Playing in the leaves the other day reminded me of doggone days gone by. It prompted Cheryl and I to take a trip down memory lane back to my puppyhood. Along the way we found this photo of me in the leaves when I was but a few months old. Thanksgiving, leaves on the ground, a nip in the air, it makes one reminiscent. It took Cheryl back to her childhood, meaning we had to listen yet again as she recounted her Thanksgivings.
She started, “Once upon a time when I was a child,” (which was long, long ago I whispered to Lexie and Duchess), “Thanksgiving mornings began at dawn for me and my family. Mom would dress me in my not-so-finest of clothes and dad would help me into my oldest coat and pair of gloves.Together we would make the trek out our back door, through the woods, across my aunt and uncle’s yard, between two hay fields, through my grandparents’ yard and across the street to my grandfather’s pasture. From there, my dad would meet up with the other men, I would find my cousins and my mom would head toward my great uncle’s basement where all the women had gathered. It was hog-killing time. I still vividly remember the process of slaying a hog and harvesting its edible parts. I remember where the hog had to be shot and how it was such a big deal when my cousin, Robert, who is only 18-months older than I, became of age to shoot his first hog. I remember how the lifeless hog was dragged across the fallen leaves and then hung upside down. I remember how the hog was de-“
We always have to stop her here and she has to continue with a watered-down version of the story, skipping over some of the most graphic parts. We settle back in and she gets to the part where the pig intestines, which I hear some people actually eat, end up in a wheelbarrow. Cheryl said her great grandfather would pull out his pocketknife from his bib overalls and slit open the intestines, which she said looked like grub worms on steroids. Cheryl and her cousins were responsible for running the meat across the street and down to the basement. “There is nothing like sausage fresh from the hog to the grinder to the frying pan,” she said. The annual event was over by early afternoon, Cheryl explained, and after the hog meat was divided among the various family members, the traditional Thanksgiving feast would start. And so would the tradition of giving thanks.
At this point of the story each year, Lexie, Duchess and I are always thankful that we are dogs and not hogs.
I'm watching for more leaves to fall.
Lexie beds down under a bush surrounded by leaves.
In honor of Veterans Day, Lexie, Duchess and I have been working on perfecting our salutes. I keep telling the girls the proper way to do it is to snap your right paw above and a smidge to the right of your right eye. More times than not Lexie plops her left paw over her right eye. While Duchess uses the correct paw, like everything else she over dramatizes it. The issue all three of us have is sticking our elbows out far enough. They just don’t bend like our two-legged friends’ arms do. Anyway, enough about us. Today we give our best salute, 21 paws up and loudest “Hooahs,” “Hooyahs” and “Oorahs” to all of the men and women who have ever donned a military uniform for our country. This includes Cheryl’s grandfathers (Mack and Grier) and dad (Gary) and Wes’ dad (Dude), uncles, brother (Greg) and nephew (Josh) and, of course, Wes himself who just returned from a tour of duty in Afghanistan. We say “thank you” and salute.
