If acquired young and properly trained, they will become part of your life and spend theirs trying to please. They have two weaknesses. Their life span does not lend itself to longevity. Also, they have flatulence, which will bring tears to your eyes! Humor is important to me and I have always enjoyed the look in the eyes of visiting friends who are seated on the sofa not knowing that the dog is lying behind it as the aroma rises and they each think the other is responsible.

May I go back to "properly trained"? My dad did not quite complete grade eight, but SO bright; just full of common sense and backwoods philosophies which I quote often. As a young child I remember him saying, "Well, If you’re going to train a dog, you have to know more than the dog to start with!" Having some pride I have spent my life trying to have dogs as obedient as the rest of the family. I will not waste time here with how it is done because huge amounts of time, love and patience are involved, plus sternest, including physical attention getting, which new puppy owners simply cannot bring themselves to do.

Molly came to us from an ad in the paper. Two other dogs had been sold the day before we visited. She was about four months old, confused, frightened and gorgeous! Dogs have eyes just like people, which is where we look first upon meeting. If the eyes don’t have it, we look no further.

Molly had it! No haggling; we paid the lady and brought her home after a year of being boxerless. If you lose an animal it is normal to mourn and decide that there can NEVER be another like it. You are correct, but believe me (4 times) there can be ANOTHER.

Molly and I often, while working the garden, have quiet chats with Gypsy (who helped us raise four children) Augustus, Barley and Alfalfa, and they understand and are pleased that a new boxer now runs the deer, rabbits and squirrels away and has never crossed the property lines…..EXCEPT ONCE…hence the picture above.

My wife is an umpire of women’s sports and often travels internationally in her work. She was on a junket during Molly"s second heat and I was charged with two weeks of virginal vigilance. I guess I did this so well that I never saw a male suitor in our brief trips outdoors. This is odd in a rural area because they normally line up with that wistful look in their eyes.

Anyway, with about a week left in the heat, Marge returned and on her first "watch" Molly simply ran off at about 10 p.m. and when she passed under an arc light had turned into TWO dogs, heading for the woods! Of course I was most upset and followed after with a flashlight and great shouting.

Exactly one day before the end of a seven week gestation period, she began to make a nest. The next morning she began an all day birthing process in her whelping box in my office. I am always astounded that a young female knows exactly what to do and that each offspring, nearly helpless, knows too, how to begin life.