My Dog Suit

   Whoever I am inside my dog suit, and whoever my Mamma is inside her people suit, have definitely been together a really really long time. I wonder if some psychic could tell us how we've known each other in our past lives. I love being with her, and I go crazy when she's not here! I wonder what I was like before I adopted her. She was totally meant to be my Mom. This is how we met:
   My big sisters Chino and Rosie died six, and five months before Ma accidentally found me. My Mamma was so sad she said she would never get another dog ever again. One of my Aunties and her husband wanted to buy my Ma a puppy as a present, but Mamma said uh-uh. She was grateful, but no thank you. Mamma said the only way she would ever get another dogger is if she found a black, female, grown up boxer at the shelter. That was kinda a joke, because Ma thought that was impossible. Welp, she put that energy out there and the Universe heard her. The Universe must like her a lot.
   One Friday night (April 11th, my birthday) Mamma was on the phone with one of her friends and they were looking at craigslist together, looking for lawn furniture and garden stuff. She doesn't remember what the title of the post was, but when she opened it she saw me. I was super skinny and I looked scared, but I has my sister Chino's eyes so when Mamma found me she started to cry. She's a big baby like that anyway. My auntie found it online too and said "Well, looks like you found your black boxer". It was Friday at night time, so Mamma figured she would have to wait till Monday to call about me. She asked the Universe all weekend long to please let me still be there. Usually when she asks for something she always says "if it's meant to be" but she knew she was meant to be my Mom so she left that part out. She asked my auntie if she'd take a ride almost 100 miles away to meet me, auntie said sure.
   On Monday morning Mamma called Sean Casey Animal Rescue and talked to Sean. He said I was found in Harlem in December (the 13th actually. 4 months earlier!). I had just had puppies, but they weren't with me. (We look for them on petfinder from time to time)  I'm sure they're all doing just fine though. I was about three years old, and my name was Lucy. Mamma's only other question was "is she good with cats?" He said they'd check later that day and asked me to call back. When Mamma called back she spoke to Charles who tested me while Mamma was on the phone, and I did fine. He then said a bunch of other great things about me, and noted my awesomeness. Mamma said she'd be there on Wednesday to meet me (April 16th, my gotchya day).

   When Mamma first saw me she totally fell in love. Charles asked if she wanted to walk me, so we went around the block and I immediately made Ma laugh because I peed right on the sidewalk, I didn't even need grass. I'm from Brooklyn. Then I scaled a wall, a couple of em actually. Mamma laughed some more, and that's it. I was hers.
   I really loved Charles. I mean the way I smiled at him was like I was trying to flirt with him. Before we went on our walk he said he wanted to see me do my "trick" one last time so I jumped into the second story kennel that was mine, about 3+ feet off the ground. He thought that was real cool. Him and Sean picked up a very very skinny Ma and her puppies while we were on our walk, so they were at the vet with the Mom when we got back. We waited a while for him to get back so I could say goodbye to him but I didn't get to. I kept looking around for him though. I do send him updates and cards though, so I hope he knows how awesome I'm doing. Mamma put Chino's collar on me, and we went home.
   My first night home Mamma put Chino's bed right next to the couch where she slept so I wouldn't get scared. She didn't know if I wanted to sleep in bed with her yet. Now I'm a notorious bed hog. I played with Chino's toys that Mamma kept for a little bit, and then went straight to sleep. The next morning, after breakfast time and pees, I got on the couch with her and slept on her lap. We were instant buddies. Right away I became very very protective of her. I'm a little better about that now, but if I'm sleeping on her lap and you come too close I'll go Cujo on you. And if we have a slumber party somewhere and Mamma is asleep, with me usually in the crook of her knees, you can't come anywhere near her. I protect the hell out of her.
   I was a bit timid at first with other people, still am sometimes. Women made me nervous at first, but I took to men just fine. Some things still freak me out, I'm afraid of towels. But I turned out pretty good. I have excellent manners most of the time. I still beg a lot sometimes, but Mamma understands because that's the only way I got any food when I was homeless. I learn tricks real fast, when I first came home I couldn't even catch a treat. It would end up just bouncing off my face. Now I know a plethora of tricks and do them often. And I can catch a ball or frisbee or snowball (<---my favourite thing to catch) in my mouth!
  We make a great team, I love to be spoiled and she loves to spoil me.

   Anyway, that's the story of my dog suit.