A few weeks ago, I posted about the loss of our dog, Rocket. Losing him was a blow that I had a hard time recovering from; my far more sensible wife rather smartly prevented me from immediately driving over to the Humane Society, for the ache in my soul would have seen me returning home with a carful of pets that we really couldn’t have supported. We needed time to grieve, and then, with time and distance, evaluate whether we were in a position to be pet parents again.
As you can probably imagine from the photo for this entry, it was a thoughtful but short discussion; just before the Fourth of July, we made a trip to the Animal Refuge League of Green Valley searching for a new forever friend. We found the appropriately named Amigo in one of the outdoor kennels, a rescue who had been with the shelter since the Christmas holidays. I’m not ashamed to admit it was love at first sight — when the handler took him out for a meet and greet with us, Amigo immediately went to my wife and easily allowed her to lead him to the multipurpose room. Once there, he settled between the two of us as though we’d been a threesome all along. After adopting so many pets over the years, I’ve come to the conclusion that most pets choose us, much as we would like to believe it’s the other way around; it was clear after a few hours that Amigo had found his humans, and we brought him home that afternoon.
So I feel obligated to admit I’m having a hard time not spoiling Amigo. The toys you see in the above photo are all my fault, along with the half-dozen not shown; I may or may not have also purchased special treats to make him feel more at home. He’s also much younger than our last dog — the shelter told us he was three, but the vet thinks he might be closer to 18 months. Either way, he has a lot more energy than we are used to dealing with, which has meant some minor adjustments in our lives in order to keep Amigo engaged. I suspect once it cools down enough this fall, he’ll happily accompany me on my early morning jogs, though if he does, we might need to chat a bit about how frequently he stops to smell the bushes.
I’m so happy he’s joined us — yes, there is a bit of learning curve for all of us with a dog so young, but Amigo is already a huge part of our family. There’s nothing quite like the greeting I get when I return home from my day job every evening, nor the unconditional love he seems to exude with each wag of his tail when he sees us. While there’s still a tiny ache in my heart for Rocket, Amigo has managed to snuggle his way into the rest to my soul — and I couldn’t be happier.