One of Life's Joys ~

This is our puppy. Two pounds of fuzzy fury, named Rambo. He's a silver teacup poodle, and has, with a sweep of his paw, changed the tenor of our household since he came. My manly husband melts into a smiling boy, each afternoon as he comes home from work. Rambo fills the void left by small children, who used to crowd the glass door every day when daddy came home. Now they are grown, and almost always gone when he drives up into our steep driveway. Our youngest son Isaac might be home, but he no longer squeals and jumps up and down, arms waving, yelling, "Daddy's home!!!"

He's going on sixteen, you see.


But the puppy senses when dad is on his way to home and hearth. I guess it is the daily phone call I get, "Hi Beautiful! I'm on my way home. Need anything?" (No lie. Every day. I am a blessed woman. It so rocks to be me!) Rambo must be able to observe and understand my voice and tone, whenever it is Tim, telling me he is headed this way. That itty silver bit of soft fluff will always skitter to the front glass door, and watch until he sees the old green mini van pull up.


Then, he jumps up and down, twirls, and barks loudly. There's no way around it ~ he has to be saying, "Pappa's home! Pappa is home!" That is not a stretch, nor is it overly imaginative. That is pure fact. It is a fact that never fails to put a smile on my husband's face, even on the worst of days.

In the words of a pastor's wife friend of mine, from rural Virginia, who met Rambo not long ago....(imagine a soft, southern drawl):

"This doggy's a gift from God."
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"I care not for a man's religion whose dog and cat are not the better for it."
~Abraham Lincoln

"Dogs are our link to paradise. They don't know evil or jealousy or discontent. To sit with a dog on a hillside on a glorious afternoon is to be back in Eden, where doing nothing was not boring - it was peace."
~Milan Kundero