Yes, I got a Covid puppy. I was barred from going into my office and like millions of others had the same united idea: it’s canine time! No more excuses of not getting a dog just to leave it alone all day in a crate. My whole house was a crate that my husband and I were stuck in for an interminable amount of time.
We had been dogless for 11 years after we lost our beloved, irrepressible, incorrigible Airedale, Ruby. She bore such a hole in my heart that I couldn't think of replacing her. If you asked me about her, I would call her my soulmate, and wistfully look off, conjuring up the many memories of her capricious behavior: the couch she ate, the stockade fence she broke through, the raspberry bushes she decimated. Best Dog Ever.
The benefits of being dogless were many, though. My husband and I were free to travel without care, spontaneously spend an overnight in New York. My mother-in-law used to repeat this joke: “You know when they say life begins? When the kids move out and the dog dies.”
At one point, I had to adopt my mother’s cat that she no longer could care for it. I resented that, I wanted no animal responsibility. But the cat worked her way into our lives. I loved the way she draped herself over the back of my couch, like a luxurious black fur accessory, a plush and living decoration. And she was not a big commitment. If anything, a cat is so much less a burden that she fooled me into thinking pets were easy.
Gradually I started to entertain the notion we would get another dog. Weakly at first. I thought being open to happenstance would put me in the way of a dog as if I would stumble upon a person who wanted to give their precious dog away. Or I would find an abandoned puppy under my car. Years passed and this did not happen. So I began to look with more purpose, starting with a wide view of dogs.
I dragged my husband in on the search. When we took walks, I pointed out dogs and wondered if it was a contender. We’d exchange thoughts. That kind? Maybe. Or that kind? Never. My husband was pickier than I was. Too picky. But it was a joint effort raising a puppy or getting a grown dog, and I needed his buy-in.
I spent many hours on dog rescue websites, sending photos of potential dogs to family members. As it went on for years, people thought I wasn’t serious. I am famous for being a low-key fantasist. I’ve done this about so many things: buying a horse, moving to the Berkshires, leaving my job. I’m also famous for never pulling the trigger.
The pandemic pushed most of us into living constrained lives, limiting our space, and widening our time alone. It was just the two of us, my husband and I, all day, all night, all the time. We set up our desks within spitting distance of each other. We had breakfast together, broke for lunch together, had cocktails at seven, and cooked dinner together. We took the same walk around the neighborhood every night. Covid put us in a rut. Our days were too predictable. Our schedule too damn boring. We would calcify at this rate, harden into early-onset curmudgeons, no longer flexible.
To quote Churchill, “Never let a good crisis go to waste.” Seize the moment, take advantage of a catastrophe.
We had time now but a newfound sense of urgency — eventually I would have to go back to my office. I searched feverishly online, reading articles such as The Best Dog for Your Zodiac Sign. I took two tests with the title “What is the right dog for you?” And twice, the same breed was chosen, a dog I never heard of, the Chesapeake Bay Retriever, affectionately known as Chessies. My curiosity piqued, I poured over the breed websites for a while, liked what I saw, then promptly forgot about it and searched for other dogs.
Then one summer day while out for a walk, I spied what I thought was a Chessie. I left my husband behind, as he was talking to someone, and followed closely on the heels of the owner and dog. It took me half a block to catch up and when I was within earshot, I yelled out, “excuse me, excuse me!”
The man turned around, he was big and burly grizzled in late middle age. I asked him if his dog was a Chessie. He said, yes, with the bare minimum of friendliness, but I pushed on and started asking lots of questions. My husband caught up to us in time for him to hear the dog owner say, “I’ve had five and there is no better dog.”
I don’t think we take coincidence seriously enough. I don’t think we recognize how much it plays into our lives. In big ways and small. Basically, every relationship we make has happened out of coincidence.
While my husband continued prying answers from this reluctant guy, I studied his dog, whose name was Moose. Moose was large, but not too large, with a big handsome head, a muscular body, a rich chestnut coat, thick and curly that provided protection for swimming in cold water. Like the owner, Moose did not seem interested in us. Good, I thought. My Airedale was an overenthusiastic greeter of humans. I wanted a cool-tempered dog. Moose had a faraway look in his amber colored eyes like he was thinking of bigger things and we were mere obstacles put in his path. The dog wasn’t flighty.
We parted from the man and his Chessie with a breeder recommendation in Michigan. But most importantly, as we walked away, my husband said, “that’s a dog I would get.”
That’s all I needed to hear. I hit the trifecta: the time, the motive, the breed. Thus, began my search for a Chessie breeder.
…to be continued