By Liz, hoping summer doesn’t come to an end anytime soon…
It’s been nearly a year since I lost my Shaggy, my best little friend. All of you are more than familiar with my stories about her and my seemingly endless memories and pictures – and I appreciate all of you humoring me. Don’t worry – this isn’t another memorial post.)
But I was so lonely after she died – and I was also hibernating a little, which wasn’t good. Since I work from home, I had no reason to even go outside after she died. And most days, if I didn’t go out to yoga or the gym, I wasn’t getting out at all. I had to fix that before it became a problem. Plus, I was missing everything that came with having a dog.
So last November, I adopted two new dogs. Both puppies (I know, I know). Molly, my schnauzer/Lab/true mutt mix, was completely planned. I did my research online, I scoured Petfinder, I spoke with a number of rescue groups about a number of dogs. I went back and forth in my own mind about whether or not I should get another schnoodle, like Shaggy, and decided not right now. I thought I’d constantly compare a dog of the same breed to my girl.
So I looked at other mixes. I do love schnauzers – they are so stinking smart and loyal – but it wasn’t a hard and fast criteria. Molly just happened to have that in her mix. I had actually put in a request for Molly’s sister, but when I spoke to the woman in charge, she told me about Molly, who wasn’t even up on the website yet.
“Black dogs often get overlooked,” she told me, which I knew to be true from my own rescue adventures (black cats too). I spoke to Molly’s foster parent down in Arkansas and he told me what a lovely dog she was at just five months old. I was sold. I arranged her transport, and then I had to wait a few weeks.
In the meantime, I wasn’t supposed to be looking at Petfinder any more. I wasn’t, really, but I hadn’t cancelled the daily email updates. Still, I wasn’t looking at them (most days) but one day, when I was away for work and bored at whatever I was doing, I scrolled through. Just for the heck of it.
And I saw this face.
Of course, she was a schnoodle. Of course, she was super cute. And of course I knew I didn’t need two dogs under a year old.
So of course, I put in an application. “I’ll just see what happens,” I told myself. “I’m sure someone’s already scooped her up.”
I didn’t get a response for a couple of weeks – in fact, not until two days before I picked up Molly. The response was an email that said, Congratulations, you’ve been approved to adopt Wizzy! She’ll arrive on transport next Thursday.
There was no conversation with the foster parent, if she even had one. I don’t actually know where she was staying before she was shipped up from Tennessee. I wasn’t even asked if this date worked for me, which it really didn’t since I had to go away two days later and it wasn’t ideal. It was all a blur, which gave me pause because Molly’s adoption had been so different. But how could I say no to that face?
So I said yes. Molly had been with me for six days when her new sister arrived, and she was the perfect dog, second only to Shaggy, of course. She was super well behaved, sweet as can be, and totally potty trained. And so calm. All the chaos I’d prepared for ahead of time with her never came to pass.
And then I picked up Penny…
Tune in next month for the rest of the story. In the meantime, tell us in the comments something you’ve done impulsively that turned out right! (Or wrong, for that matter!)