Books by Philip F. Harris

We thought we were done with more dogs until we got a call from our 'former son' who lives in RI. They had bought a Kerry Blue Terrier and named her Piper. Living in a basic suburb they soon discovered that the dogs needs lots of exercise and room to play. These are criteria that did not fit their situation. At 1 year old, she was a handful.  So, "Dad, if you don't take her we will have to send her to the pound" scenario came up. Yup, suckers, we took the dog. We love her to death and she gets along with all here. She is definitely high energy and loves to run in the fields and hangs with Sagan when he herds the horses. I can truly see that she needed room to burn off energy. Hopefully, she is the last for quite some time.

By the time we moved back to Maine from NY, we were down to 3 wolfhounds and Callie. Then, just before we moved, a "friend" brought over a border collie pup-that was mean as my wife is a sucker for pups. Having lost 10 dogs over the years-all, except one, to age, the idea of more dogs was not my favorite topic. Obviously, with so many dogs, it was hard to get away for any long stretch. Also, at the time we had 7 horses (another story for later), chickens, goats, etc.  But, a cute puppy was not to be denied a home so Sagan came into our lives. If any of you have a border collie-you know there passion is fetching-they love to play Frisbee but any stick will do. Actually, they are obsessive about fetching. Not stop-fetching!!!! But we love him and he has been a joy-most of the time.

Animals have been a major part of my life since the 80's.  I will share some of our adventures and photos of these wonderful friends.
Meet Callie. She is 8. When we lived in way Upstate NY, near Canada, Callie plopped into our lives. Keeping in mind that at the time we had 13 very large wolfhounds. Callie was very small. It was the day before Thanksgiving, and lightly snowing.  Deb went out to get some stuff in the a.m. and said there was a little dog at the end of the drive-which was 1,000 feet long.  There were plenty of dogs in the area so I did not give it a second thought.  For supper that night, I went out to get a pizza. Well, the dog was still at the end of the drive, wet and cold. Being a sucker for animals, I scoffed her up and brought her to the house. This caused a stir with the dogs and the little shit barked at them all and they backed off. She was maybe 6 months old. Her first meal with us was pizza, which all of our dogs have loved but they sure as hell would not get near hers. It was quite funny to see this little thing bullying these huge dogs.  Not being able to find the owner, we think she was just dumped, Callie has been a part of our lives every since-she rules the roost and is the apple of my heart.

I was born in Rockland, Massachusetts and lived there until the 6th grade. We then moved to an adjacent town, Abington, where I completed my high school education.  I did the class president thing but was not the most popular student. Actually, I was voted 'most respected' in my yearbook and the motto assigned to me was. 'doing and saying the nastiest things in the nicest way.'

One of my most memorable experiences was when a friend and I skipped school to go into Boston to march with Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr in a rally against school segregation. For a brief moment we were arm-in-arm. I did not really understand the signifance of the events until later, but it was an experience that I will never forget.

Oh, I graduated in the class of 1966. Times were indeed interesting.

Even though thousands of great books are published daily, writing is rapidly changing and becoming a lost art.  I will use this blog to comment on not just my writing, but also about what I feel is right and wrong in the world of literature.  I hope to get a little personal here, also.  Maybe introduce some of my family, talk about influences on my life, where I've been, what I've done and just share a little about me, beyond the formal bio.