“Is that a Newfie puppy?” asked a woman whom my dogs and I passed on a path that runs along Bend’s Deschutes River. I knew she was asking about my zealous girl Sophie.
I looked at the woman’s full-grown, chestnut-colored Newfoundland and laughed. Whether Sophie is at the river, in the High Sierra or manning the back of my vintage RV with who knows how many other pups, she’s deceptively full of zeal.
“Nope,” I replied. “She’s a 13 1/2 -year-old Aussie-Golden Retriever mix.”
Even though I think Sophie looks more like a black bear cub, she often gets mistaken for a Newfie puppy, in part because of her fluffy puppy cut, which keeps the mats down and her spirits up, and in part because she just doesn’t look or act her age.
“Maybe you are a baby Newfie,” I told her as we moved on.
Sophie wagged her tail with pleasure. The girl can sniff out a compliment when she hears one. She picked up a stick and flung her head this way and that before wandering off-trail to sniff out a chipmunk. A few minutes later, she bounced into the river, much like she did when I first rescued her at age two and lay down in the current to cool her tummy.
I knew she would pay for her exuberance. Sure enough, the following morning, she struggled to rise and then walked around like an overly developed linebacker. “It’s worth it,” I told myself. I’ve told the vet the same thing. I want her to live the way I want to live–full of zeal and happiness, even if that costs her a few months or even years of her life.
Still, when a friend told me about how Brady’s Senior Formula with CBD and botanicals had helped her older dog, I raced out to find some the very next day. Less than 48 hours later, Sophie was already markedly more spry, even after another long, off-leash outing.
When thinking about the sequence of events, I realized that the writing lesson here is two-fold:
- As writers, we want to go for the gusto and plunge in, channeling all that vigor and zeal we had for life as kids.
- We also need to realize that sometimes we need a little assistance to help maintain that level of enthusiasm and performance. And that’s okay, too. Whatever works.
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