say yes

Ramona the dog is actually eating. A little. We just got back from our morning walk, our third-ever morning walk, in the early quiet of a pandemic spring morning after a day of ceaseless rain, when all felt washed clean, the cloudy filtered light hitting the wet pink dogwood petals just so, and a scant few runners and fellow dog walkers and even fewer cars shared the streets with us. We adopted her on Tuesday evening, from the Delaware Humane Association. She is nine months old and since her arrival on West Walnut Street has been too excited, overwhelmed, and busy sniffing to be very interested in food or water.

But slowly that's changing. And slowly the cats are considering the possibility that she might be here for good. Beatrice is too. We shared her arrival on Facebook and everyone has been kind and congratulatory; on our walks we always see someone we know who shouts from the other side of the street: the new puppy! Hooray!! So many people have asked things like what made you cave? or you finally gave in, huh? but the truth is that I wanted this dog. The kids were ambivalent. I have wanted this dog since ...well, since the spring of 2015, before Mike got sick, when I was scrambling to rent our house and get us ready to go to England, and Beatrice was just-two. I told Mike we had to do it when we got back from his sabbatical year, when potty training would be a fading memory and his tenure meant we would be in Annapolis for the very long haul (he loved to imagine being a tutor at St. John's well into his seventies; the example set by older tutors who continued to teach and mentor inspired him). A dog could roam our big backyard and delight the children for years and years.

Amazingly, he agreed. What was amazing about his agreement is this: Mike had the most special dog in the world when he was little. Ralph. When he lost his beloved old Ralph at the tender age of six, he made a vow that he would never love another dog again. True to Mike's singleminded, veering-into-obsessive determination, he never did. But at forty, his heart was ready to open the dog-door back up. Just one more of those secondary losses; Mike never got to love our family's dog.

I think he'd be cool with Ramona. Her puppy energy would test him, for sure. But she's a lovely dog, who stops to sniff red fire hydrants and look longingly, ears perked and head cocked questioningly, at other dogs she wants to play with on our walks. I watch her and think: she's acting so doggy. Is this dog really our dog??

I advocated for her starting about two weeks after Mike died. The kids were initially game, and we planned to adopt in the summer, when I was off work. But gradually it became clear that what with selling and buying a house, our general grief-laden state of semi-functionality, lots of travel, and the kids’ aversion to chores, a new dog made zero sense. We adopted the kittens instead, who as you may know have provided us with an inexhaustible source of joy ever since, and limped along as best we could. Every time I revisited The Dog Question, the children would, with varying levels of intensity, object. We’re not ready, they said. Beatrice is afraid of dogs, and the older kids told me in no uncertain terms that I already had too much on my plate, we’re a busy family, and if we had a dog I would nag them incessantly about taking better care of it (“because we’re lazy, Mama”) and wind up doing too much myself, making me even more snappish and grumpy. The overall stress level in the house, already too high, would creep higher still. It would be disastrous.

Well, that’s possible. I don’t even care! I wanted a dog! A panting sniffing smiling muddy-pawed exasperating adorable mutt. Animals make me happy; they always have. I forgive them for pooping. Picking it up seems a reasonable price to pay for their shaggy sweet company.

Maybe widowhood is lonely. And losing a parent is hard. And facing your fears is empowering. And tapping extra love that we all have on reserve can be healing. It’s a lot of pressure to put on Ramona’s furry shoulders but I think she can handle it. This strange time, along with its terribleness, has offered me a number of unexpected gifts: time for noticing, gratitude for the natural world, freedom from our car and too-busy schedule that driving said car facilitates, long walks, fresh attunement to my grief, dance classes in the kitchen, appreciation for my community. Now Ramona joins the list. A doggy dog who will invite more love, more freak outs, more delight, more frustration, more nagging, more playing, more life into our tender family. I say yes to that.