Traveling Man

Here we go again. I am watching them pack. Uh oh!!! Where are we going now? It seems that whenever they plan to go somewhere these days I am going with them. And more and more it is me in a crate in the belly of a plane. I am getting really tired of this, but I should be used to it.. I have being doing this for as long as I can remember.

My first trip on a plane was when I was just a baby. One day I am at my house with my mom, brothers and sisters and the next day it is all changed. One by one my siblings left with people I didn't know. For a moment I thought I was staying. That would be nice. Here in Colorado, amongst the beautiful mountains.. This would be a nice life, with mom and all my relatives. But just like that things changed. Literally in the middle of the night, I was packed into the car with my crate, given a kiss and left in the airplane hanger to go who knows where. All night traveling.. Where? Where? Where? and then in the morning again by myself waiting for what would happen next. And then this woman out of nowhere showed up. Calling my name. How in the world did she know my name? I had never seen her before. She opened my crate, picked me up, gave me a big hug and kiss and held me very tight. I didn't know what to make of her, but I thought I would give her the benefit of the doubt. I really didn't have too many options. And at the moment she was all I had.

I settled in pretty well in my new house. There people were certainly nice enough and the others were OK. I respected the older ones and made friends with the one girl who was my age. She became my best friend. Frieda, that is her name.

My life seems to be one of traveling. I mostly go in cars, vans or trucks and we usually go to the dogs shows. But at least once a year they load me into a plane to make a long trip far far away. Flying is not my favorite thing to do. I do like the attention I get at the airport, but the time away from my people is pretty stressful. I have travelled pretty much all over the country, but my biggest adventure by far was my trip over to Europe to stay with my friend Tuuli in Finland.

We have driven to the show, but something was different. My lady was different. She seemed anxious and nervous the whole trip. She packed and packed and much of the stuff was for me. That wasn't too unusual. But the really weird thing was once we go to the show, I was not in the show. I am always in the show. That is what I do. For an entire week I hung around the hotel room. I went out and met people, I even saw my first lady from Colorado. She made a big deal about seeing me. I really didn't recognize her, but she certainly was glad to see me.

And then it happened. That last morning. I thought we were going home, but she packed my stuff and brought me to another room where there were two young girls that I didn't know. They certainly seemed nice enough. Now, I am the kind of guy that is pretty friendly and I climbed on their bed and made myself at home. That seemed to make them happy. And then my lady started to cry. They were all crying. They were hugging each other and hugging me. What was going on? And then she left. Where did she go?

So now what? I am in this hotel room, with two people that I don't know. And so began my greatest adventure. I was back in the airplane but now when we landed, all of the people were strangers to me and I did not understand them at all.
Our first stop, yes there was more than one stop, was in a place called Paris. I think this was not the plan because I was taken out of my crate by a man and he and I just stood and watched and waited. I finally saw the night young lady running toward me with panic on her face. I stood up happy to see her, at this point she was all I had and at least I could understand what she was saying to me. There was something about volanoes and closed airports, but finally we were back in the air and to our final destination, Finland where I would spend the next several months.

This new place was different from what I was used to, but also very exciting. We lived in the city in a small apartment, so there was no backyard, but we went for long walks which I loved. One of the first things that happened was that Tuuli introduced me to two beautiful foreign girlfriends. Maybe I was going to like this place afterall.

I settled in there pretty quickly. That is kind of who I am. "If you can't be with the one you love"... You know the rest. I made it work, Lemonade out of lemons so to speak. And than one day I heard my lady's voice. She was here. I ran to the door to see where she was. I ran all over the house. She was calling my name. But Tuuli called me over to her to go on her lap and to look at the machine. That was where her voice was coming from. She was telling me how much she loved me. That was great. I loved to hear her voice. So, when she would call on the box, I would lay on the bed and just listen to her. I felt that one day I would see her again.

Than just like that it was over. We were packing up and getting ready for another trip. This time not just me, but two puppies were coming with us. I learned these were my daughters, but I didn't really care too much about that. Another long ride and than there she was . My lady.. Crying again, struggling to get me out of my crate. I jumped into her arms and hugged her. Boy. I missed her, it was good to be home.