puppy love

Just finished watching a movie on cable entitled "Eight Below". It was about 8 Siberian huskies and their explorer owner who had to be rescued in the Antarctic because of extreme weather conditions. The owner was airlifted first because they couldn't fit the dogs in the helicopter with him. He ordered the 8 dogs to "stay", promising that he'd come back to get them. But the snowstorm got worse that neither helicopter or icebreakers could go back and the owner was already suffering from frostbite so the dogs were left there for more than a hundred days. They found ways to survive but never strayed far from where their master had left them. Eventually, he was able to return and rescue his dogs although two succumbed to the harsh conditions in the Antarctic.

It was a heartwarming, albeit a little sad in some instances, movie and I cried several times. I think I cried more times watching "Eight Below" than when I watched some other tragic love stories. Sounds silly, I know but if you have a dog, you'll understand why. When my dog Nike died in 2002 while I was working overseas, I was devastated. Some of my colleagues caught me crying in the dressing room the day she passed away and thought something bad had happened to a member of the family. When I told them my dog had died, they replied, "Are you sure it's just your dog?!" They couldn't get it. But she was part of our family. My dad even says that she was an angel in disguise because she helped turn us all into more sensitive, caring people with a renewed respect for life in all forms.