Her Name
She was a beautiful little puppy; very fuzzy, a black coat with creamy paws. Little white eyebrows give her face great expression. When she walked away from you, she presented a snowy white bum under her tail. Her markings were distinctive and eye-catching. But, what to name her? The family wanted "Blackie", "Shadow", "Midnight"..... When I looked at her, she was unique and special and needed a name to match. At first "Murphy" seemed right. Then "Baby Ruth" or "Hershey Bar".
That year winter came early. Nebraska winters are notoriously COLD. Bitter cold winds and little snow. The winter of '83 the snow fell in November followed by frigid cold. Record low temps for the month of December made Alaska look like a balmy island. It was during this time that I was house training her. I don't know if it was my frantic calls to her in the middle of the night trying to get her in out of the cold or just the fact that she liked the name. After several different attempts at picking her name, two days after we met she was "Hershey Bar".
Through the years she would answer to many different versions: Hershel, Little Miss Wilde, Meister (not sure where that one came from), Hersh....and many others. Mostly I called her Hershey Puppy. No matter how old she got, she was always my "puppy".
