To all you guys out there that have dogs or cats, you know how attached you can become to them. The love they share with you is unconditional, and comes from the heart. In return, the love we share with them is exactly the same as well…unconditional.
Many of you know that our “little girl” is Cheyenne, and she’s been part of our family for over 4 years now, and she will be 5 next April. During these years she has brought constant joy and we’ve had many laughs provided by Cheyenne, simply being Cheyenne.
We live where there are numerous hogs, coons, possums (we just can’t bring ourselves to put the letter “O” in front), deer, and other wild life. With this type of surroundings, she’s “in her environment.”
Cheyenne is a red-nosed pit, and she’s caught several coons, and three hogs that I know of. We try our best to keep her of the hogs anymore simply because of them cutting her up, and boy, we’d sure hate to lose her.
Deb and I have gotten to the point anymore that we have two main young girls in our lives, Shelby Lynn (Red’s daughter), and Cheyenne.
Let me quickly add something here. Pit bulls get a bad rap in many instances. She’s not our first pit, but we have to say that we’ve never had a problem with Cheyenne in regards to people. She loves people, and anyone that knows her recognizes this.
Shelby Lynn does just about anything she wants around Cheyenne, and this includes walking up and taking her bone from her. She loves Shelby Lynn, and I’m sure would hurt you over that girl…just ask her Daddy!
Shelby Lynn had been misbehaving one afternoon, and her Daddy was getting on to her, here in the living room. Cheyenne was up on the couch taking this in.
Well, Red had asked her not to do something a time or two, and Shelby Lynn said something inappropriate, and ole Red bailed out of his chair, took Shelby by the arm, and went to pop her on the tail one time.
When he did, Cheyenne bailed off that couch with teeth bared and went to growling at Red. Red couldn’t believe it. I just looked at him and said, “Go ahead…but I don’t think you can whip em both!”
Red didn’t either…
He did appreciate the fact though that Cheyenne was so protective over Shelby Lynn, regardless of her actions and when Shelby’s outside with “the Shiny Girl,” we all know she’s in good hands…or paws may be the better expression.
When Cheyenne was about a year old, Fed-Ex pulled up out front, and I was outside on the phone. The driver jumps out of his truck, comes through the gate, and it was just about this time Cheyenne came around the house and spotted him. I though oh no!
Before I could get off the phone, Cheyenne was already to him, and they just disappeared from view behind the gator. I told the man on the other end of the phone I’d call him back directly, and went to see what was up between Cheyenne and the driver, who was black by the way.
I ran around the gator, and there those two laid. Cheyenne on top just a licking his face, and the driver on the ground laughing hysterically saying, “Oh, I love you too girl…yeah, I love you too!”
Shoot, those two were having a dern ball out there with each other. I just looked down at the driver and said, “Well, you’ve shot holes all in my “guard dog theory.” He just died laughing. He was a good guy.
On top of this, after his and Cheyenne’s escapades, EVERY time he’d get out this way, and our gate was open, that scoundrel would come down the drive, get out and say, “Where’s Cheyenne?” Not, how are you guys…or boy, it’s a nice day, or I have a package for you. Nope, only, “where’s Cheyenne?” He would come in for nothing other than to see Cheyenne. This was amazing to me.
Anyway, Cheyenne has always loved to sit in a chair with me out on the porch each morning. We get up, I get a cup of coffee, and Cheyenne gets up in her chair right beside me…every morning.
Deb was out sitting on the porch yesterday and I walked out. Cheyenne was sitting there on the porch looking like she’d lost her best friend. Deb was sitting in a chair, and she asked me what I thought was wrong with Cheyenne?
I looked for a minute and said, “You’re in her chair.” Deb said, what do you mean, HER chair. I told her that was exactly what it is…her chair. Deb thought I was nuts.
I looked at Cheyenne and asked her what was wrong, and did her “Mama” have her chair? Cheyenne looked at me, then looked up at Deb. She then went over to the chair beside the one Deb was sitting in, laid her head in the empty chair and just looked at Deb.
After a minute, Deb got up, moved into the other chair, Cheyenne climbed up in the one Deb had just got out of, and took a seat…happy as a lark. Deb just shook her head and said she’d never seen such. I just told her…after all Deb…it IS Cheyenne’s chair! End of story.
Another time while we’re talking about Cheyenne and chairs, I’d gone over to the side of the porch to workout. Yeah, believe it or not there was I time I’d workout some.
Anyway, Cheyenne was probably six to eight months old, tops. She came around there with me, and back then the yard wasn’t fenced, so she had the run of the place. You better watch her close though because she’d be into something, again think coons etc.
So I was wondering what to do to keep her occupied for 15 minutes or so. I thought, shoot, she likes to sit in a chair, so I’ll put her on a leash, hook the other end to the arm of the chair (the chair’s plastic), and she’ll wait on me. If she wants to get down, no problem, the leash will contain her until I finish.
This was working out just fine…until Deb walked out! Cheyenne saw Deb, jumped out of the chair to go see her, and the leash tightened up. When this happened, the chair moved, made a racket dragging across the porch, and it was on!
That racket the chair made just scared the devil out of Cheyenne, and then she realized she couldn’t get away from it. She moved…it moved! She took off like a rocket ship!
She took off across the yard running just as hard as she could get those little legs to run, but no matter how much running, cutting, or dragging, that dern chair was right behind her! She couldn’t get away from it no matter how hard she tried!
She’d be running just a dragging that chair around, and for the life of her, no matter what she tried, the chair stayed about 6 foot behind her, there was no escaping it.
It was so funny on one hand, but so concerning on the other because she just wouldn’t stop and let me unhook her, and you could plainly see this was causing her big time distress.
I was hollering for her to stop but she was paying me no heed! She kept looking back behind her, and seeing that chair just flopping around. Every so often, by the chair being drug behind her and bouncing around, the chair would catch on the ground and then FLY up into the air, just a spinning, and this would terrify her, this chair flying around in the air behind her.
She ran, and ran, and ran, and she did this for at least five full minutes, going wide open! Finally she slowed down just enough for me to grab her, and get her unleashed. She was one happy little girl when I popped that leash.
She was free but kept looking back behind her for that dern chair, but after a short while she realized it was history, and she was indeed free at last!
I gotta’ tell you, for a considerable time afterwards, you could not get her around that chair. She’d go out of her way, just to not have to walk beside it! As time wore on though, this was no longer an issue, and once she overcame her fear, it became HER chair!
It is funny now, but it wasn’t really funny until we got her unhooked from it. She was really stressing while it was taking place, and for the life of me I just couldn’t get to her in time until she tired a little. But boy, after we got her unhooked, we laughed almost until we cried…her running and looking back, and that chair bouncing around everywhere!
Anyway, I thought I’d share that with you guys today. After Deb got out of “Cheyenne’s chair” yesterday, we talked about Cheyenne and the runaway chair. We were laughing, but Cheyenne just looked at us as if she just wasn’t getting the punch line to this story.
Pets are great though aren’t they? We have three now. Cheyenne, Callie, and Susie. The latter two dropped off in front of the house, and we ended up giving them a home too.
It’s funny with Susie because she had really been mistreated evidently. She came up to the house one morning from the barn. It was obvious someone had left her. She was still bagged up where she’d just had pups, but we never saw them.
She was so poor I didn’t know if she’d make it. Honestly, I’d never seen a dog SO skinny. We fed and watered her for 3 days prior to letting her inside the fence. This was because I didn’t believe we could save her, but we did.
Anyway, a funny story on Susie is that after we did let her inside the gate, and she became a part of the Bronson family, she wouldn’t go back outside the fence…period!
We’d go for a walk, Deb, Cheyenne and I, but Susie would not come outside the fence. It was like, “On no guys, I’ve been dropped off before, I AIN’T ABOUT to go outside this fence! I’m perfectly content right here in the yard, INSIDE the fence! See ya’ll when you get back!”
This went on for about three months, but now she goes anytime we go too. She realizes now that…she’s one of us!
You guys have a great day, and God Bless you and yours! Deb says to tell ya’ll to keep a smile on your face, and one in your heart!
Dub and Deb