Family III: Clover

FarmWife once said that if she was going to be stranded on a desert island with just two pets, she'd want me and Clover. This was a revision of her first statement, which was that Clover would be best because Clover has a smaller appetite. "How," she asked, "are we going to find hay on a desert island?" I reminded her that if Alec Ramsey could keep a fiery steed like The Black alive on dried seaweed alone, she could certainly find a way to support the subsistence of her hardy and sedate Fenway Bartholomule. If anything, the foraging might help us pass the many lonesome hours!

Clover is a very good companion to me, to FarmWife, and to the whole family. She is tidy, respectful, bold, attentive, responsive, brave, sociable, athletic, etcetera. She has much muleness.

Clover, at 11 pounds, is a chihuahua or possibly a chihuahua/min. pin. cross. As a 10 month-old stray in the tri-cities area in EasternWashington, she was picked up and taken to a high-kill shelter. Luckily, our local alternative humane society likes to pick up busloads of adoptable little dogs and bring them here to find families, and so they did. And so she did (find us, that is). She was my family's Christmas present to ourselves in 2010.

When I go trailriding, I carry FarmWife AND Clover until we're past traffic, then Clover goes on ahead on foot—er, hoof—um, paw. She sweeps the trail for Satan's Chickens, keeping me safe from harm. We are a good team.

Clover is shiny, like me. She is smart, like me. She loves FarmWife, like me, and has big ears, like me. There is very little separating us except a taste for meat, a tendency to roll in chicken poop, and about 889 pounds of body weight.