Sunday, February 15, 2009

A Window to Carol's Heart




When I was younger, I used to ride an assortment of horses. There were fancy-shmancy, purebred ones and the not so fancy, grade horses. Occasionally, people would ask me, of all of them, which ones were my favorites (other than my own). My answer was almost never the youngest, the fanciest, or the one with the most advanced training or perfect conformation, it was the horse that simply had a heart of gold. Two in particular come to mind - Breeze and Agamar. Breeze was a happy little Heinz 57, grade pinto and Agamar was an older Polish Arab who feigned grumpiness regularly, neither were considered "beautiful" or built to perform well in my riding discipline, but both of them had incredible heart that made them priceless. I mention them because I was thinking recently of Carol, a dog whose best attribute, in my opinion, is her heart. But how do you capture that on film or when you're quickly walking by her kennel? That's when I thought of Breeze and Aggie, because when I looked at them, it was always their kind eyes that struck me. But Carol's tend to get buried in her big brindle patches. However, if you take a moment to really look, she's got the eyes that lead to her fabulous heart, which makes her worth her weight in gold......

Hendrix (aka Cobalt) in His New Home





From Cobalt's New Person:
Well it's been just over three months now since I brought Hendrix home. I did want to change his name and it was a hard decision. Since he came home with me on election-day, I considered naming him for our president, or something presidential - Carter was a close runner up. None of those worked out, but I finally decided on Cobalt - its an element that is used to dye things blue - and he has a blue nose. It suits him well, we call him "Coby" "Coco" or "Cobayashi" as nicknames.
We have a fantastic life together! Just last month my good friend moved into my house with her dog Karma (see pics) - Karma is an older lady and does a good job keeping Cobalt in line. But that doesn't happen too much, as Cobalt is generally a very polite young dog. We take the dogs out for hikes in the local parks and to the coastal beaches several times a week - or just hang out at home in our cozy house. Cobalt is a ridiculous snuggler and gets to sleep in bed, under the comforter every night. In fact, he's curled up, totally covered by the blanket, next to me as I type this. :)
Thanks to all you do there at the shelter, and thank you so much for letting me take Hendrix aka Cobalt home with me!