One year ago today we adopted Max, and our lives changed for the better.
My daughter works at a local Petco, and on the last weekend in January, her store hosted an adoption event with one of the local animal shelters. When my wife picked her up at work, they decided to meet some of the dogs at the event. They took one look at Max, and his soulful brown eyes, and called me. Having never had a dog, I was dubious about adopting one. I met them down at the event, took one look at him, and said, “Sign the papers”.
We still had to bring Brittany to meet him, and we did a year ago today. This picture at right was taken at the shelter that day, where we found out that he was in the shelter for 6 months. He was stressed out, heartbroken, and weighed only 45 lbs. They didn’t know his actual birthday, or exactly how old he was, but we didn’t care.
Within two weeks of signing his adoption papers, I was laid off from my job of 17 years, and my father passed away. Those were by far the two most earth-shattering events in what was a tumultuous year. A month later, everything became crystal clear. I came home after having a rough day – upset, tears streaming down my face. Max initially looked like he was in the mood to jump around and start playing, but instead jumped up on the couch next to me, and started to lick away my tears. It was that moment that Max stopped being just a good dog, and instead became my dog.
Since then, through all of the walks we have taken, he has brought me to so many places I didn’t know existed, even in my home town. He has become Brittany’s playmate, Ashley’s source of center, and our baby boy.
Mondo Ponds, taken with my phone during one of our walks
We don’t know what we did before he arrived. In spite of all that happened, I still consider 2014 to be a good year, because of Max. We set out to rescue him, but he ended up rescuing us.
