Portrait of Betsy

Portrait of Betsy
By:Leland William Howard
Published on 2011-04-28 by AuthorHouse

She wasn’t a dog anyone wanted. Bald from the nape of her neck to the tip of her tail, she was a scrawny little black dog with little to recommend herself to anyone other than the little tricks she used to perform to amuse people. A loser dog. But then, I wasn’t a person anyone wanted either. A loser in the eyes of the world. A ne’er do well named Jamie Fairchild, who, at the age of forty-one, had tried his luck in many places and invariably had failed. For twenty years, I had become a stranger even to the members of my own immediate family. I didn’t want a dog. I wasn’t even looking for one. But God has a way of intervening, regardless of our hopes, dreams, and personal wills, not necessarily giving one what one wants but what one needs. “Th ey ‘tole me you needed me,” Betsy told me. “Who told you?” “My superior offi cers,” she smiled, elevating her chin toward heaven. “Th ings hasn’t been goin’ so well with ya these past twenty years. I hear tell ya had big dreams once, but you went bust, was homeless jes like me fer awhiles. I also hear tell them folks of your’n ain’t much of a family. But then, mine tweren’t neither. I hears ya likes adventure, ain’t afeerd of takin’ risks. I ain’t either. I also hear tell ya likes to perform. I does too. But ya lost your confi dence along the way. Well, I’m here to give it back to ya.” Before long, Betsy was putting me through my paces. “Ah-ten-tion!” she’d bark at me. “Th at’s what our C.O. always barked at the fellas I worked with in New Guinea. Saunders was his name. Man, he was a doll, but he could also be one mean sonofabitch, let me tell ya. When Saunders barked them orders, them guys all shot up straight as ramrods. Shoulders up, ass in, chest out. Now, lissen up, Pop. Ah-ten-tion! Git that chin up! What good’s it doin’ hangin’ down thataways on your collarbone?” “Well, no one would be able to cuff me under it if it’s hanging down.” “Lissen, Pop,” she would say. “No one’s gonna cuff you under the chin. And if they does, I’ll take care of ‘em so good, they won’t need to wear no shoes! No one messes with a Marine. Not if they know what’s good for ‘em. Now lissen up! Chin up! Shoulders back! Ass in!” Awkward as these unaccustomed positions felt to me, I complied with her commands. “Yeah,” her muzzle widened into a grin. “Th at’s more like it, Daddy.” If Betsy had set me onto the road of physical exercise, she also corrected my posture. If it hadn’t been for the disciplines that she imposed upon me, I’d now be a walking question mark. “Why are ya walkin’ with your shoulders down on your chest?” she’d bark. “You wanna be a hunchback one day?” “No,” I said. “Th en stand straight and stop hangin’ your head,” she said. “How are ya ever goin’ to see where you’re a-goin’ lookin’ down at the ground all the time?” “You look at the ground when you sniff ,” I’d say. “Yeah, but that’s only to get the smell of direction. It’s in the dog world what you call a map in the human one. But ya c’aint go nowheres by always lookin’ at the map. Time comes when you’ve gotta keep your eye on the road.” Th is was the army now, and I had become Private Jamie to Sergeant Betsy. When I would slump down into that easy chair, one of whose armrests she had completely disemboweled, and had sunk into those pointless ruminations about what I should or should not have done so many years before, Betsy would approach my feet and deposit at them the tug o’ war rope, fall back on her rear haunches, her big brown eyes shining with excited anticipation, her muzzle dropped open in an eager smile. “Come on, Dad, let’s play.” “Oh, please, not now, Betsy,” I’d say. “Oh yes, now,” she insisted. “Come on. What good’s settin’ there goin’ over things you c’aint do nuthin’ ‘bout? When you does stuff like this, you’re like me when a fl ea gets on my tail and I keep tryin’ to bite it off of it, but the more I turns around, that tail jes keep gittin’ further away from me. Memories is like fl eas, Dad. You chew on ‘em too long, they gets your tail sore. Ya gotta keep your eye on your star. Th ere’s one up yonder that’s your’n and your’n alone. Keep your eye on it, and it won’t be forgettin’ ya. You jes take a hold on my tail, Pop, and I’ll take ya to your highest dreams.”

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Book ID of Portrait of Betsy's Books is VsQy884IttEC, Book which was written byLeland William Howardhave ETAG "yqEffi4K/pA"

Book which was published by AuthorHouse since 2011-04-28 have ISBNs, ISBN 13 Code is 9781456726232 and ISBN 10 Code is 1456726234

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