I wanted to wish everyone reading my blog or my books or following our lives on this magical farm a wonderful Christmas Eve (I’ll wish you a Merry Christmas tomorrow.) I wrote this on behalf of my wonderful dogs, who cannot speak, but who won’t mind, I think, if I speak on their behalf.

I find that once again I have three wonderful dogs.

The dog fates are good to me in some ways. They remind me of the nature of life, good and bad. They have taken many of my dogs (Orson, Rose, Lenore, Frieda)  – too many – away from me in painful and difficult ways.

They have brought me wonderful and loving dogs in surprising and unexpected ways. It balances out, for me, I guess. Life is about life and death, joy and travail, darkness and light.

Each comes with the other.

Pain and grief are unavoidable in our world, but suffering is a choice for me.

My favorite dog writer was Jack London, my favorite dog book was “Call Of The Wild,” a book that inspired my favorite of my books, The Story Of Rose: A Man And His Dog.

That book is only available as an e-book, my publisher lost interest in me around that time and wouldn’t publish it in paper. It is by far my most loved work.

I often think of my dogs when I think of one of my favorite passages in London’s book, where he describes his dog Buck:

“During the four years since his puppyhood he had lived the life of a sated aristocrat; he had a fine pride in himself, we even a trifle egotistical, as country gentlemen sometimes become because of their insular situation.”

That could describe any of my dogs, especially this crew, Red, Fate, and now Bud.

My dogs are generous, they share their treats and lives with one another, none of them have ever harmed a person or an animal. They live in great enthusiasm, they love life and are up for every second of it.

Their enthusiasm and curiosity are contagious and inspiring. So is their love of people and of the world. Every morning, when I zip up my jacket, they rush to the door, eager to get to work and start the day, eager to follow me wherever I want to go.

My dogs support me and my writing, they drop to the ground whenever I turn on my computer and don’t move until I turn it off. How they know to do this is somewhat beyond me. They know me in a way most humans can’t. They accept me in a way many humans won’t.

I have no illusions about my dogs.  Unlike Buck, not a single one would rush to defend me if wolves were after me. They would be up the road and over the hill in a country second.

That does not mean they don’t love me, it means they are dogs, adaptable, evolved and intuitive. They know when to stay and they know when to go, nothing personal.

More than any of my dogs, London evoked my border collie Rose, a brave and powerful animal who arrived with me when I came to the country,  saved my life more than once and made me feel safe living on a farm with animals for the first time in my life.

If often think of Rose rushing up a hill to stand between three terrified and lost lambs and a pack of coyotes advancing down the hill in the midst of an awful storm.

I kept calling her to come back, but she would not leave the sheep, she stood her ground and stared the coyotes down, growling softly but persuasively, until they turned and ran off into the woods.

“..not only did he learn by experience,” wrote London of Buck, “but instincts long dead became alive again. The domesticated generations fell from him. In vague ways he remembered back to the  youth of the breed, to the time the wild dogs ranged in packs through the primeval forest and killed their meat as they ran it down…Thus, as token of what a puppet thing Life is the ancient song surged through him and he came into his own again..”

My dogs all remind me of what a puppet thing life is, their ups and downs and troubles and triumphs inform me and my work, comfort me and inspire me.

I think of many things on Christmas Eve, especially the spirit of the real Jesus Christ, who thought always of the poor and the helpless.

But I also think a great deal about my dogs, about how they embody the Christmas spirit in their energy and loyalty and intuition.

On their behalf, I wish you a very joyous Christmas Eve, dogs are at the heart of my work, and I thank you for our support and interest in them.

If they could speak, I know they would wish you nothing but wonderful holidays. And they would be happy and excited if that came to be.