27 September 2019
This post is not a poem or even a song, but an outpouring of a grateful heart which is, in its highest sense, a poem or a song.
This morning I learned that Uno, the One and Only Uno, died last year, on 21 September to be exact. I’d given thought to him last night, and this morning Dear Husband performed the brave act of finding out that the beloved beagle is now the Westminster King in doggie heaven.
I am thankful for not having known last year at this time of the passing of that noble and inspirational hound over the Rainbow Bridge. I was, at that time, dealing with the tear-filled parting from a very dear and elderly friend. I believe that Uno helped to call her Home last autumn.
Looking back today at that phenomenal victory of his in February 2008, I got a glimpse of my life — of life — just before so much of the world we’d known changed, forever.
Just before that first night of his stardom, 11 February, I’d gone online to the QVC boards (forum) for diversion from my busy job of home-schooling Dear Daughter. And I read the excitement from one woman, posting from New Jersey, that the Westminster show was about to begin for this beagle named Uno!
Uno had a real shot at winning the Hound Group. The televised Westminster Dog Show, in NYC, with the 3-hour time difference (not to my advantage in the American West) was truly just about to begin on the telly.
I emailed Dear Husband at his office to let him know that Beagle History could be in progress. And so it was.
The next night, when Uno got the silver cup he'd demanded, I was thrilled beyond belief. I immediately emailed my home-schooling resource teacher, who was nail-biting over the Super Tuesday political primary:
AND THE WINNER IS ....
UNO!!!!
She has probably never forgiven me for my light-hearted joke!
Dear Husband was quite enamoured of this distant cousin of Bridget Louise, our Duchess. Uno-mania spread throughout our household, although our almost-adult Children were less enthused — “It’s a bit much” was one wry comment.
The world out there was looking mighty scary. I purposely focused on this plucky pooch for inspiration. By the end of that summer of 2008, I’d begun to write motivational “Guideposts” to colleagues and friends. And, sometime during that process, I unknowingly steered my writing into the voice of THE DAWN.
You might say that Uno helped me to see the dawning of THE DAWN!
Eleven years ago feels like eons ago. And, yet, in many ways, those days are very much alive, for me, for many who know the bliss, the joy and the wonderment that come from appreciating the small and not-so-small pleasures in life.
Uno was a small and a very big pleasure in my life. He taught me how to enter into any arena, confident of success, and claim victory because, ah-roooo, it belongs to you.
To own a beagle is to live life with a person, or personality, who happens to be a canine. I owe so much to Champion K-Run’s Park Me In First. I think America does too.