Greg Burch is a logger and the supplier of our firewood for the winter. He came to the farm yesterday with his wife Crystal and his much-loved dog J.D., an aging pug.

This was important to me because Greg was, in an important way, the inspiration for my getting a small dog. He was one of the first big men in trucks who showed up on the farm with a small dog, the very mention of J.D. can bring Greg to tears. I was to see this curious phenomenon again and again as one big man in a truck after another showed up with their pugs, corgis and small bulldogs.

It was not what I expected, yet another curious subset of the dog and animal world. Greg would come out of the deep woods with a truck full of firewood – a strong, very tough logger – and go on and on about J.D. who was sitting like Yoda in the cab of his truck staring out at the world.

You just could not love an animal more than Greg loves J.D. This sparked my curiosity about small dogs and my interest in having one and writing about their appeal. When I told him I had a small dog, he came rushing over to meet him.

So I wanted Gus to meet his unofficial Godfather dog and I wanted J.D. to meet Gus. Greg says when J.D. passes – he can barely mention it – he doesn’t want to get another dog, he would rather buy Crystal another car. But I’m not sure that is true. Some of the big men in trucks love their dogs too much, they can’t bear to get another one to lose.

i told Greg people who love dogs this much should always have one, right up to the day they die.  It turns out Crystal is a cousin of Robin Gibbons, who bred Gus so well. Robin might be getting a call from her soon, when Greg isn’t home. If she brought him a puppy, he would melt.

Anyway, here is a photo of Gus meeting J.D.  his godfather and the inspiration for this strange new journey.