Two things that have been a part of who I am for as long as I can remember are a love of dogs and a tendency to depression, the first of which can sometimes help to take the sting out of the second.
But around the time I turned 30, I went through a period of depression so profound that I could barely function. Spiraling toward oblivion, I made the painful decision to check myself into a psychiatric hospital and to give away my dog, Lou.
Though I eventually climbed my way back to health, I remained shaken by the encounter with my own fragility and ashamed that I had fallen to the point where I was unable to take care of not just myself but a dog who depended on me. After that, the idea of ever getting another dog seemed out of the question. Now, our relationship was going through a difficult time, and in the way some couples look to a baby to save a faltering marriage, Charlotte and I each hoped that adopting a dog would draw us closer.
I think her name is Quincy! When Charlotte arrived at our rented cottage on Eastern Long Island, carrying Quincy wrapped in a blanket, I felt a rush of love. As I watched her pad clumsily around the living room—sniffing the skirt of a couch here, mouthing a coffee table leg there—it seemed to me that this could be a new beginning.
I vowed to myself that this time I would take good care of my dog. It would be my way of putting things right for abandoning Lou all those years ago. For a while, Quincy seemed to be a dog designed more for looks than loyalty. Quincy attracted attention wherever we went—women started smiling at me on the street when I was with her—and passersby routinely stopped to ask what kind of dog she was.
