Every love story starts somewhere.
26 February 2011.
I was in Glasgow visiting a friend when, somewhere in Wales, a little pup and her two brothers were born. I didn’t know her then. I didn’t even know I was about to become a dog owner, and how my life would change.
Over the next month or so, the idea of getting a dog crept into my mind — for all the wrong reasons, really. I was foolishly hoping that it might help make something of a relationship that was already going nowhere.
It wasn’t until early April that fate truly stepped in. A chance meeting with a woman in a pub in Rutland changed everything. She told me, with great conviction, that I should definitely get a cockapoo – perfect city dogs, she said, and she had done all the research and suggested I check out Jandaz Cockapoos. That was the day I first laid eyes on her and her brothers.
There followed much deliberation over whether to choose a girl or a boy. I had my heart set on a Mr Darcy in my life, after all. But I was persuaded to choose a girl. As it turns out, everything happened for a reason. I went back and forth, but fate quietly sealed the decision for me.
It wouldn’t be until May that she would finally enter my life.
Shortly after Darcy passed, at her memorial service, a friend gently reminded me that while the day she left me will always hold sadness, the most important days are the day she was born and the day she came into my life.
And so today, with a sense of bittersweetness, I think about how she entered the world, unaware of how profoundly she would feature in my life, and how completely she would change me. I give thanks for her, and for her life. If fate had not taken her away, we would be celebrating fifteen years together. But beautiful Darcy, everything she gave me remains, the love, the lessons, the quiet ways she changed me. And for all the heartaches, I still give thanks for this day.
2019 at Cliveden House
2019 Dancing on tables at The House of Mutt
2020 was a Covid birthday
