Clyde

Morey was dead. We were in deep mourning. This was the first death we kids had ever experienced. Our parents could see we were sad so they decided to take all five of us to the SPCA (pound) so we could get a new dog. We knew this dog wouldn't replace Morey, no dog could. But it least it would fill the void we all felt.

When we got to the pound, I was amazed at how many dogs we could choose from.  There were all types of dogs. But we all had to agree which dog we would take home with us. So we all looked around and consulted with each other.

We agreed upon a medium sized golden retriever. I doubt it was a pure bred retriever. We didn't care. We just wanted a dog. I am not sure how Mom and Dad felt about this type of dog. It was much larger than Morey. But, they agreed and we got the dog.

We all piled into our green and white VW bus and in hopped our new dog. He was so excited and jumped on and licked each of us kids all the way home. We were excited but we missed one important thing. We didn't have a name.

I am not sure how it happened, but we decided to name him Clyde. The movie Bonnie and Clyde as out during that time, maybe we named him after the outlaw Clyde. Seemed a great name at the time.

Clyde was a fun dog. Not the neighborhood dog Morey was, so we had to make sure he stayed in the backyard. If I recall correctly, Clyde kept getting out of our yard so Dad had to add slats to the fence to keep Clyde in place.

Taking Clyde for a walk was a chore. It was not so much a walk as it was a pull. Clyde would pull us all over the place.

One day we all noticed that Clyde as getting a little fat and seemed to be slowing down some. He didn't want to go on walks as much and when we did walk him, he no longer pulled us. We are all confused. Was he ill? Did dogs ever get sick?

Not long after Clyde started gaining weight and slowing down we were surprise with five golden retriever puppies. Clyde was a girl! Who knew?

Okay, there had to be obvious evidence, but I figured all dogs were boys and all cats were girls. It never occurred to me that there were girl dogs. We all learned something that day. Well, I did.