Asa
Asa formally know as "Roxy" came to us on a sad day. When my son's cat had tragically died. Our families hearts were broken into piece and my son Solen'Del was traumatized for life. Our cat was so dear to us and life without her just seemed so dark. She was a little jester that loved to make you laugh. It truly was a joy to have her in our lives.
Chimera our beloved little girl.
I had put our name on a waiting list a year before I got the phone call to adopt Asa. When I was looking to adopt Tien'kou. I had never got any confirmation that my name was indeed on a list still or ever. So once I had adopted Tien, I never thought I should get my name removed.
We were grief stricken when the phone rang. Tears were still streaming down my cheeks as I sat on the couch comforting our two sons. It was a lady from the Shiba Rescue that I had submitted my information to. She explained Asa's situation to me and said that she thought I should look into adopting her. I had told her that I wasn't sure if now was the right time due to the current situations and she said to me, "God provides miracles in strange ways. When he takes he also gives." Now, I am no fool, I know perhaps this lady was desperate to find this dog a new family. And was using our grief to get the better part of me. But neither am I a christian. I don't normally fall for all that bible and Jesus mumble jumble. Don't get me wrong, I do believe in a higher power. And I don't believe one religion is better than the next. What I do believe is that each and every person has to believe in something and no one on earth has the right to say that they are right or wrong.
But above all things I believe in following my heart. Because my mother always told me that "when it comes to God it doesn't matter what label or name you place s/he is always in your heart. Follow your heart and you will never be lead wrong." My heart screamed at me to do this. It screamed at me to answer the phone as I sat on the couch and cried. And it screamed at me to be patient with the lady from the rescue that clearly had little regard to our grief. My heart continued to scream as loud as it could until the day I brought Asa home to meet Tien'kou. Everything in me said this was right and who was I to argue with the divine?
All went well with Asa, despite our tragic loss, she made our pain more bearable. She was so warm and loving. It was like she opened up her heart and gave us a big hug. She truly was an angel.
Just as my Tsunami was my guardian angel that day he gave his life to save mine she was an angel of comfort.
And that is why we chose to call her Asa. Because it means "A new beginning" in Japanese. It was a new beginning for her and a new beginning for us.
It was love at first sight, the boys loved her, my husband loved her and I loved her. She was just amazing. The question though was, how would Tien'kou feel about her?
Tien accepted her, except when she wanted to play with his chew toys. Tien never played with his toys but he didn't want any one else playing with them either. He would run over and take them from her and then try to bury them under anything he could find. Asa of course wasn't so easily bullied. She only took Tien's selfishness as him wanting to play and the games were on. She would spend hours tormenting Tien in a desperate attempt to get him to play with her. But he would lay beside me and just watch her carry on as if she were a foolish child, despite the fact that she was only a couple of months younger than he was.
After a few days of watching poor Asa try with all she had to get Tien to play with her with no success. Her cheerful face began to frown and I wasn't about to let our little ray of sunshine dim. So I went to the corner store and bought Asa her very own chew toys. Tien stole them. With the usual Shiba inu attitude "MINE".
I laughed at such a sight. Was the old man actually starting to come out of his shell. After all this time he was actually showing some interest...or disinterest in something. With one look into Asa's big brown eyes and back at Tien I playfully snatched the chew toy back and tossed it to Asa. Tien looked at me, bewildered. Asa brought the toy back to me, and I tossed it again! Tien stood up as if to say "now stop that, I will not have any of this!" Asa brought the toy back to me and I offered it to Tien. He snatched the toy and ran away to bury it. Asa gave chase. Before I knew it the two the of them were running through the house snatching toy back and forth playing and wagging their curly little tails.
With that of course, little did I know I was about to have puppies. Sure I knew I'd have to get her spayed, but I was told she had never gone into her heat cycle yet and I so I figured I'd give her a chance to settle in before putting her through all of that stress. But it was too late. They romped they played and they made sweet love and who was I to argue. They were happy and besides, I knew eventually one day in my life I wanted to raise Shiba Inu puppies. I had just hoped it would have been later rather than sooner.
She had 4 beautiful puppies in her first litter. Two boys and two girls. Two sets of twins. A red pair male and female named Inali and Renji and a white pair male and female named Buddha and Nanook.
Still to this day Tien and Asa are a happy couple, they love each other like husband and wife both tending to the pups and getting into trouble together. They are on their second and final litter now. For Asa will be getting spayed Feb 23rd, 7 weeks after her second litter for which was born on New Years Eve 2011 mine and my husbands 8 year anniversary. Her second litter was small but very healthy and are two male sesames. Their names are yet to be decided. We are keeping both puppies.
