I'm gonna manipulate you into crying now.

Yeah, the concept of me maybe having a new boyfriend came rappelling in through the windows, in emotional SWAT gear, armed with standard-issue military assault rifles and grenades, to knock that waterworks crap off, (Well Helloo ladies. NO MORE TEARS!) and we all thought we were in the clear.

Nope.

Once upon a time, I moved into a big girl apartment. (You've heard this, I know, but keep reading). Actually spending time there meant accepting reality (booo hisss), so, as all big girls do, I went to great and inefficent lengths to avoid that. I paid rent there for a month before actually moving in, and then even took a week or two to sleep there.

My first night in the apartment was torture. My mattress was on the floor. There was nobody downstairs to go talk to. No comfort food to pick at in the fridge. No Minimeems comments to tune into, at any given time. Just me and a bunch of boxes and newly refinished floors. I sobbed alone in that echoing room. The uncurtained windows let the city street light in so I couldn't sleep. It sucked.

The next day, I happened to be puppy sitting Macy, a gorgeous black CCI pre-training pup. (I blogged about it, HERE). I brought her home from the office. I faced a high risk of cluing my landlord in to the fact that I had a very un-allowed Black Lab with me, so I left the conspicuous sleeper crate in my car and smuggled the cutie into the disaster area I wouldn't call "home."

Remembering that she was a total genius dog, I decided I'd fold up a mat in the corner and just tell her to "stay." Who needs a crate? Pffsht. Keep in mind that CCI dogs at 5 months, like Macy was, are already trained better than most household dogs ever will be. Also keep in mind that they are NOT allowed on furniture and certainly not on a bed. I trusted her.

"Macy: stay. Good Stay."

This is a fine example of Macy doing "Stay" for me at the CCI banquet that week. If she could talk, it would be "SIR YES SIR."

I switched the light off. Macy stared. I crawled onto my ghetto floor-mattress (no sheets, cuz that would be too classy) and curled up in my Rbf quilt. Then came my uninvited bedtime ritual of hot tears brimming through closed eyes. YARGHallgfhh. I wondered if it would ever stop. The heart-stomach connection seared. All that weepy crap I used to whine about. I ached with loneliness. It, like, physically hurt.

I heard nothing from Macy's corner. About two or three minutes passed. Or about as long as it takes for a puppy to think you're probably asleep by now.

Thats when I heard puppy paws reeeally quietly and softly padding toward the mattress. Then she crawled up onto the mattress (easy access) and curled up in the crook of my knee. I could feel her clean, shiny puppy fur. I felt her growing-puppy ribcage rising and falling with her breath, snuggled up to my legs. She knew it was naughty, but she wanted to cuddle with me SO bad, and after all, I would never know. She was warm--no, radiant--and she was alive. CCI rules are strict, and I follow them obediently when I have their puppies. Their rule in this instance would be to issue a firm correction and crate her.

No effing way on God's green earth was I moving her from that spot.

We had an unspoken agreement. She would wait till I was asleep to crawl in each night that week, and I would pretend to be.

I would have survived that first week alone in my apartment. I would have made it through. But Macy in her own way, knew I was hurting, and made sure I knew everything was going to be OK. That dark empty room felt like it had a thousand invisible pounds of downward pressure inside it. Just touching Macy lifted that. Life always steps up for me and finds a way to make it just a little bit OK. It really does.

Tadaki, Kelly's CCI service dog, saw me curled in a ball on the floor of the dark bedroom during our Jackson '09 trip. Tadaki knows me from the office. I do not have treats in my cube, and I follow the rules (strangers don't know the rules, and break them, usually with some form of dropped food). We are professionals. We don't have a cuddly relationship.

He saw me there, crying on my vacation three months after Rbf died. (Some cowboy at the fundraiser had made a plane crash joke about Jed.) So the night was effectively over. I felt bullied by life, by love and even by others' freedoms. I felt like quitting. Despite the fact that there were two other CCI dogs in the condo to play with (yes, we all vacation together), Tadaki took a deep, serious breath, crouched down, and aligned himself tightly along the fetal curve of my body in spooning glory. He rested his snout over my side and held still. I woke up to sunlight hours later. I hadn't moved an inch. Neither had Tadaki.

Macy went off to CCI's moderately intimidating training facility (we just call it college) a little while after I had her. CCI's standards of excellence are high, and only about one in three actually graduate to be placed. I wondered how Macy was doing over the past six months, until I got a text the other morning as I was waking up. From Kelly. It said "Macy is going to be a facility dog."

CCI's facility dogs are skilled and trained as assistance animals, but in addition, have shown elevated abilities in emotional connection. They're often used in hospitals and court systems, and usually with children. They work to calm kids who have to testify and other traumatizing things.

In other words, they have unparalleled ability to soothe and comfort the broken and afraid.

Macy traded in her yellow vest for a blue one, and she lives in Texas now. She lifts that thousand pounds of hurt and darkness for other people now. And I'm proud.



And maybe I overestimated this, and maybe it didn't make anyone choke up. But I'm sitting here bawling like a baby. Screw Fergie. There's no "T" in "Duchess," and big girls DO cry.

Trying to cheer up the stoic dog in the room.

She wasn't psyched to get dressed in the mornings.

We were both psyched to get home from the office, though.

Good Stay, Macy.