You See That Profile? That's the Profile That Says "I'm Prettier Than All the Other Dogs, Because That's What the Other Dog Owners Gush."

I haven't ever posted about my dog. That is because I started this blog when I was a mother, not three years ago, when I was a Lunatic Dog-Owner Who Stopped This Short of Dressing Her Dog in People Clothes.

My dog's name is Lu. Really, we don't know how to spell that, but I assure you, it is a girl dog name, short for Louisa, not a boy dog name, short for Louis. The cashier at Petsmart said "My [boy] dog's name is Lu, too, short for Lucifer!" Her name is Lu because Tyler had a crazy obsession with the name Lu and was ready to name our first-begotten-she-child Lu (this probably should have been the first red flag of a revolting name fetish that became all too apparent when he suggested Ebeneezer as an appropriate first-begotten-he-child name. "Listen to how cool that sounds, Laura. Ebeneezer Howe."). I wasn't convinced. I was even less convinced when he pulled the name Luella off my family history chart. I told him, "If we name our daughter Luella, we might as well name her Luella Mae Sue and plan on her marrying Cletus Homer Jefferson. If we ever get a dog, we can name the dog Lu." Done and done.

I first realized What A Big Part of the Family Lu Is when she needed surgery on her leg at 7 months old. They tell you golden retrievers are gentle and loving and great with kids, but they don't tell you that golden retrievers come with all sorts of genetic joint problems. Lu was born with elbow displasia, meaning her elbow didn't fit together right, making her lame. It's difficult to have the conversation, "How much are we going to spend on a dog?" at any time, but that conversation had a pretty bleak outlook when happening between a graduate student, not really making any money, and a public educator only on step 2 of his public educator's salary. I'm not sure I've properly thanked my in-laws for making her arthroscopic surgery a possibility, and I still won't disclose to my dog-hating parents exactly how much we spent on the dog.

Talmage was born when Lu was a year old. I didn't love Lu any less when Talmage was born; I just started loving Talmage a lot more. But I realized how big a part of my life she still was when she got caught in a current swimming in a bloated spring-runoff river. I realized she wasn't going to make it back to shore and glimpsed the waterfall in the distance. I did stop to take infant Talmage off my back, but I was ready to jump in that river for my girl. It's probably fortunate that she had already gone over the waterfall by the time I looked back up, but the next several minutes before she turned up 20 meters downstream were almost as frightening as Talmage's five minute febrile seizure.

Last night I came home late from book club. The house was dark, and Talmage and Tyler were both asleep. I opened the door and kicked off my shoes when Lu wandered sleepily down the hall. I stopped to pet her, but she looked at me with eyes that said, "Thanks for the effort but I'm really tired. I just wanted to make sure your home and okay. Everything good? Great, well I'm going back to bed."

She's my best girl.