By Kaileah Coulter
Around a year ago I felt as if there was something missing from my life. My boyfriend and I spent many hours discussing and decided to expand our family. After getting off work one evening we got in the car and drove down to the Humane Society to look for a new dog. We walked through the kennels and found a small, floppy Australian cattle dog mix and we knew that she was the dog for us. When we got her into the room to meet her one on one it was like she chose us instead of us choosing her. In less than ten minutes I was out doing the paperwork to bring her home with us.
We walked into getting a dog with very little preparation so the first stop was to buy all the necessary gear a 4 month old puppy would need. On the way we threw around names and after a few that just didn’t fit we came up with Barley. It was a great name and she started responding to it immediately.
This was our first dog that was ours and not a family dog. Over the next few months we struggled with training her properly and disciplining her in the best way. We took some puppy classes in which she excelled far beyond the other dogs. The road seemed to be long and rocky at first but she was eager to please and took well to the training we were giving her.
Today she is about a year and a half old and is still very rambunctious. She is a loyal dog and goes everywhere with us. We are continuing our long road together and even though there were some tough times I have grown as a person and a pet owner. She has plenty of years ahead of her and I don’t intend on taking them for granted.
