Tribute To Oscar - My Inspiration

Sunday was a tough day to wake up. My first thoughts were of Oscar, and Katy & Martin (his mum and dad). My hooman girl and I had a down and dirty talk about how we were feeling, and we decided that we both wanted to follow Oscar's example and live, play, wrassle, run, and love like there's no tomorrow!

My inspiration: Oscar Boy running in the rain with a buddy.



So, in keeping with that commitment and with the idea of celebrating Oscar, we kept our date to play with my buddy Hercules at the dog park. We talked with Herc and his mom about Oscar and we played!! I realized that for me, one of the best ways to honor my buddy is to give myself some time to do some grieving and some playing every day.

Here are some of the images of our day together.

Me runnin' like the WIND!!

Here's the south end of 3 northbound dogs. (That's me and Herc following our new buddy, Boobee - yep, that's his real name. We were told it's Albanian for "Fido").

Wrasslin with Boobee.



Funky close up of my game face.




Then we took it into the water! Look at Boobee's fierce wrasslin' face. He plays hard!







We met this sassy Boston girl, Lala. (It must be noted that while she is a cutie and sassy, she is NOWHERE near as cute, sassy, and captivating as my Ruby. Plus my Ruby has a bootiful brindle coat and does not look like an Oreo cookie. Mmmm... Oreos...) I digress...




Lala got us all riled up and then stopped to watch the fun. That girl knew she was workin' it!

Taking a breather.






This was probably the most surreal and inspirational siting of the day. This little puggy boy was tearing up the water swimming WAY OUT into the deep part of the pond fetching his ball. Yes, he was outfitted with a cute little orange life jacket, but he was SWIMMING!






I could only stand on the sidelines watching him in complete AWE at his swimming prowess.






Then I decided it was time to go for it! I wandered out over my head and actually had to SWIM (not just wade in the water). When I first realized I wasn't touching the bottom of the pond any more, I reared way up out of the water & took some big strokes before settling down into a more relaxed swim. My girl didn't catch much of the actual swimming... I think she was in shock that I actually did it.

After all that excitement, we bellied up to the open bar before heading home. Here's Herc getting ready to get is drink on.





Here's Herc all doggled-up and ready to motor on home.



We had a blast!! It felt good to talk about Oscar, feel my sadness, and run and play all at the same time. I sure do miss my buddy, but am learning to move through the sadness with the help of his example and my Herc. Thanks, guys! I love you both! Oscar's influence on the world continues!


Love,
Stanley