Puppies in a Basket

The weather outside was terrible. Rain, rain and more rain. The river at the back of my property was cresting and was going to soon flood its banks. Each hour the river rose foot by foot. It became time to grab a few possessions and head for dry land.

I went into the kitchen of my farm house, which by the way, had water up to my knees. I could hear my dog howling at the top of her lungs from the living room and was going to ignore her for the time being until I remembered why she was howling. She just had a litter of five puppies about six weeks ago.

I went into the living room and saw my dog standing on the top of my couch, with three of her puppies standing there with her. She had one puppy in her mouth and the other puppy was standing on a window ledge. I could tell the puppy wanted to jump. He was pretty scared. He would stick his nose over the edge, look down into the water filled room and then look over to his mother, with the saddest look on his little face.

I saw a basket sitting on my kitchen table. I grabbed it and went over to the window ledge and picked up the little puppy and put him in it. Then I took the other four puppies and placed them all in the basket too. I knew my dog could swim and I knew she would follow me as long as I had her family in the basket with me.

I took the basket over to the small row boat I had and set it down inside. My dog climbed, sopping wet, into the boat and stood over top of her family, looking down at each one to make sure they were okay. I climbed into the boat and quickly started rowing toward a piece of dry land that was much higher in elevation. I knew that piece of land was not going to flood.

Once on dry land, my dog came over to me and licked my face as if she was thanking me for saving her life but most importantly the lives of her family too. It was as if she knew that I had given up all of my prized possessions just to save them. However, I’m not sure if she realized it or not, but she and her family were my prized possessions.