Challenge of Literature Blog Hop

I have a feeling there are a few of you out there that are going to faint after seeing this blog post. YES, it is true, Tracey of "A Beadiful Mess" is posting about B*E*A*D*S! Amazing, isn't it? My lovely and talented Sister-in-law  Sister, Kim of "Jumbled Hutch" told me about this challenge. I went to Erin's blog to check it out and thought, this isn't for me, sounds to hard, sounds like a stretch. I did everything I could to talk my self out of participating. Later that same day, I went back and just signed up. I felt good about it. I needed the challenge, to stretch, to challenge myself, and more importantly, to make myself do SOMETHING beady!

When I was a kid growing up, we didn't have much. We had 6 children in our family. Times were tough and we scraped by through divorce, remarriage, job loss etc. One day my Mother went out to some rummage sales. I would say I was about 10 years old then. She knew my love of dogs because I reminded her of it constantly by begging for a dog. I had names picked out, what color of dog I wanted. I had bought dog dishes, toys and collars at rummage sales with the money I scrounged up from various babysitting jobs. It was not to be. No one else shared my love and desire for a dog. Anyway, knowing of my dog obsession, she came across a book called "The Call of the Wild" by Jack London. There was a picture of a dog on the cover and it was only a quarter, so she bought it for me. The description if the book is: A classic novel of adventure, drawn from London's own experiences as a Klondike adventurer, relating the story of a heroic dog, who, caught in the brutal life of the Alaska Gold Rush, ultimately faces a choice between living in man's world and returning to nature. I was in heaven. I must have read that book at least 100 times. It sticks in my mind as the defining moment of my love of books. When this challenge presented itself, I knew right away this would be the book I would model my piece after. I present to you, "The Call of the Wild".

Kim made me this wolf centerpiece out of an old book page!

And you can best "believe", I have dogs today, and have had dogs for 37 years. I am not me without a dog in my life. See the other entries HERE.