As an author who’s built a Writer’s Platform on an Observance known as National Dog Week, I’ve tried to make it my business to keep up with the myriad of holidays and observances established just to honor the pets and animals that enhance our lives.
I’ve written previously about how pets are especially helpful and therapeutic in the Widowed Community and how we understand how our pets suffer, too, when they’ve lost a beloved guardian, or how a pet learns to bond with the spouse, or significant other, that remains.
The first Full Week of June is set aside for an observance called National Pet Appreciation Week a time when we can be more aware of the ways we can care for our pets, spread awareness and educate our communities about fostering and adopting pets, or making donations of funds, time or talent to help with groups and organizations, near and far, that promote the human-animal bond. How you do this is your personal choice.
Several years ago I began writing and blogging about Captain Wm. Lewis Judy, the man who in 1928 founded National Dog Week in 1928, then launched a Facebook Page to help spread the mission and spirit of this enduring observance. Its “discovery” on my part was serendipitous and inspired me to start writing about the dog-human bond. Interestingly, when this observance rolls around the last full week of September each year, people always comment on how EVERY week is National Dog Week. I get it, it truly should be, however, I point out that this officially designated week is a time of collective thought and organized action to ensure our canines receive the honor, love and care they truly deserve. Once-upon-a-time, it was celebrated on a grand scale on the Plaza of Rockefeller Center in Mid-town Manhattan and across the nation.
Eight months before my husband, Rich passed, our beloved rescue dog Teddy succumbed to a Mast Cell Tumor despite great efforts to heal him. It broke our hearts, and I know Rich was never the same. He made me promise that we’d never have another dog. A dedicated dog-lover, he’d already lost too many in his lifetime.
I kept that promise. But when there was no more “We”, I went out and rescued a blind puppy born of a street stray. I traveled clear across the nation to California to bring him back to Georgia so we could begin a new life chapter together. At one and a half years now, Quint is still quite puppyish. One of Rich’s pet peeves was that I always seemed to “hide” his pens and reading glasses. It is interesting to note that Quint has a penchant for removing my pens and readers from surfaces throughout my home, rendering them unusable by the time I retrieve them from his jaws. Pay back is a “beotch” I can almost hear Rich say, laughing from above.
As a Board Member of the Dog Writers Association of America, also co-founded by Captain Will Judy in 1935, I was happy to learn this week that the Revell-Baker anthology, THE DOG WHO CAME TO CHRISTMAS was a Finalist in the DWAA’s annual Writing Competition. My personal essay, “The Gift of Dog” was featured among so many talented writers. We didn’t snag the Maxwell (like we did in 2021) but just to get that nod among a sea of entries was very rewarding.
Congratulations to all my dog-writing colleagues who entered and the Finalists and Winners. I sponsor an award and grant presented in the memory of my late sister, Manette, for the those who write or produce media depicting “Bully Breeds” in a positive light. I also thank American Legion Post 348 in Brick Township, NJ, for continuing to sponsor the Captain Wm. Lewis Judy Award for those who write and produce material that highlights the roles of our Military Dogs on and off the Field.
All this will keep me positive as I plan the Service for my father who passed a month ago. We miss him dearly, and as I plan to present at Camp Widow organized by Soaring Spirits, International, back in San Diego, in July, at a venue just steps away from where I “Fetched Quint” at a time we needed each other the most; the dog who continues to lead me down the Write Path no matter how ruff.
