Skipper

Skipper with Deb in 1963

Those who have come to know me think of me as somebody without pets and some would think I'm not even a fan of pets. How wrong they are. No fault of theirs, after all why wouldn't they think that way?

I haven't had a pet for a very long time, 40 plus years at least. However, like most youngsters, I definitely longed for a dog in my younger years. During those years,  I was a city dweller, big city, hence, pets were out of the question. I lived with my mom (Carol Watson),  brother (Dan Waston) , grandma (Pub to me but Violet Newbury to others) and my mom's younger brother (Jerry Newbury)  in a series of smaller apartments in Toronto which wasn't going to be conducive to having a dog and somehow I knew this and accepted it rather well. I kept myself content with the pets of others.

Skipper with Dan in 1963

I got my fix.  I absolutely loved playing with the pets around me. Once, when we were living upstairs in a duplex in the city, the family downstairs owned a big beautiful dog. I was too young to remember the type, but it was blond, long haired and larger dog.  I would often sit at the top of the stairs making noises to see if the dog would come up the stairs. In no time, this dog became my best friend. The downstairs family often let my new friend visit me and of course my mom was more than happy to see me enjoying my new friendship. We only lived there for about a year but my attachment grew deep. It became a daily ritual.  Sometimes when the owners weren't home, my friend didn't come and I felt let down. Then there came a time when my friend stopped visiting altogether, each day I whistled and called him, soon I became worried.  Then the news came, my mom  told me that my pooch friend was killed by a car. The owners had a hard time telling mom and didn't know what to say to me.  Perhaps that is when mom knew that when her and Twist (Oliver Watson) finally married, a pet would be in order. I know now that, I equated pets with loss which always led to heart break and that would show up throughout my next few pets.

A year later, my mom married and we moved to Huntsville on Fairy Lake,  I got my first real dog. Skipper, who came from my grand-dad (Dan Watson) from Baysville. He was smart and easy to teach tricks to and my mom, brother and I taught him many. Unfortunately, just less than a year later, we had to return him. At the time, I was told he was part wolf, I often wondered about that. But my sister (Susan Watson) was soon born and perhaps, if it was part wolf, maybe my Skipper wouldn't be the best pet to have around a baby. I missed Skipper but eventually we replaced him with Fido, Fido also didn't last more than a year. We left Huntsville in order to allow for Twist to return to school in Oshawa as there wasn't anywhere in Huntsville where teachers could take university courses. The home in Oshawa didn't allow pets.

Susan with Fido

A few years later, we moved to Thornton where we got Rusty the most beautiful border collie in the world (to me), he managed to capture that long gone title of becoming my best friend. Somehow, Rusty seemed human to me, greeting me every morning, spending evenings with me after school and being my finest bud all weekend. Unfortunately, Rusty did have a habit of chasing cars and therefore we needed to be very careful about not letting him escape from our gated yard. During this era 60's early 70's most dogs weren't tied up and tended to have a free roam, nor did we collect their 'poops' back then. One day, while I was in grade 11, Rusty managed to get out, he always wanted to follow me to school as I left to catch the bus each morning into Barrie. That fateful morning, he did manage to get out, he was hit and died hours later despite the gracious efforts of owner (Gord Burke) of the flag store. I knew then, I couldn't have another dog. My heart and my head wouldn't be up for it. We had Rusty for 5 years, the longest I owned a pet and next to losing my grandmother, losing Rusty was pretty traumatic for me.

Although this sounds like a sad entry, it's not really intended to be that way.  I thoroughly enjoyed my time with pets, I continue to enjoy the pets of others but after that fateful day, the desire to have another pet left me forever, call it protection or insulation but the decision was right for me and to this day, I quite enjoy the pets of others and my lifestyle today wouldn't allow the type of devotion a pet needs and deserves.

(I did actually get a puppy for my daughter, it was also run over a month later.  We also discovered that both Tanya and Ryan had pet hair allergies.)