The Dog Who Wasn't Mine

I never wanted a dog.

I should probably start there because everyone who knows me now finds that hard to believe.

I was forty-six, divorced, living alone in a small house outside Sacramento, and pretty comfortable with the fact that my life had become predictable. I worked, came home, made something to eat, watched television and went to bed. On Saturdays I did laundry. On Sundays I called my daughter.

It wasn't an exciting life, but it was quiet, and after a difficult divorce, quiet felt pretty good.

Then one Tuesday evening, I came home and found a dog sitting on my porch.

He was some kind of shepherd mix, maybe six or seven years old. One ear stood straight up and the other folded over at the top. He had a faded blue collar but no tag.

I tried walking around him to unlock my door.

He stood up and followed me.

“No.”

He wagged his tail.

“You don't live here.”

More wagging.

I gave him some water because it was hot outside. Then I made the mistake that changed everything: I gave him half of the chicken from my refrigerator.

He slept on my porch that night.

The next morning he was still there.

I posted his picture online, called the local shelter and took him to a veterinarian to check for a microchip. Nothing. Nobody contacted me.

For almost two weeks, I kept telling people I was "temporarily taking care of him".

Meanwhile, I bought him a bed, food bowls, a leash, treats and one of those ridiculous squeaky toys shaped like a beer bottle.

My daughter came over one afternoon, looked around my living room and said, “Dad, you realize you have a dog now, right?”

“I don't have a dog.”

She pointed at him asleep on my couch.

“You bought him a blanket.”

“That doesn't mean anything.”

His name became Murphy.

I don't even remember deciding on it. I called him that once and he looked at me, so apparently the matter was settled.

Murphy wasn't particularly impressive. He didn't know tricks. He hated getting wet. He was afraid of the vacuum cleaner and once barked at a plastic bag blowing down the street for almost five minutes.

But every day when I came home, Murphy acted like I had returned from war.

It didn't matter if I'd been gone nine hours or nine minutes. Same celebration.

Eventually, I started coming home earlier.

Then I started taking walks after dinner because Murphy expected them. I met neighbors I'd lived beside for years and had never spoken to. I lost twelve pounds. My daughter started visiting more because she loved him.

Without realizing it, the quiet life I thought I wanted had actually become a pretty lonely one.

Murphy fixed that without ever asking me a single question about it.

We had almost seven years together.

Then one morning he didn't finish breakfast.

Anyone who has loved an old dog knows how quickly your mind notices something like that.

At the veterinarian, they found a mass. More tests followed. Cancer.

There were treatments we could try, but Murphy was already old and the vet was honest with me about what those treatments might buy us and what they might cost him.

I took him home.

For the next six weeks, I spoiled the hell out of that dog.

Chicken whenever he wanted it. Car rides with the window down. Slow walks where I let him smell the same tree for ten minutes if that's what he felt like doing.

His last day was a Sunday.

My daughter came over in the morning. We took Murphy to the little park we'd gone to hundreds of times. He couldn't walk very far anymore, so we sat under a tree.

At one point, he put his head on my leg.

My daughter started crying.

I told her, “Don't. He's had a good life.”

Then she said something that broke me.

“So have you, Dad. Since he showed up.”

That afternoon, the veterinarian came to the house.

Murphy was lying on his blanket with his head in my lap when he died.

For the first time in almost seven years, I went to bed without hearing his nails clicking across the floor.

The house felt enormous.

I lasted eleven days.

Then my daughter called.

“I'm coming over.”

She showed up carrying a leash.

I knew immediately what she was doing.

“No.”

“Get in the car.”

“I don't want another dog.”

“I know.”

We drove to the county shelter.

I told her I was only looking.

Then I saw this little brown dog sitting at the back of one of the kennels. She wasn't barking like the others. She just watched me.

The employee told me she'd been there almost three months. She was around five years old, nervous around strangers and had been returned once because she took too long to adjust.

I sat on the floor.

For several minutes, she wouldn't come near me.

Then she slowly walked over and put one paw on my knee.

I started crying right there in the shelter.

Her name is Millie.

I've had her for two years now.

She's nothing like Murphy. She loves water. She hates car rides. She steals socks and hides them behind the couch. And when I come home, she doesn't run to the door.

She waits in the hallway until she knows it's me.

Then her whole body starts wagging.

I used to feel guilty about loving her.

It felt like somehow I was replacing Murphy.

But I've realized something since then.

Murphy wasn't replaced.

He's the reason Millie is here.

A dog I never asked for showed up on my porch and taught a lonely middle-aged man how much room there was in his life for another living thing.

And when he left, that room didn't disappear.

It was just empty again.

So I filled it.

Not because I stopped missing him.

Because he taught me what to do with the love he left behind.