My Furry Baby

I feel I owe it to myself to offer up a little post about my furry baby, who has been my stand-in child for 2+ months Now. His name is Quincy, and he’s my little Shih Tzu puppy that we adore, but in the interest of full disclosure, he’s a little monster.

Quincy is 5+ months old. We got him in late April after a reality check meeting with our financial planner in which we learned that we don’t have the moula to buy a house, but we certainly can afford a dog, cant’ we?!?! So B and I went to the little breeders place where we go to play with pups when we need our spirits lifted, and there was this little face staring up at us. I kinda had my heart set on a white-ish colored Shih Tzu puppy, b/c that is similar to the dog that we’ve dog sat for in the past for friends, and this particular puppy was more of a dark golden color. B asked me to take a good long look at him, and he was indeed adorable.

And then I found out he was born on Feb.11, 2006 – 2 days prior to what would’ve been my due date had my pregnancy stuck around a little longer.It was kismet. I had to have this puppy. I felt like he was destined for us. Plus, I was convinced that I was having a boy and I felt like this was my son to be in a sense.
So we brought him home, named him Quincy (just because we liked the sound of it, not out of any love for the great Quincy Jones or any presidential allegiance to our second President John Quincy Adams). Or was it the third president – as you can see my American history ‘aint what it was in High School.

The first day with Quincy home was hard. I know it’s not the same thing as having a baby, but it sure felt new, exciting, scary, overwhelming and intriguing to me all once. I was surprised that all of the mixed emotions I anticipated having about bringing home a baby without a manual on how to raise it totally came flooding to me. I second guessed getting the dog. I wondered what I was going to do with him. How I could stop him from whimpering. How I could make sure he’d always be ok. How I could walk out of the door and leave him cooped up in the apartment for hours, all alone. But we got used to it together, B and I. And now I can't imagine life without little Quincy. He makes us feel like a family. I look at him, and I know he is a part of us. And after spending the weekend with him, it's hard to leave for work on Monday mornings. I look at his face and I feel like we're disappointing him by leaving him home alone. He doesn't get that we'll back. He has no conception of time I'm sure and I know that when I come home I find him standing by the gate the exact same way I left him in the morning. It breaks my heart.


Sure, I get annoyed when he barks in the middle of the night and keeps me up. I start questioning why we thought it was a good idea to get a dog in the first place. I start wondering if it was smart to sacrifice my sleep now, when I need it most. I start cursing at him in my head because I'm honestly really tired and want to go to sleep and his barking is annoying. And I start to wonder if that means I'll be a bad parent...that if I can't handle my dog's formative years then how am I going to handle a child. I start thinking that maybe this is a test, and it's showing me that I'm not cut out to be a parent and that the things happen for a reason means that the past year was to show me that a child wasn't meant to be in my future. But I need to get that thought out of my head. It's not very positive-thinking of me and is self destructive. I love my dog. I look at his face and I feel warm and fuzzy. I want him to be a well trained obedient pup, but I realize he has an internal need to create mischief. He is testing us, and if survive the next months of his puppy-dom, I'm hoping we will be ok. Maybe this will make us stronger. Maybe this will teach us to be better prepared for the unknown. Neither one of us ever owned a dog before so we have no clue what we're doing. But that's ok. We're all learning. We 3 are getting used to each other. Children don't come with instruction manuals. I'm allowed to get mad and annoyed at my dog, aren't I? It's all part of the learning process.