It doesn't feel like seven years. We got her not two months after getting married, not one week after buying our first house. I guess she completed our idea of what married people looked like; they apparently have a dog and a mortgage! We couldn't agree on a breed - the hubs wanted a rat terrier and I wanted a golden retriever, each of us making the argument for the breed we each grew up with and never knew anything different. We compromised on a medium-sized dog that was good with kids and calm and that equation came to a Boston Terrier. And Sadie Barkington Bogle, born August 12, 2006, in Canal Fulton, Ohio or at least somewhere near it, fit the bill and that was it. We had planned on buying two girls, but there was only one girl and one boy left, and the girl was ours. She rode home in my lap for the entire trip. I held her as nervously as I would hold a newborn Britton three years later.
Good with kids? Heck yes. This dog does not bite (due to awesome training by the hubs when we were young and had the time for such things!), and she has put up with Britton way more than Britton has put up with Sadie. Who cares that Sadie refuses to walk halfway through a neighborhood walk and has to be carried when my kid can put stickers on Sadie and she won't run away? Sadie has never forgiven me for having kids and taking away her "only child" status, and we have the poop stains outside each nursery to prove it. But over time, she has begrudgingly softened up to these little creatures that want only her.
We joke that Sadie is exhausted from sleeping so much. Sometimes it seems that all she does is sleep. She burrows in her blankets, seeks out the sun, gets as comfortable as possible for her naps. It is like living with a retiree.
When I was on maternity leave, we went through a weather spell where it was thunderstorming at the same time I had to leave to pick up Britton. Sadie can't stand storms - they leave her panting and shaking and terrified. So I took her with me to pick up Britton. And these couple of days of riding along turned her into my co-pilot who was invited (and after two weeks, frankly expected it as her right) to join me for every car trip. It also served the purpose of guaranteeing that she wasn't peeing on my family room rug - the rug we have replaced three times in a year because she keeps peeing on it. Out of spite. For no reason. As long as she is in the front seat (with her blanket and the seat warmer on high), she's not peeing and pooping in my house. A win-win, really.
Happy 7th birthday, Sadie!
No comments:
Post a Comment