You might ask, who the hell is Banjo? Banjo was my lab/pit bull, who knows what else, obstinate, mud headed dog. But, he was mine. I was in my twenties when I brought him home from the pound. My then husband didn’t think much of him. Banjo didn’t think much of my then husband either.

I don’t reminisce much about that time in my life, other than to learn from it. My ex was a man of few words, mostly because he didn’t know many. We were young when we married and what drew me to him were his broad shoulders and washboard stomach. What pushed me away was his narrow-minded, opinioned, mean-spirited, overall negative attitude towards life. To put it mildly, he was an intimidating terrorist. The only breathing being that I ever saw him step back from was Banjo. Good ol’Banjo was responsible for preventing more than a few of the black eyes I used to sport around.

Banj used to sleep by my side of the bed and no one could tempt him away from it until I got up. That dog was glued to my side at all times. He was fiercely protective of me and vindicated me more than once with a few of the warning bites he inflicted upon my ex.

I grew up and grew wiser and left Mr. Asshole. Since then I met the most wonderful, kind, intelligent man, who knows more words than Mr. Asshole had Snap-Ons. One morning, he was being his considerate self and decided to let me sleep late. He tried to coax Banj out of the bedroom to let him out for the morning. Before I could shake the sleep from my eyes and yell NO, he reached down and tried to pull him by the collar. Banj gave him one of his warning bites. Chris still comments on how he didn’t break the skin, he applied just enough pressure to leave a bruise.

Banj got old, arthritic, blind and diabetic. My vet and I kept him comfortable for as long as we could. I know that those of you who love animals truly understand how devastated I was when we had to put my old man down. I moped around the house for a few weeks before announcing to Chris one morning that I needed a baby. The look on his face was priceless until I clarified it was a puppy I was referring to. We went puppy hunting that morning and after holding and assessing at least a dozen pups, I saw some big brown eyes staring at me. I picked up a big, black, handsome pup and placed him on the floor with me. I looked him in the eye and asked him if he would be my new old man and he licked my nose. Misho will be two in February and he’s 120 lbs of love. He doesn’t have the same alpha dog attitude that Banj did, but I don’t have to worry about him taking someone’s leg off either. He’s lying on my feet as I type. I have another shadow glued to my side.

During my recent move, I found some unused syringes I used to give Banj his insulin. I got a little misty eyed thinking of him. But, guess who wouldn’t leave my side yesterday morning when Chris got up to leave the dogs out?