Unseeing Eye Beagles

I think I was 6 or so when we got our first dog, he was a beagle. We’ve had three dogs and they’ve all been beagles, none of them the hunting kind. They’ve all been house dogs and none to bright; I have had a better nose than all of them.

I forget where we got our first dog but when we got there, a bunch of beagles in pens greeted us. Of course, not being able to see well, I naturally tripped over the fence and fell in the pen. All the puppies ran away from the big, to them, human that had just fallen into their house, except one. He came over and started licking my face and he was the one we got; Barkley. I named him after the Sesame Street character, I don’t know if he’s even still on the program. I haven’t watched in a long time but one thing I can tell you, it could run circles around Sponge Bob Square Pants.

He was really little when we brought him home, but I was a couple feet shorter too; so, take that for what it’s worth. I don’t remember much of his early years except that he always liked to chew things. If left alone he would chew things to damage them, that was his one flaw. He was cute so I suppose the chewing was overlooked. My grandfather and he were good friends; though that may have had something to do with grandpa always feeding him under the table. Barkley liked our summer place a lot. He liked to swim in the river and when off his chain he liked to go far away. My father always had to go looking for him; he never came back on his own.

He’d bark at just about anything. He also got a lot of table food and that, we’re pretty sure is what ultimately resulted in him being put to sleep. His ashes are scattered at our summer place, which he very much liked.

Pretty soon, we got another beagle. We needed another beagle, even though he didn’t replace Barkley. This time Mark named him and he picked Fred. I wanted to call him Spock but it was Mark’s turn and that’s what he picked. There weren’t any pens for me to fall into this time, the mother and father were loose and the puppies were around the house. Fred had an uncle who was Canadian dog champion and some other illustrious breeding but he turned out to be a wuss.

He was tiny, fit in your palm tiny, when we took him home. For a while he had little dishes but eventually he got regular sized ones. Unlike Barkley, Fred didn’t bark and then he started to but never approaching his predecessor. Instead of barking at and chasing rabbits and other creatures that dogs are supposed to chase, he let them alone. The only thing he really barked at was cats and to come in. He wasn’t destructive like Barkley but he did get the garbage when we went out. We left him in the house; he was fine except he did get the garbage. We went through I think four garbage cans but none was foolproof.

I have to finish Fred and talk about Max. Chow for now and enjoy reading.