Watching Your Baby Get Old

Cassi was our first baby. We had been trying to get pregnant and were still living in the blissful ignorance of thinking that it would just happen - like it does for the majority of the world - for about six months when I started thinking that I wanted a dog. Part of my need for a pet was based on the suspicion that was sneaking into my heart that the whole baby thing probably wasn't going to work out the way I had previously planned. The other part (a much smaller part) was just simply because I love animals and had had pets for as long as I could remember and it was just time for us to have a pet. And so I mentioned, off handedly, one evening that I thought we should get a dog.

Tim's no was so emphatic that I was a little stunned. And as I sat there trying to comprehend the fact that he had no interest what so ever - in fact, I would go so far as to say he had negative interest in a dog - he followed up with, "We don't need a dog."

The next six months were peppered with recurring bouts of this conversation:
Me: Could we get a dog? I'd really like one.
Tim: No.
Me: Please?
Tim: No. We don't need a dog.

I tried, very hard, to understand that Tim had never had a pet of any sort growing up. (I completely discount the fish he had. Seriously, fish are not pets.) So he didn't understand the joy that a dog could bring to a family. I tried to help him understand that I was ok with a dog in lieu of the cat that I would, all things being equal, prefer if not for the pesky thing of him dying from lack of breathing ability should a feline enter our home. And yet we circled back to, "We don't need a dog." Every. Stinkin'. Time.

Finally, nearly a year on the button after we started trying to have kids, something in Tim cracked just enough that when I brought him the classified ads with the Shetland Sheepdog puppies circled, as I'd been doing for a few weeks, and asked if we couldn't at least just go look at the puppies, he caved.

"I'll go get the checkbook," he said (not particularly graciously, I might add.)
"But we're just looking." I said.
And then issued forth the most inelegant snort I have ever heard him utter. "Yeah. Whatever. I'll go get the checkbook."

In the car on the way to the breeder, Tim began the dad speech. You know the one. "This is YOUR dog. I want nothing to do with it. I am not feeding it. I am not cleaning up after it. I will not play with it. I do not want it. It is your animal."

And Cassi came home with us that night.

Within three days, two things were clear:
1) Tim adored her
2) She preferred him over me

Despite her clear misunderstanding of the fact that Tim didn't want her (sometimes I tell her, "Daddy didn't want you - I had to beg for you!" and she just wags her tail and then goes to flip circles of joy in front of Tim in celebration of his general existence), she is and will always be my first baby. And my heart is already breaking a little bit because today I took Cassi to the vet. She's aged visibly since the loss of her friend in January - even the vet remarked on it. And they have also classified her visits as "geriatric checkups". Shelties don't live super long lives - usually to 13 or 14...and Cassi will be 10 next month.