After losing five dogs within a year to old age, my mother and I swore never to bring another dog home in order to avoid the pain that one suffers when one loses a beloved pet. For one year we stuck to our promise. And then the craving for another dog began. We ignored it for a while praying everyday that we would overcome this longing. However, destiny decided our fate one day.

We were feeding the street dogs in our sector as per our habit when we saw a brown pup being almost run over by a car. It seemed lost and disoriented, so we brought it home for a night. Or so we thought, since God had other plans for us. Next morning we could not bring ourselves to give up the pup and my mother christened it ‘Mili’ since we had ‘found’ her on the street.

The first few months of having a pup in the house were traumatic since Mili turned out to be a hyper active dog. Her wild genes made her unmanageable and soon we had changed her name to ‘Kyon Mili?’ She has been with us for two and a half years now in which she has destroyed scores of plants, eaten up dozens of household articles and scratched us with her nails when she is in a playful mood. We are bound to the house as we cannot leave her with any one and since she is highly intelligent, she has learnt to twist us around her little finger (or toe).

Why do we still love her? Who else but a dog makes you feel like the world’s most important person when it expresses affection for you? When you return home, who makes you feel that you have been sorely missed although you were away only for a few minutes?

After doing something very naughty, who looks at you with those deceptively, innocent eyes that make you melt? It has to be a dog. And after all the constraints and disturbance that she has brought into our lives, we can only say “Mili, thank God tu Mili”. As for the pain that we would go through when the time to lose her comes, well, that would be worth the pleasure she gave her in her lifetime. My recipe for a wonderful, although sometimes hectic life – please bring home a stray pup and add love to your life.

Written by - Dr. Sabbarwal, is a lecturer in P.U. and very kind and lovable to animals also feeding and caring of her streets dogs.