One Decade

It was ten years ago.  My husband was enthusiastically watching a college football game.  I'm sure I was doing something child-related.  At that time, we had a 7 year-old, a 6 year-old, a 4 year-old, and a 9 month-old.  So, of course I was doing something child-related.  I was probably making a snack, breaking up a fight or changing a diaper.  We really didn't need any more commotion to the family . . . no more wildness in the house.

At that moment, 2 tiny puppies wriggled their way between the boards in our fence, entered our yard, and entered our lives.  We found a little grassy nest back behind the fence where they had huddled for warmth before bravely looking for a home.  One looked like a German shepherd; one looked like a golden retriever.  But because of their age and the way they were nesting together, the vet determined they were brothers . . . brothers dropped off in a neighborhood in hopes that someone else would take on the responsibility that their owners reneged on.

We may not have needed commotion and wildness, but we got it.  They lived in the kitchen.  They chewed up cupboards, pooped on the floor, ate cookbooks, gnawed table legs.   For years, our house had the faint odor of puppy-ness, and the value of all our furniture dropped dramatically.

But they became family, as surely as anyone to whom I had given birth.  They wriggled their way into our hearts that day.  And, just like family, they alternately frustrate and delight, annoy and endear.

 

They have been known to warn of intruders, comfort sad little hearts and obediently stay off all couches, chairs and beds. 

And they have been known to pee shamelessly on silk curtains, gnaw stacks of expensive Post-It Notes, and gobble up a warm pan of lasagna.

But they're family, and we couldn't imagine life without them.  I'm so glad 10 years ago two little puppies looking for a home found ours.