My life has been an interesting road travelled.

20 years ago would I have thought I’d be where I am now? Apart from “happy”, no, this is nothing like I thought it would be. Heck, 20 years ago I couldn’t imagine being 20 years older — that seemed so…. old. I mean, like you’d be watching VH-1 instead of MTV! (and of course, I do watch VH-1 now and not MTV).

There’s a lot about my life that I cannot explain. Why did I take the path I did in undergrad? Why did I choose Texas A&M for grad school (well, I know some reasons, but still it seemed odd to pick up my life and move to Texas)? Got married in somewhat of a whirlwind, but we’ve been together longer than most couples have these days and are still very much in love. Lots of things like this, where there’s calculation, but only so much calculation. The rest just sorta happens and things work out, many times better than I could have ever expected.

Sasha is one of those things, at least so far. Sure we’ve been researching dogs for years to find what would work for us. There’s been a lot of calculation and figuring. But then our obtaining of Sasha just suddenly happened. An opportunity knocked and we answered the door. It was somewhat calculated, and I think we were prepared for opportunity knocking. But still, I look back and think about how many questions I should have asked, things I should have sorted through before we drove 2000 miles to Georgia to get this unknown dog (tho I said to myself that we’re allowed to drive 1000 miles back empty-handed, if need be). I feel in some respects that yes this was calculated, but that in a lot of others I just blindly dove in head-first.

However, I think if I thought about it too much, I would have over-thought it and it wouldn’t have happened.

Sasha needs work. She needs more work than a puppy should at her age. She’s got some things in place, but there’s a lot that isn’t… and maybe even needs remedial work. For instance, while this morning I saw some progress in getting her to walk on a loose leash, she never once responded to “sit” (always had to push her butt down).

But like the saying goes, there ain’t no such thing as a free lunch. I knew there’d be work involved. I didn’t know there’d be this much work involved, but I’m committed. Does it annoy me a little bit? Yes, but mostly because I question if I did my homework well enough and if I truly knew what I was getting myself into. But I look at that cute little doggie face and I melt. It’s like any labor of love in life… like kids. It’s more than you bargained for, but that also means the payoff will be well worth the investment. 🙂