Newfoundland Dreams

Well having written the book about my friends the Newfoundlands I thought I better see what’s happening with the Newfie scene today, You see in the days when I had them there wasn’t much in the way of social media, I’m not even sure if Facebook had been invented at the time. We weren’t completely devoid of computerisation I ran an early Apple with 4 megabits of memory which was the central feature of my company Virtual PA. Mike had a bigger Apple for three dimensional design but I think he only had a memory of about 3 gigabits not much for a drawing program. Anyway I digress but it shows what a steam age we ran in at the time.

There seem to be three main Newfoundland sites (is that what you call them?) on Facebook and all flooded with wonderful pictures of our friends. I just love looking at them but oh the temptation. I know I keep on about the responsibility you have to your pet and the fact that I’m not in a position to have one, it’s just crucifying to see the pictures. But now I’ve started I have to keep looking and they’re all on the email page too, it’s like a drug. It was bad enough when I was writing the book trawling back through my memories of the happy times we had together. Sadly I have very few pictures of them to help me remember, of course it was in the days of film cameras, what a long way we have come! Nice as it would be, I don’t really need picture to relive some of those happy days but when I do see the pictures on Facebook and read the comments, it’s enough to start wanting to look for an old Newfie rescue. One who’s lost his owners and needs the care and friendship that I know we could give him, we’ve all the time in the world now were retired but I also know that old age has it’s penalties and for a Newf it can be an exceedingly expensive time. This is where the responsibility kicks in if you can’t afford the vets bills and sometimes on a continuous basis, then you’re not doing right by your dog.

So where are we, no I can’t afford to guarantee the old Newf of my dreams an unlimited budget, therefore I simply can’t have one. But I can still enjoy other peoples Newfies on the net, I’m so pleased I found the sites/pages (you know what I mean) on Facebook, somehow I feel still part of the scene. I never was a breeder, I wasn’t too keen on showing though I was on a breeder’s contract for part of the time so I was slightly involved in both but the main thing for me was include them as part of the family, not as children but as contributing partners.