Weekend at Bernies. Or with.

“I can guarantee you one thing. A new purse will never throw up a pair of children’s underwear.”

Before:

It’s official, we’ve lost our minds.

Welcome home, Princess Pippin Booperschnoodle of Chonkerton, Duchess of Zoomieland, First of Her Name. Please respect our privacy as we adjust to life as a three-dog family.

Just kidding, of course I’ll tell you the story.

Pippin the Bernedoodle puppy had been invading my Facebook feed for months. It all started very innocently the week that my mother died when a page I follow announced the arrival of a pile of adorable puppies. Monitoring their growth was exactly the medicine I needed while coming to grips with losing my mother.  

I would look for the latest pictures and giggle while imaging just how good they all smelled (puppy breath can fix anything). I’d ooh and aah at their unique colors while wondering just how big a Bernedoodle would be. I watched them take rides around their yard, all piled into a wagon taking their first breath of fresh air. 

As April arrived, the population of the puppies began to dwindle as each was picked up for the trip to a new home and excited family. Eight puppies became seven and then five and then two and then…just one. 

That “one” was Miss Purple. 

I spent most of June trying to convince a friend that SHE needed this dog as they’d lost two senior dogs in two weeks and how does one work through that? Not with Miss Purple, evidently. 

Miss Purple’s designated family went a different direction and so she remained available week after week after week until I started down a dangerous path of “Wait, do we need a puppy? Is Miss Purple meant for our home?” 

If I’m nothing else, I’m a professional justification-er. 

Looking for a sign? Look no further, I will find you one. 

Signs I invented for myself and Miss Purple? It seemed like our older dog, Finley, was suddenly slowing down. It seemed like Kylo, our younger dog, really needed a playmate. While cleaning out my mom’s dresser, I found the first “book” I ever wrote. The topic? How I hoped our family’s dog had a puppy so I could take it to school (written well-prior to my understanding of just how puppies were made). My husband read it with a sigh before saying, “If you want to get that dog, just get her.”

Uh, what? 

That was just silly.

Was it?

I did not ask him to repeat himself lest it was a speaking error. 

In the days following that statement, we had a wild storm which took out our power, the interwebs, and cell for 18 hours. After 16 hours, I was poolside with my son, the lifeguard, telling him that I thought dad had said I could get a puppy.

“I’m listening,” he said.

I shared the story and then explained that I hadn’t opened Facebook since Sunday but that I was going to open it right there in front of him and that if Miss Purple was on my feed, we’d take it as a sign. Obviously, the metric-imps were listening as Miss Purple appeared, front and center, with a new note about her hunt for the perfect family. 

“Welp, guess we’re getting a dog!” my son declared.

And so we did.

After:

Miss Purple is still on the hunt for the perfect family. We were not that family. We learned that over a chaotic 72-hours in which we were reminded just how much work a puppy involved, especially when placed in the hands of two fifty-somethings with no young children at home. The last time we had a puppy (Kylo), we were in our mid-forties and the kids were 15 and 11. All hands on the poop deck included many more hands than in today’s timeline. 

Miss Purple is the cutest, funniest, sweetest, cuddliest puppy on the planet. She also has the energy of twenty-five human three-year-olds. We knew we were outmatched almost immediately although my husband was kind enough to let that realization brew to completion in my brain without a single desperately questioning glance. 

In all my years, I have never read the “buyer’s remorse” clause in any contract until last weekend. We had 72-hours to change our lost minds. I read this with feelings of failure, relief, and fear. How in the world do you tell someone that the puppy you’d just taken off their hands would have to be returned? Weren’t they going to think I was an idiot (at best) or the worst pet owner on the planet (at worse)? 

Looking for a sign? Look no further, I will find one and, this time, it was in the form of a wiggly puppy covered in diarrhea. 

It is quite normal for pets to have the runs when transitioning to a new home and Miss Purple was delivering every thirty minutes. One of those deliveries occurred while she was in her crate and, well, you can guess how that went. After a major cleanup, I sent a text with the news that we would like to engage the return policy. The response was very kind, thank the good Lord, but also with questions about what was going wrong. 

In a rare moment, I kept my words brief and without the potential for loopholes or encouragement to keep trying to make a round peg fit into a square hole. Our dogs did not take to a new puppy (this was true) and we did not see a day when they would (this was blurry). We could not keep up with Miss Purple’s needs (this was true) and we could not imagine a time when she would calm down (this was blurry). We would be bringing her back the following morning (this was true) though we were devastated (this was blurry – we actually felt quite relieved). 

When I woke up the next morning and unlocked Miss Purple’s crate, there was a new pile of something waiting for me. I was happy that it didn’t smell and declared it probably vomit. After walking her, feeding her, and corralling her into the kitchen, I returned to the crate to clean it up and found…a pair of Elsa underwear, sized 3T.

None of us wore a sized 3T, though I can’t speak to the Elsa piece. 

This poor dog had been trying to eliminate a pair of children’s underwear for days. Oh, the bullets we dodged. How we didn’t end up with a brand-new puppy undergoing emergency surgery was nothing short of a miracle. And, if little Miss Purple was as crazed as she was while, no doubt, having terrible stomach pains how would she have been when cured? Or with a stomach filled with actual food, rather than children’s underwear? 

I learned a lot in those 72 hours, primarily that my retail therapy should remain aimed at things that are not alive, like shoes or purses or botox, and that it’s okay to opt in for the buyer’s remorse clause instead of committing to a decade of something you don’t want for fear of upsetting a total stranger.

As my good friend said, “I can guarantee you one thing. A new purse will never throw-up a pair of children’s underwear.”

Amen, sister.