It all started when my beloved Shara died suddenly from a heart attack. Poor old Sabok was lost as an only Saluki. Khaz the Cocker of Mom’s didn’t count. Not a Saluki!

Enter a helpful friend sending me the link to the now gone Saluki Rescue Central web site. There was at that time a person needing to get rid of an unplanned litter of pups, four months old. He rescued Salukis and had one red Crown Crest / Harmony bitch that wasn’t spayed yet. Not a problem till he rescued two little Sirinagar boys six months old. He never did figure out which little boy did the deed but lo and behold he had ten pups to place. There was one picture of the whole litter posted that showed sleeping pups on a couch. Sleeping that is except for one red gold that was staring at the camera with a look on her face that said " I can wreck a rock! Wanna see me do it?"

Of course that was the one I took. She was already named Xena when we got her and due to my husband at the time having worked in the film industry he thought a small Saluki named after the warrior princess was cool. So her name didn’t even get changed to a more Arabic spelling.

We got her at the airport and went straight home where Sabok got off the couch immediately straight over the coffee table to greet her. Khaz the Cocker lifted her head looked and went back to sleep. Slocum Kitty, the cat we had, took one look and went to our bedroom to sulk.

From the get go she fit into our life as if born there. Of course there were lessons to be learned. Like day two in Sitka she learned she couldn’t walk on water. I’d taken Sabok and Xena with me to do boat checks. First we went to old Thompson Harbor where with encouragement from me and Saboks example she learned to walk down the ramp. I’m sure I entertained everyone on the dock as Xena made it down the ramp without spooking and I sat down on the float picked her up and did a lot of being silly with my pup while telling her what a good girl she was. On the way back up the ramp she marched beside Sabok so proud of herself.

From there we went to Crescent Harbor to bail ‘Ruby’, my skiff. Xena walked down the ramp as if she had been doing this for about a thousand years. When we got to the finger float where ‘Ruby’ was tied she followed Saboks lead and got on the finger float by ‘Ruby’. I tied them both up and while explaining just what I was doing I loosened stern line, got in and started bailing.

Xena was interested in what I was doing for about two minutes then she noticed a piece of kelp floating by the end of the finger float not more than six feet away. I had just finished telling her it was a piece of kelp when she stepped off the float to go get it. No she couldn’t walk on water. Yes she could swim. I scooped my pup out of the bay and straight home for a freshwater rinse and dry off. That is after I could stop laughing like a crazy person.

At least this gave her a healthy fear of going to close to the side of the ‘Ruth W’, my forty foot boat, when underway and didn’t stop her from coming to love skiff rides in ‘Ruby’.