There really never was a time when Julie and John did not have Allie. In only their second year of knowing each other, my daughter and her then boyfriend did what college kids do when they think they may have met the love of their lives: get a dog together.
Puppies are the first engagement rings. Not quite as expensive. A good primer for the challenges that will come in the years ahead should the couple stay together. Their Allie taught them about patience, commitment, loyalty, and love. All of those the ingredients they would need to grow not just in their love for her but in their love for each other.
For fourteen years, this beautiful Boxer faithfully followed their regimen and routine (except when I came to visit and let her jump up in my bed after they went to work--it was fun disobeying Julie). The rest of the family swore that sometimes Allie's paw made this motion to salute when Julie walked by. But, oh, how Allie was loved by two individuals who were as bound to her as she was to them.
They were family.
A family that is now smaller, as Allie's 14 years of curling up at the end of their bed are over.
May they remember Allie's puppy-ness that in the beginning gave them a common focus, her wagging stub of a tail that greeted them every day when they walked in the door, and her unconditional devotion to her favorite people on this earth.
"I want old love, the kind that takes years, to turn to gold love...."
I pray Julie and John will experience this kind of love with each other fifty years from now.
And they can thank the sweetest Boxer that ever lived for preparing them for their own golden moments.
