Happy 6th Birthday to Molly!

Today is Molly's "fake" birthday.   She was adopted from the shelter on September 5th, 2009 and was roughly 2-3 months old.  I went three months back from that date and decided that June 5th was a good day for her birth date.   Today Molly is 6.  That seems weird to me.  That Molly is middle aged.

Molly has always been larger than life, she has always been my "crazy" dog.   She is the dog who pushes all my buttons.  Who, when I say "Jump." asks, "Why?" instead of "How High.".   She does not worship the ground I walk on, she frustrates me.  She did not come with any self control built in, she has a short fuse, she can be very irritating.

But I am so proud of her.  I am crazy about her.   She is not, as they say, my "heart dog".  And there is nothing wrong with that.  If Ein is my heart, my loyal "would jump off a cliff for me" dog, Molly is like a force of nature.  I said in a post months ago that I love her power.  I love how she shakes my whole body when she tugs, I love to watch her "all" when she chases her ball or when she runs agility.  Every cell in her body is dedicated to being In The Moment.  That's why I named her "Ride the Lightning".   She always felt so unpredictable to me, her actions so much like striking lightning rather than actual decisions.  Reactions rather than carefully made decisions.  I guess any dog is like that, but everything with Molly always felt so Big.  So Big and Frustrating and Out of Control.

Silvia Trkman's La passed away today.  My friend's amazing pitbull Luce passed away last weekend.  And it all made me stop and think that they "crazy dogs", these "difficult dogs", these dogs that teach us...these dogs are the dogs that make us who we are.  They make us into better trainers, better people.  They inspire us, they make us think.  People want to read their stories.  They want to feel tears in their eyes and a sob choking in their throat because some crazy dog somewhere pushed some even crazier human to their limit, and together they became something beautiful.   When things go smoothly, easily...well that's pretty boring.

Luckily for us, boring is not something we will ever have to worry about.  Thank you, Molly, for making me think, making me learn, for forgiving my mistakes, for forcing me to be better, for forcing me to be smarter.  For forcing me to be what you deserve.  Happy birthday, Molly Moo.