In 1997, my husband and I moved into a really nice townhouse in Virginia. Between us we had three cats and four ferrets. At the time, one of my husband’s favorite shows was Mad About You starring Paul Reiser. He loved the dog on the show – a border collie in sable and white named Murray. When we started talking about getting a dog – he really wanted a Murray.
So we began the great search and discovered a breed of dog called the English Shepherd. They are cousins to the border collies and we even found a breeder who’s dog Joker reminded us a great deal of the Murray on Mad About You. She lived in Montana and we lived in Virginia, but she sent us great picture packets of all her dogs along with videos. As we watched the videos and looked through the pictures, we began to fall in love.
At the time, both of the breeder’s females were pregnant. Tawny was the sable and white female and the other female, a black and tan, was also pregnant.
One Dog or Two?
My husband was in love with both Tawny and Joker, so we waited in anticipation of the puppies being born. In the meanwhile, I was getting more and more interested in Duke, the large black and tan English Shepherd and his mate’s litter. We discussed and decided to wait and see the puppies when they were born. On June 1, 1997 and June 9, 1997, both litters were born. The breeder sent us pictures and we ooh’d and aah’d over them. Tawny’s litter of 9 only had 2 males in it.
We spent three weeks looking at the different photos she sent us and she included a few from the other litter as well. There was a very tiny black and tan puppy with a horseshoe of white on her chest that stood not as tall as the grass in several of the photos. I kept looking at the picture and wondering. We talked and talked – and finally we decided to get both. In August, when they were 9 and 7 weeks of age, Max and Murray took a direct flight from Montana to Virginia.
I was a nervous wreck. It was a long flight and they were so tiny. When we picked them up, we were lucky that they’d been allowed to fly together in the same crate. It gave them both comfort and they were so tiny – our newly arrived Murray looked like a stuffed animal and Max looked like a toy dog. Max and Murray joined our family and last week we celebrated Murray’s 9th birthday and tomorrow we celebrate Max’s.
They have been with us through thick and through thin. They were there when we got pregnant and when I was on bed rest, Max camped out with me. When I had a migraine, Max parked herself as quietly as possible where I was. When our daughter started getting active on the floor, Max and Murray would park themselves on opposite sides of the room to keep her away from the stairs.
Illness and Animals
When Murray was three years old, we noticed he was having trouble jumping into the car to go out to the farm with us. It seemed to be getting progressively worse and our largest worry was dysplasia. We went through lots of weeks of testing and trial and error before our vet decided to do a blood test that told us the problem was not in his bones or his conformation – it was his thyroid. That also explained the lethargy, weight gain and lameness.
She told us to put him on thyroxin, a hormonal supplement to help his inactive thyroid and provide his body with the necessary nutrients. It’s been six years and we’ve done a lot of trial and error over the years to make sure his dosage stays right – but here we are celebrating his 9th birthday and he knows to come and alert us in the morning at 6:30 for his morning meds and at 6:30 in the evening for his evening pill. He’s better at remembering than we are sometimes – now with our nephew running around on the floor and crawling, Murray is enjoying guarding yet another new member of our family and he so loves the kids – he’s crazy about my daughter and my nephew.
We’re very lucky to have our Murray and our Max. We also have our other dogs too and we love them – but Murray and Max are pushing a decade with us and I can’t wait to be celebrating their fifteenth birthday.
