Hope

This Week's Song - I've Got a Wet Nose, How Bout You - by Robbie Pryor - It never hit the charts. You've never heard it. But it was number 1 with two little girls between 2007-2010. A pretty good run. 

I once rolled my eyes at people who talked about their dogs. That was until I got Hope. Roll your eyes if you must.

Sophie disgusted Hope is in her chair

Two years into my marriage to Nancy and our new life with four kids we decided “why not add to the chaos?!” We decided to get a dog. We had a couple of “trial runs,” trying both the puppy route and an older rescue dog. The most unforgettable was a Beagle mix named Peanut. She was the cutest puppy ever delivered upon this Earth but apparently a Beagle mated with Satan. It became increasingly clear there was a strain of Great Dane and schizophrenia in the lineage. That dog tore up the house, the landscaping, and, finally, Nancy’s leg. Shortly after our baby, Andy, turned 5, I looked out the front window to see Peanut dragging him from the front yard into the shrubbery like a lion would an antelope. Finally, in an attempt to save the situation, we hired a “dog whisperer.” She left our home in tears, a broken woman. Peanut went to a nice farm - really. Nancy and I had given up Hope. Then she arrived.

Nancy found her online at the East Tennessee Golden Retriever Rescue. We invited Hope for a visit. The people at the Rescue don’t mess around. They make home visits. There were many requirements. We were vetted and interviewed over the phone like potential Supreme Court Justices. We scurried around getting the house ready like we were getting a visit from the Queen. After some subtle but healable heartbreak with the previous attempts at canine addition, we decided to lie to our children. It is often the best policy. “A nice lady is coming to talk to Daddy about a case” Nancy said. “she might bring her dog with her.” We didn’t want them to think this dog was staying.

nap time

It was love at first sight…for all 6 of us. She answered to Hope and had recently been found with her litter mate, abandoned in a cold world. She was the deepest red I've ever seen in the breed. She changed our lives. She collapsed at the feet of my four kids, who proceeded to climb all over her. I don’t think the lady was there four minutes before I blew the cover and said, “We are keeping her!!!” Years of beautiful chaos ensued.

As my children came of age Hope pulled wagons, dressed up for Halloween and was a reindeer every Christmas. She was equal parts pet, confidante, friend and child. She played multiple roles in homemade stage presentations and plays. She healed broken hearts and warmed cold feet. As the red on her face turned white, Nancy decided we needed a puppy. I thought it was a terrible idea and, as a seasoned trial lawyer, argued my point with both logic and supporting facts. So, we got a puppy. Sophie blew into our lives like a tornado. As docile as Hope was, Sophie was "energetic." Hope, first annoyed by her, began to mother her, train her if you will. The two of them provided constant entertainment. Hope was scared of the fireplace, Sophie wasn’t. Hope loved tennis balls, Sophie didn’t. Sophie slept in an old chair, Hope on the floor. Neither could swim and both thought they were humans. Every night we adhered to ritual - I came into the girl’s shared room with a guitar and the two dogs for a “Hope Prayer.” It was a 30-minute (sometimes longer) goodnight. A play of sorts ensued where I spoke a prayer as though Hope was talking to God. The girls would giggle with their heads bowed and their eyes closed as Hope prayed for various things. "Please allow food to be dropped from the table" and "Please help Sophie sleep more." Songs were made up and performed with my poor guitar accompaniment (two favorites were “I Have a Wet Nose, How bout You” and “I Love Cinnamon Rolls”). It was my favorite time of the day. I think Hope and Sophie loved it. They anticipated it like it was a meal. Whenever I picked up my guitar, they were on the march to the girls' room, where they would jump up - one on each of the twin beds - and expect the love that was so eagerly given by the adoring children.

The crowd

In the final year of her life, Hope threw caution to the wind. Never a beggar and ever obedient, she ate an entire hickory sausage log off the coffee table without permission. She began climbing into Sophie’s chair. Sophie was okay with it. The two of them were inseparable - Sophie loving Hope, Hope tolerating Sophie - until that inevitable day came.“Something is wrong with Hope,” was the text. Pet owners understand. It is the day we all dread. After all, it is usually the biggest hurdle to owning a pet - you have to give your heart over knowing that one day it will be shattered. Isn't that what love is? Risk - Reward.

Hope and Sophie

The little girls, who’d been smitten when the nice lady walked Hope into our lives, were Seniors in High School when that day came. They held vigil with Nancy and Sophie until I got home. The boys disappeared into their rooms while decisions were being made. Women are stronger than men. I’ve always believed it. Nancy, Cori, Shelby, Sophie and I sat with her until Hope’s predicament made it obvious a trip to the vet was needed. We left Sophie with the boys, and in the middle of the night, in a room of a pet hospital, the four of us linked hands and sat on the floor surrounding our Hope. We put our hands on her. We laughed through tears as we shared our favorite stories and cried unrestrained tears in one last concert for our girl. It was a beautiful moment. We were all brokenhearted children in that room.

Hope Prayer went too long

Sophie was devastated, but recovered, perhaps sooner than the rest of us. She is now 8 and every bit the puppy she was when she came to us. We are convinced she kept Hope young during the years they shared. Sophie and I mope like babies when the girls leave for college and rejoice when we are all together. She sits at my feet when I’m writing and working in my home office. She listens to closing arguments and opening statements. She follows Nancy around the house. I take pictures of her and send them to the girls far away in their new worlds so they won't forget we are there, loving them. Hope opened a world to us we had not previously known, and the two of them together have brought so much joy and love into our family. My parents ended up getting one…and then two Golden Retrievers, all because of Hope. Shelby arrives home for Christmas today. Our family will be complete for the next few weeks. Sophie is going to the airport with us. I might have to dust off the old guitar tonight. Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays!

My Gatlinburg

This Week's Song - In My Tennessee Mountain Home - by Dolly - Who needs her last name. This week my Tennessee Mountain Home emerged from the fire and smoke. You can't burn magic and you can't kill a spirit like ours.

The Smoky Mountains

Pigeon Forge ended at the water slide, the one made of concrete that left cuts and scrapes. Sitting with my siblings in the back seat of the family station wagon in 1978 with the attractions of the gateway to the Smokies in our rearview, the Pryor kids adjusted to focus on the scenery outside of our window. That stretch of 321 into Gatlinburg has always been my favorite part of the ride from Knoxville. As we disappeared into a canopy of trees covering mountain sides, my father playing Bill Monroe and Flatt & Scruggs on the stereo, I felt like I was being transported to my very own Neverland. The path was cut by a river that rolled over rocks seemingly placed by the hand of God. Twists and turns and a final climb opened to a wondrous little town, our East Tennessee Magic Kingdom, where the taste of a candied apples and freshly woven taffy waited to dance on our tongues - A place where pancake breakfasts in front of giant fireplaces started a day filled with believe-it-or-nots, wax museums and putt putt. Chair lifts and alpine slides, a babbling brook and an indoor pool - oh, the indoor pool - transformed every short trip into a vacation. We didn't have money, but we never knew. We had Gatlinburg.

Gatlinburg, Tennessee

My parents, like so many East Tennessee couples, honeymooned there. As a family, and with several other families, we rang in many a New Year in Cobbly Nob in the 1980's. Uncle John died there in his little house, his sacred last breath drawn on the mountain air he loved so much. I was too young to understand but old enough to never forget. It was, for me and my siblings, our first encounter with death.  My brother and I stood in the front yard listening to the wails of my sweet Aunt Lucy through the screened porch door, the one that slammed on rusty springs when we would run back and forth to the creek.  I was sad, but even at that age I knew it was a special place to live and a better place to die. I think Uncle John would agree.                  

Taffy and Candied Apples on the Parkway

Gatlinburg is our secret place, a land of magic and mystery unknown to the rest of the world. That's what we thought then and how I feel now. Children of the Valley share it with the world but it is ours. The images of it burning this week would not register, its streets and businesses, hotels and chalets, all a haven of childhood memories that simply cannot be erased. How can you burn that down? As I watched it burn on news coverage and social media, I thought of it all - the wedding chapels, the mom and pop motels, and the handcrafted pocket knife I got as a kid.  I thought of high School dates to The Burning Bush restaurant and the skating rink at Ober Gatlinburg, where grace escaped me, but not the girl. There were fraternity formals at Bent Creek Resort and day trips with my babies, when they were still babies, to see the great aquarium. Then there was a magical day with Nancy and all four kids in the river, skipping rocks and exploring the forest followed by a night in town exploring its beloved streets and sharing our childhood memories in order to carry out our obligation as children of the Valley - to sprinkle the pixie dust of the spirit of the mountain on the next generation. For those of us raised up in East Tennessee, Gatlinburg is both a right of passage and a an accessible bit of Heaven, a piece of our sugar-laden heritage and hickory-smoked birth right as "mountain people." It is, quite simply, happiness - East Tennessee style.

August 2007

This too shall pass, for in the realm of our world tucked firmly in the shadow of the Smoky Mountains, Gatlinburg's light can no more be suppressed than that of the stars or the memories of a child.