I’ve gotten far behind on my work. This little creature takes a lot of my energy 😉 But she’s awesome.

When I walk with her alone, people stop me on the street to ask what breed it is (Shikoku) and how much she cost.

Shikoku is a rare breed. There are very few of them outside of Japan, where they come from, and even in Japan they are rare.

I chose that breed because it seemed to fit our expectations to a dog.

• It should be close to a wolf.
• It should be independent and intelligent.
• Obedience doesn’t matter that much.
• It should be lively, but not demand 3 hours of daily running (2 x 30 minutes of walk per day should do it).
• It should be able to live with a cat.
• It should be able to live in a house without garden.

When I did my research, I saw Shikoku a few times among the test results, but I didn’t look twice, because I saw they were rare, and I didn’t think I would be able to find any in Israel.

So I went for a smaller dog (even though, I’m not that fond of small dogs) called Shiba Inu.

There was a breeder in Israel, so I contacted her. BUT she’d stopped breeding them. She gave me the phone number to the leader of the spitz dog community, and I called him. He told me that Shiba Inu could no longer be found in Israel…

I was disappointed, but then he continued.

There was one breeder who just had a litter of Shikoku puppets. I couldn’t believe my ears.

So I contacted that breeder, Shay Snitzer, and yes, he had 3 puppets for sale in less than two months. The price was 10,000 shekel – around $2,500.

My husband gasped. That was the same as four months of rent. Even though he loves dog, he thought this was a lot for a puppy.

I called the breeder back and said that I was interested, but it had to be a later litter, because right now it wasn’t possible. We would stay in contact.

And we did.

Now, I did a lot of visualization. The problem was not just coming up with the money, but making it so that $2,500 was a drop in the ocean. I thought maybe writing fiction was the solution to that.

Then I started to visualize my dog at home. I would say, “Nefnef, bedtime” or I would “see” her next to me in the kitchen. Things like that. No big deal, no meditation or anything. Just seeing her in daily situations with me.

Then one Thursday, Shay asked me for my phone number.

I got a phone call Sunday. There was something wrong with one of the dogs, nothing serious, since we didn’t want to breed on her, but enough so that the breeder from Belgium, who’d bought her, didn’t want her. We could have her for almost free (1,000 shekel = $250) if we were interested.

If we were interested?

My blood pressure went through the roof 😀 I couldn’t focus all day, I had only one thing in mind: We could get our Nefnef now.

So we took the train Monday and went to Tel Aviv to get her. We walked her there, saw her father and mother, and then we took her back home. She sat on my lap the whole time (almost 1 1/2 by train) and she didn’t cry or anything. She seemed happy.