Molly

Now we've done it.

After we met Knucklehead, the obsessive-compulsive, penis-vacuuming Beagle, I was somewhat disheartened and disenfranchised with the whole dog-adopting thing. Then, on Saturday morning, the phone rang. It was the dog adoption people. I wanted to ask them if this new dog had any Liberace-like tendencies-- a gold sequins dog collar, for example, but I held my tongue and listened patiently to the description.

Female. Golden in color. Short statured. Shy at first. 8 months old. Cockapoolador.

My wife and I drove downtown later that afternoon, leaving Finley at home, to meet this new girl. They said the previous owners gave her up for adoption because they felt the dog "needed more space."

"A.K.A. 'Hi, we got a puppy and it was really cute but now we don't know what the hell to do with it' the adoption agent helpfully translated."

"Needs more space" is something you say to a soon-to-be-former significant other when what you really want to say is, "Get the fuck away from me, preferably out of my zipcode." After meeting this dog, I cannot imagine anyone breaking up with her, let alone not wanting to be in her zipcode.

She was indeed shy at first, very, very wary of my wife and I-- probably because of both of our prominent noses and vintage eyeglasses. I mean-- imagine how all of that looks to a dog. She hid prodigiously behind the adoption center Ford Econoline van, parked inside the gated, pavement-covered area where we were introduced to the dog.

"Her name is 'Miley,'" the adoption agent said, rolling her eyes. "I can barely bring myself to say it-- I'm sure the idiots named her after Miley Cyrus." I'm sure, too. Them and their eight-year-old daughter who promised to clean up all its shit with her fingers crossed behind her back.

That didn't come out right-- nevermind.

Slowly, slowly, Miley warmed up to us. After ten minutes, she crept up onto my lap and stayed there. Until, that is, she started pawing gently at my chest and I rolled back onto the pavement, where she beached herself on top of my chest.

"Oh, man-- you're done," the adoption agent said, smiling, as she walked past us. "You are totally done. She's got you good." Two licks of my chin finished me off.

It wasn't a done deal, for real, though, until we could drive back to our house, throw Finley in the car, and drag his dumpy, gray ass down to the shelter to meet Miley. If he bit her face off, or if she treated his penis like a gasoline syphoning implement: no dice. But the two dogs when put together were largely indifferent to each other. Miley was definitely curious about Finley, and Finley played it with a relatively cool air.

Cool, except for the fact that he began foaming at the mouth like a heterosexual shark inside the Playboy mansion's hot-tub. The froth was as thick as shaving cream and it stuck to his beard and dripped down like stalagtites. I'd never seen anything like it. If it wasn't for his month-old rabies tag, I probably would have had him shot down, just to be safe. I guess he really, really liked what he was seeing-- or smelling. But there wasn't all that much interaction. Yes, the traditional nose-up-the-asshole bit was ritually done, and done, but not much else. She got in his face a couple times, and he did not growl as he had done with Knucklehead. He just, you know, foamed on her head a little bit. But that's what siblings do. Right?

He didn't even mind terribly when Miley climbed back into the relative safety of my lap, and that surprised me. I looked over at my wife. The adoption agent came back.

"Is this a match?" she asked.

"It's a match," I said. I said it before doing the silent check-in with Mrs. Apron, but I couldn't help myself. It was the first time I've ever been in love with two females at the same time in the same space.

"But we've got to do something about that name," my wife said, "it's awful."

"Well," I replied, rubbing the dog's incredibly soft, velvet ears, "I think we can very easily transition her from 'Miley' to 'Molly.' And that's an acceptable, very serviceable dog's name." My wife smiled, knowing just what I meant.

When I used to work for a non-profit that processed loan applications for people with disabilities, one of our board members, a 4'11" elderly blind woman named Noreen had a seeing eye dog named "Molly." When I knew Noreen, she had just gotten Molly after her former seeing eye dog of fifteen years had passed away. He was an excellent dog. Molly, a puppy, was a "goof" as Noreen said. I remember the first time I met Noreen. It was at a board meeting. This board had never gotten together in person before-- all votes and discussions were held over teleconference or by email. The entire board had assembled and Noreen was the only person who hadn't yet arrived. 10 minutes after the meeting began, the doors opened and there was this tiny little woman with a big ass, squinty eyes, and a silly looking black lab, its tongue dangling out of the side of its mouth and its eyes bugging out. Noreen stood there for a moment while everybody looked at her.

"Hi..." she said, in a squeaky, funny little balloon-air voice, "I'm Noreen...." She stood there awkwardly and struggled for a moment, I think, to think of something interesting to say. "And... I'm blind!"

Our Molly will come home on Wednesday. She's being spayed on Tuesday, and, while I feel sorry that she has to have surgery, I'm also relieved. We had a crazy lesbian health teacher who loved to regale us with stories about holding her dog over a vertically-stablized tampon and plopping the dog down on it. I'm happy to admit that I'm just not man enough for those kind of antics, though I'm sure they would make for great blog fodder.

I'm confident that Molly will not wreck our house, or our marriage. She might wreck the car, or the sofa-- but not our lives. I think she and Finley will get along just fine-- she may even make a new man out of him, although I rather like the old man.

I also am pretty sure that Molly will be a little bit of a goof and, dare I say, a knucklehead herself, and I'm also pretty sure that she'll be a great dog.