My “grandson” Jinx is a mixture of Dalmation and Australian Shepherd, adopted at North Shore Animal League on Long Island at age 10 weeks. Never had a dog in my life until age 56. I read Rescuing Sprite, all the while thinking how in God’s name can someone deal with something like this. Jinx iis now 6 yrs old and l would be lost without him. Whenever I pick up my keys, he assumes he’s coming with me (and he’s right). No matter what errand I’m running, if I can bring Jinx, he’s right there with me. I wear a uniform and while driving Jinx sits straight up in the front passenger seat like a king. I can’t tell you how many people have commented that I look like his chauffeur, uniform and all. I drop Jinx off at my brother’s house during the day while I go to work. My bro is retired and him and Jinx spend the day at the park or down at the beach. As soon as I get home with Jinx, he sits right in front of the stove and waits for me to cook dinner for us (while we listen to the Mark Levin Show). When he sees a baby carriage, he runs to it, sits down next to it, and licks the baby. He knows more people in the neighborhood than I do. I had triple bypass surgery in ’04 and my one worry was that he would jump up on me when I got home (he’s about 85-90 lbs now). When I got home, Jinx just licked my hand and whenever I rested during the day, he would lie on the bed next to me and lick my hand. Funny story, I went to Vegas last year and on calling home, my husband told me Jinx was like a lost soul. I told him to put me on speaker phone which he did and I talked to Jinx. When I called the second day, and asked to be put on speaker, my husband said “no way” because when I was on speaker the prior day, Jinx ran all through the house lookinig for me and when he couldn’t find me, he just moped around the house. (I haven’t left him again for more than a day).

Eileen from NY

I just finished your book and have told the family that it will be required reading material for our family. What a great book- it brought back some sad and happy memories about our dog, Maverick. He was a toy poodle (never groomed) that we grew up with. We had him from the time I was 4 until he died when I was 18. He was like a brother to us. For the last few years, he was blind, and eventually he got outside and was struck by a car. He still had the courage to walk up the driveway with his side badly hurt. As my twin brother and I drove him to the vet to have him put to sleep, I will never forget what happened. The song “Seasons in the Sun” started to play. With the lyrics- Goodbye to you, my trusted friend. We’ve known each other since we were nine or ten. Together we’ve climbed hills and trees…
He was a black poodle, and there is a line also of , You were the black sheep of the family….
I will never forget that day, and that day was 34 years ago. Really enjoyed your book and the reality of just what our dogs do for us.

Mike from IN

Our close friends sent us a copy of your book knowing we had recently lost our beloved dog, Lulu. Lulu, a beautiful Akita mix, was found by our son,almost 10yrs ago, shivering in the vestibule of his girlfriend’s apt. in midtown Manhattan. They cleaned her up, called us and proposed that we or our close friends might be interested in adopting her. We were skeptical because we had crazy Corky, a lab mix who didn’t get along with most other dogs. Reluctantly, we picked her up and brought her uptown to our friends’ brownstone. They had a yard,other dogs and were willing to take her.Needless to say, we bonded instantly and instead of leaving her with them we took a chance and brought her home to meet Corky. We’re sure she had made up her mind to adopt us by then and was determined to like this rambuctious doggie she heard us talking about.Despite some tense moments, Corky and Lulu became fast friends. She deferred to him in every way and in his old age became his eyes and ears alerting him to our comings and goings and making sure he was at the door first to greet us.
A few years after Corky’s death, Lulu developed serious health problems. She had to have her spleen removed and later tumors showed up around her nose and mouth area. We tried everything we could to help her medically and we know we prolonged her life by at least 2 years. Sadly, in February, we had to let her go.
Your book touched on many of the emotions that we felt both in good times and bad. We have another dog, Lucky, an Australian terrier given to us about a year ago by an acquaintance who found caring for a dog too much trouble. He’s a silly and playful two year old, and of course we love him a lot, but Lulu was special and we’ll always miss her.
Thanks for writing your book!
Cecille and Bob from NY

I just finished your book and enjoyed it so much. I lost a lab two years ago at the age of 11. My gardener left the gate open, he ran out and was hit by a car. I blamed myself for not checking the gate, it was horrible. We loved our beloved Seine so much and my husband and I were so distraught. We also at the time had a golden retriever who chose not to run out and thank God she is alive and well at the age of 8 today. I don’t want to even think of lossing her. I will really need professional help.
I felt your pain and understood how you felt.
Dogs are such special members of the family better than some blood relatives.

Carol from NJ

I just finished your loving tribute to your wonderul Sprite. Tears flowed down my cheeks as my own loss came rushing back to me afresh. My beautiful Golden retriever “Troi” (pronouced Troy) died 2 years ago, and there’s still such a hole in my heart. We use to say she was just a big old bag of love. Always smiling, so happy to see us and such a blessing to our lives. Even though I still miss her terribly I am a better person for the paw prints left on my heart.

Terri from MO

I live with my wife and step-daughter in TJ because it’s cheaper than San Diego. We are all animal lovers and, in addition to Rufo, we have a Chihuahua named Dolly and two turtles, Lucas and Matteo.

Rufo came into our lives quite by accident, sort of like that proverbial mid-marriage surprise pregnancy. One day last July, my wife said that there was a very young puppy that was abandoned in the green belt around our condo and the children were bothering him, not intentionally, but in the mildly overprotective manner that some children have. She asked what we should do, knowing my answer would be, “bring him up and let’s get him cleaned up and see how he is.”

When they brought him up, I saw this tiny scrawny puppy that didn’t look like he’d survive the night. I went to the store and bought some powdered baby formula and a baby bottle to force feed him, if necessary while Claudia gave him a flea bath (he was crawling with them). It turned out that he was strong enough to drink the formula straight from a bowl and in a couple of days, he was taking in solid food. However, he still looked like those photos that one sees of starvin cattle in the 30’s Dust Bowl with ribs sticking out and shriveled skinny hind legs.

As he grew a little, we figured that he was some sort of boxer mix because he was a little big and had a velvety black floppy muzzle. He also has a great heart, having survived a bout with a near-fatal parvo virus before we got him vaccinated. Today, he weighs about fifty pounds and like said has a lot of heart. He loves to run and leaps and bounds like a deer and loves to jump on me. He refuses to give up when we play tug of war with his favorite blanket. Claudia says he cries when I leave the house and leaps on the back of the couch to stare out the window waiting for me to return.

We’re looking for a bigger place just for him because the condo is too small and Claudia believes he needs to be outside. However, she would bet a dollar to a doughnut, or however the Mexicans say it, that he will still sleep with me even after we move.

By the way, my son is in Iraq right now and will return this July.

Dan from Baja CA