Chuffy McGruder . . . my second dog ever

So tomorrow is the big day. The word from our agency is that 60 families were matched in this group. They spent all day today translating the information, and they will start notifying families between 9:30am and 10:00am tomorrow (central time). They will start by calling people on the east coast and work their way west. And rumor is that it will take about an hour and a half to get through all the families. Lots of people from other agencies got their referrals today, but we will wait. So, as you can imagine, today dragged on.

When I got home tonight, I went for a run. I am training for a half marathon (which is scheduled for August 20th and is the third of a three-part trilogy called the Triple Crown-- and I've already run the first two half marathons). I didn't want to run in the humidity (who thought San Diego would be so humid?!?), but I didn't want to miss out on the mid-week run. So as I was running, thinking about this new child of ours, I was getting rather choked up. I was thinking about how the thought of having a second child can sometimes be so overwhelming. But then when I was running, the thought of learning about my second child was such a relief. Almost like I've really been waiting for this. And I have-- for over a year.

Anyway, I got back to the house and my husband asked me if I'd checked on the dogs-- which we'd left on the side yard today because the neighbors complained about their barking last week. So this morning, I put their bark collars on, gave them some water, a pillow to sleep on, and put them on the side yard. Jason went to check on the dogs, and he looked over at me--I could hear the anguish in my husband's voice when he said my name. I thought, "Oh no! The dogs must have gotten loose." But that didn't make sense because I'd just run all over the neighborhood and no one had "found dogs" signs up.

As I got closer to my husband, he softly said, "He died. Chuffy died today." And I burst into tears. We got Chuffy from a pug rescue group in Orange County. He came with the name Chuffy, and I dubbed him Chuffy McGruder-- and he was a really good dog. He was getting old, no doubt-- going blind and a little deaf. But he followed me everywhere. He was, without question, my dog. I think he was somewhere between 8 and 10 years old. And when we adopted him, we adopted another pug with him-- Pugasus (whom I have dubbed Pugasus LaRoue). Pugasus is smaller and a couple years younger. But he is really Jason's dog.

Chuffy had bad breath. And he snored when he slept. But he was really a very gentle and very faithful dog. And he loved to give kisses. He licked and licked and licked. If I didn't want my feet licked, I had to keep them tucked up with me on the couch. Chuffy was super patient. Just last night, when Casey was trying to ride him like a horse, Chuffy didn't even whimper or wine. And this morning, when I caught Casey uncurling Chuffy's tail for the millionth time, Chuffy wasn't making a peep. He was a really good dog. In the photo above, which was taken a little more than four and a half years ago, Chuffy is the dog on the left.

Casey asked about Chuffy a million times tonight. "Where's Chuffy?" I tried to explain that Chuffy went bye-bye, but then I worried Casey might wonder why Casey wasn't coming back. So then I said, "Chuffy went bye-bye and he's not coming back." Casey said, "Bye, bye, Chuffy." But I don't think he understood. My bet is that first thing in the morning, he'll come running into the family room, wondering what the heck happened to Chuffy.

So today ended up not being such a good day. But I'm certainly hopeful that tomorrow will be a little brighter . . .