I was given the best gift ever when I was 14. But it wasn’t really the best gift ever. It happened like this. On December 31, 2019, we heard my doorbell ring after wanting to hear that sound the whole day. We knew that my puppy, Tua, was finally here. My sister and I raced to the door to go and greet our new puppy. 

My siblings and I had been dreaming of getting a dog since we knew how to pronounce the word dog. When I was little, my sister and I even made a very detailed PowerPoint on why we should get a dog. This PowerPoint included us being the only 2 people taking care of it and a list of absurd names such as sprinkles or wiggles. Although it had a lot of great points on why we should get a dog, it definitely did not cure my dad of his terrible dog allergy. We made horrible suggestions such as “Dad can just move out!” or “He just won’t touch the dog,” which were clearly very irrational. Another obstacle we overcame was my brother, who would rather move out then take on the responsibility of being a part-time dog owner.

The one solution to our dad’s allergy was to get a hypoallergenic dog, which meant the dog would most likely not cause my dad to have an allergic reaction. We eventually didn’t have to take this route given that he was not living with us anymore, which made it a lot easier to pick a dog because we would have a much broader search. We couldn’t think of a solution for my brother until he also moved out, which had nothing to do with the dog, although it seems like it does. After both of these things happened, my sister and I immediately thought, “Now is the time to bring up the dog again.” When we did eventually bring it up my mom was hesitant to give in, but eventually did because she grew up with dogs and wanted us to have the same experience. That started our search for the perfect dog.

When we started looking, we asked around to see where we should get him from. We knew we wanted to rescue, we just had no clue where to start. My cousin had rescued a dog from a rescue center based out of the city, which is what we were going to do, until one Sunday morning. My mom was scrolling through Facebook, as most moms do on a Sunday morning, and fell in love with a dog that popped up on her feed. This was at around 8 in the morning, so my sister and I were still sleeping. She ran upstairs to show my sister and me the dog she just found, which ended up being the ugliest dog I had ever seen. His name was Nutterz, another red flag. We are not cruel people and we would not judge a dog based solely on its looks, but he was also 10 years old, so we vetoed that dog and moved on.

Later that day, my sister was scrolling through Instagram and just happened to see an actual cute dog that was on a rescue page ad. She showed him to my mom and me and we instantly fell in love. The dog was perfect and even though he was only days old, we could tell that he was the one we wanted. After seeing the dog, my mom reached out to the rescue center and we put in an application to get the dog. Getting this dog would have been very hard if we didn’t have a friend who was close to the person who decides if we get the dog or not. Of course, this dog had lots of people wanting him because he was the perfect dog, so we are very fortunate.

After waiting a month to get this dog, he was finally here. When he got to our house, his foster mom had him in a travel case holding him. Past her talking, the only thing I could hear was his barking. Although it was barely a bark, given that he was 8 weeks old at the time, I could tell it would still become extremely irritating. Once we introduced ourselves to the foster mom, because my mom and she had only talked over the phone, we brought him into my house. We had no clue what he looked like due to the fact that we only saw pictures of him when he was first born, but he was even better than we imagined. He was a chestnut brown color and was the most energetic puppy I had ever met. 

Getting this dog, we obviously knew that it was a huge responsibility, but we had no idea how close it would bring the three of us. He has taught us to work together because he isn’t just a toy, he is an actual living animal. Also given the fact that everyone is just happier when a dog is around, they are always happy to see you and sad when you leave. Overall getting this dog has changed my life including my relationships with my mom and sister and overall happiness in my home.