This is the first picture of Lucy I ever posted here.
Lucy’s first name was Rosie; I don’t know if I ever told you that. She came to me as a surprise: A girl who my back-then boyfriend and I were friends with had bought a teacup shih tzu with one blue eye and one brown eye for some unconscionable amount of money at a Malibu pet shop. And then that girl decided to go to London and maybe not ever come back, and so she gave the dog - Rosie - to us. I didn’t know this; what happened was that my boyfriend decided to surprise me, so one day in the fall of 2005 I was sitting at my kitchen table doing whatever, and the door opened, and I saw my boyfriend's nine-year-old daughter standing there. She kneeled down on the floor and parted her curled hands, and this fist-sized ball of white fluff came speeding towards me. And that was it, I was in love. I liked the name Rosie but I wanted her to be my own, and so I named her Lucy. I don't remember why I picked that name, but from then on that's who she was.
My dad happened to be staying at my house that day, and when I ran to tell him about Lucy he'd barely even look at her, so annoyed was he that I’d gotten a dog (too much responsibility, why would you do that, et cetera). But later that afternoon I had to go out for some appointment or another, and so against his protests I left her with him - literally just dumped her on his lap, said “I’ll be back in a bit,” and left. When I returned a few hours later, I walked in to find my father and my new puppy snuggled up on the couch, gazing into each others' eyes.
