The darling hellion’s film debut

Even with the best of domestic and digital organisation, files sometimes can’t be found, and so it has been for a year or two with the video shot and edited by harvestdad in honour of the day on which Millie joined my household and made it a two-dog home.  It was not long before the summer solstice in 2003 when she and her three litter brothers — two red, one black and tan like her — were brought up from Otago by Deena their breeder, and taken away by their respective new owners.  We had so much hope of her, this black-and-tan ball o’ wonder, which proved sustaining in the subsequent months of furious feistiness.

Earlier this year when looking for a marriage celebrant, I recognised one name as the person to whom Millie’s black-and-tan litter brother went.  One phone call and it was an easy choice to make.  In the video the pup is called by his original name, Buckle, but this has since changed.  Curious the links that wind us all about, over time.

The video is also important to me in that it was around that time I decided to try my hand at keeping an online diary.  As I’ve written before, Millie quickly became a narrative feature, often under the moniker of My Darling Hellion.  In an early entry (now protected), I noted:

My Norwich terrier-owning friends have often commented that, concerning this breed, females are more biddable, more affectionate, more obedient and less intractable than males. One may add a NT bitch puppy to one’s household with fewer changes and disruption than a dog puppy.

On the basis of my li’l girl Millie, this is bullshit. She has energy and attitude to burn. She is composed almost entirely of feistiness. …  She likes to run around the house scragging Arthur by his ruff. She would rather fight over toys than share them. While housetraining her has not been too difficult … , providing incentives for her not to nip and bite my face, hands, arms and legs by way of play has been more of a challenge. No bities, Millie. No Bities!

A few months ago, the video file turned up amongst archives at the house of the harvestparents.  Now the world can see the fabled confrontation between Buckle and Arthur in the playpen, and watch as Millie explores in the second half of the video my then-gardens.  The flower that you see her tussling with didn’t last long and she later dug out the entire plant.  In those first weeks she also bisected, and thus destroyed, a small olive tree in a pot, starting the conversion of the section from mostly-trees to mostly-lawn.  (We are happier as a result, now we have the winter sun and less to maintain.)  The demon eventually became the matron, but here she is with her brothers, before we guessed anything about what came next, or what after that.