Friends and Animals

I have quite a few writer friends, and quite a few blogger friends, but the ones who really put me to shame are my writer friends who regularly keep up their blogs. I know, I know, I’m working on a new book. But so are they! I know, I know, I’m also a mother trying to get her kid ready to go back to school–but so are they! This morning, as I paid my usual visit to their witty, up-to-the-minute blogs, I resolved to blog more often myself. Really. I know I’ve said that before, but I mean it this time.

Jacob’s back from camp. During a single bout of homesickness midway through the two weeks (it turns out that there’s a reason camps don’t like parents to call or visit) I had what felt like a eureka moment. It went like this:

“Honey, would you like to take Fudge, the bunny, home with you at the end of camp?”
Jacob turned to me, a smile lighting up.
Michael stared at me over Jacob’s head, as if to say excuse me, but what-the-&%$#-are you thinking?

Here is a picture of Jacob right after we promised him Fudge, the bunny. In the upper right hand corner, you can see a little bit of the bunny’s behind.

After returning home, my eureka moment faded. A bunny? What was I thinking, indeed. We have a terrier. Terriers are bred to kill small, rodent-like creatures. And besides, in the words of my most animal-loving friend, bunnies suck. So I thought and I thought. I had promised Jacob the bunny, hadn’t’t I? How could I break a promise like that? I needed to come up with something better, something bigger than the bunny. And so, the second week of Jacob’s stay at sleep away camp, I spent a lot of time on the internet looking up various other possibilities. The end result? Well, we’re picking him up tomorrow. Meet Samson. The newest addition to our family. And here’s hoping that Fudge the bunny has found a happy, terrier-free home.