from the main part of the small town by open spaces and an interstate highway. The neighbors all planned for fences too, but as long as the dogs were not bothering anyone, we agreed to try to keep them on our street. So our dogs were let free with the others. There are no alleys and no trash cans to be turned over, no flower beds to dig in, so we made a mutual agreement about our animals.
I would sometimes see dogs on the next street over, but our dogs were not interested in things that direction. Our back yard adjoined pasture land and that was like home to them. They were country dogs. They had a morning ritual of a run in the open spaces before we moved. The timing was almost always the same: some time between 8:30 and 10:00 AM. They would run through the citrus groves and along a canal in the Rio Grande Valley where we lived. They would return hot, tired, and wet from the dew on the tall grass. They did not leave again during the day or night. They were good watch dogs and patrolled the perimeter of our yard at night.
I had watched them closely here and they seemed to be following the same pattern. I had talked to my husband about this and we felt they were safer exploring the pasture than going onto the other streets. We erroneously assumed there was nothing they could bother back there.
The man told my husband that someone had seen some dogs chasing his calves. He had come to check them this morning and something had chased some baby calves through a fence. He was angry and he shot the first dogs that he saw. It was 9:30 AM when Butch ran home alone. No, the man had never seen Princess before. But we can never prove that she had never chased his calves.
There will be more discussion with the dawn of the new day.
Blog Post #12
Don’t Fence Me In
Progress brought fenced yards on our street. The fences were chain link which allowed Butch to see into the yards beside us and our front yard on either side of the house. The back yard was large, but the fence was something new to Butch. He either resented the loss of his freedom or he was claustrophobic or both. He was determined not to stay in the back yard. He could not jump over, so he proceeded to dig under. As soon as one escape tunnel was filled in, he started another.
He didn’t want to go anywhere in the neighborhood. He just did not want to be fenced in. As soon as he got under the fence, he went to the front door and plopped down on the door mat. The front door was recessed and covered by the roof. This protected him from sun and rain. He claimed the area for his own.
Soon there was a street behind us with lots staked and new houses under construction. Butch made some walk throughs to check progress as did the beagle next door who was also an escape artist. I once observed the beagle racing across the yard toward his house with a taco hanging from his mouth. He had evidently discovered a worker’s lunch.
Children, bicycles, and dogs were a common sight after school. This was a wonderful time for Butch. He tried to keep up with all of the activities going on. This left him tired and willing to rest in the back yard when night came. He usually went to the patio by the glass doors so he could see inside.
After several years Georgetown enacted a leash law and hired an animal control officer (know to all as the “dog catcher”). If Butch was out when the officer was patrolling our neighborhood, we would get a call alerting us. One time we came home and found a note on the door from a neighbor telling us that the dog catcher had been on our street and that Butch was in their yard. We never had to retrieve him from the pound, but we never totally convinced him to stay in the back yard.
Blog Post #13
Father’s Day
Blog Post #14
Farm Dog
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