The hideous, semi-hairless creature I’d agreed to foster was a nightmare. There was no way I was keeping this thing, which was perfect.
I put her in the car.
On a bleak, February day eight weeks before, I’d had to put Addie, my beautiful greater Swiss mountain dog, to sleep. It was the first winter my sons, now freshmen in college, were away, and 18 months after Addie’s Swissy sister dog had died.
My entire family was gone. Eighteen years of boisterous sons and 12 overlapping years each of hundred-pound dogs — their silky-soft ears, gentle eyes and rock-hard heads bounding along with the boys. The four of them had filled my thoughts and my conversation every minute of that time. Every day of all those years had been piloted by the goings-on of our lives together. I always had stories to tell of something they’d done or said, somewhere we’d been.
Now the big, welcoming house seemed pointless. The couches where I’d find other people’s smelly teenagers crashed at all hours just looked worn. The refrigerator held food so long that it would spoil. The silence was everywhere. I had no more stories to tell.
