True Confessions From the Stage-Mom of a [Would-Be] Calendar Queen

I’ve been taking a lot of pictures of the dogs lately, even more than usual. Candids, action shots, pretty poses – you name it, I’ve been shooting it. Why, you ask? (Besides the fact that I enjoy taking pictures of my furry family members?) Well, it’s time to submit pictures for the premier edition of the Western Border Collie Rescue’s 2009 fundraising calendar! Rules for submitting pictures for the calendar are pretty simple: photos need to be high resolution shots containing one or more WBCR alumni/foster dog(s) (“no recognizable people or non-WBCR dogs, please.”) We adopted Allie from Wyoming Border Collie Rescue (http://www.wybcrescue.org/ in October of 2005, when she was about 6 mos. old and I think she is beeeeuuuutiful and would make a wonderful calendar model. Wyoming Border Collie Rescue is in the process of changing it’s name to Western Border Collie Rescue to reflect the growth of the rescue, which now has dogs/volunteers in Wyoming, Colorado, Utah, Montana and New Mexico.

Let me say, Allie herself has absolutely no interest in becoming a calendar pin-up girl. She would much rather play fetch or frisbee, than pose for more stinkin’ pictures. Any aspirations of cover girl glory are purely delusions on my own part and are continually being frustrated by one very basic fact – Allie is nearly impossible to photograph.

"Allie look here!" "No, not over there -- here!" "No! Look HERE!!!"

Her dark eyes in her black face usually cause her to appear to have no eyes at all (except for the really lovely glowing “demon eyes” caused from the flash).

Sometimes her eyespots get mistaken for big white moth eyes and people always tell me that her head looks about three times bigger than the rest of her skinny body.

To further complicate things, she can never sit still, so most of my pictures of her turn out like this.

Rusty, on the other hand, is a dream to photograph, with his lovely red and white coloring and obliging shy smiles. He will also sit and pose for the camera, which Allie will not.

(“Ball, ball? Isn’t there a ball around here somewhere?”)

Rusty, however, is not a WBCR dog, but was adopted from another great rescue (“That’ll Do Border Collie Rescue”), out of Vancouver, B.C., and thus is not eligible for this calendar competition.

I’m sure a more skilled photographer could coax a better picture out of Allie than I manage with my little point-n-shoot camera, but I do what I can. I love Allie and she is my “heart” dog, but I’m afraid that my hopes of greater glory for my skinny pup are just pipedreams. I will have to be content with following her around going “Allie, sit still” – “stay,” . . . “no, no, Allie, leave the ball alone now!”. . .”look this way!” . . . and just hope that maybe just one of the last 500 pictures I just took will actually turn out.