An unforgettable 30 minute short read!
This is a sad, heartwarming, and entertaining story of how I lost my little pet family, and how I got them back. If you are a pet lover, you are sure to love this story. Take a look at some reviewer comments below:
“Love, devotion and perserverance pays off!”
“A soul stirring tale of loss and love, told by someone who knows what it means to really love your pets!”
“A Great Little Book With A Very Happy Ending!”
“I Love This Sweet Pet Story”
Table of Contents
Introduction
Finding Dakota and Madonna
Losing my dogs
The Craigslist Angel
Living with Mafia Girl
Surfer Dude
Ruth to the Rescue
A Shoebox in Paradise
I was living in New Jersey at the time, on the Jersey shore, in a little place known as Sea Bright. It was a tiny little town, right on the Atlantic Ocean, and I was living in a beautiful two-story townhouse. At night, when it was quiet, I could hear the waves hitting the beach, and it would lull me to sleep. It was 2009.
I am from Michigan originally, but once I graduated from college, I spent most of my life as a professional business woman, working for Fortune 100 companies and traveling around the country and various parts of the world. That is, until I turned thirty-eight. That year, my life changed considerably.
I was sick at the time and in the process of recovery. I was also alone, and I was in great need of some loving companionship. I had lost my guy and my job and was close to recovering my health and finding ways to make ends meet. I was living by myself and was very weak and tired and had been lying in bed a lot, trying to recover and snuggling with my Simba, my soft gray cat, who had been with me for eleven years. He was a bit lonesome, too.
I had heard pets were good for your immune system, and I needed some companionship, so I decided to expand my pet family. I remembered that a few years before I had seen a stranger with a little white dog, and I thought of how much I had longed to have a tiny, happy dog like that and remembered it was a Maltese. I ventured online and found a store in Brooklyn that was selling teacup Maltese pups, and off I went to get one. I came home with this darling, itty bitty, 1.5 pound puppy that I could hold in one hand. He was a loving little guy and so full of energy. He was rambunctious! Simba was not sure about the new member of our household, and even though he was 10 pounds larger, he would still jump off the bed in fear of the new puppy. It took Simba a while to get used to him, but eventually, they grew to be pals. I named the new little guy Dakota, after the truck, as I wanted him to have a masculine name, given his tiny size.
Dakota would sleep with me at night, snuggled right into my side, and I was afraid I might roll over on him and squash him, but that never happened. I seemed to be very aware of him, even when I was sound asleep. One night, I woke up in the middle of the night, and he was nursing on my breast. I had to pull him off! He thought I was his real mommy. I had never had an experience like that, and have not had one since, but it is a story I love to tell people.
