family | fourgreatkids

Charlie is universally unpopular with most dogs.

He is feisty, sometimes aggressive, and never polite or restrained when he meets another dog. Especially if he’s on a leash. The growl that erupts from his little body is epic—deep, dramatic, and completely disproportionate to all of his thirty-five pounds. It’s the kind of sound that makes other dog owners stop and stare while I hurriedly pull him down the path, apologizing and wondering how something so ferocious could come from such a sweet-looking doodle.

My sweet-looking COVID puppy who came home with us on June 15, 2020.

At home, though, Charlie is all mush.

He is, without question, the most affectionate dog I’ve ever owned. More affectionate than his uncle Rocky, who is two years older and from the same breeder. Rocky is wonderful—friendly, social, easygoing—but a little more cat-like in his affection. He loves us, but on his terms. Charlie, on the other hand, wants to be touching someone at all times. If there is a lap, he will find it. If there is a face, he will kiss it. If there is an opportunity to cuddle, he is already there.

If you met the two of them only at home, you would never guess that Charlie is the difficult one around other dogs.

The difference, I suspect, happened early.

Rocky had the benefit of being properly socialized. He went to dog parks. He spent time at dog daycare while his mom worked. He learned, as puppies should, that most other dogs are just…dogs.

Charlie was a COVID puppy.

He had plenty of love. Endless love, really. He wanted for nothing except one thing: regular time with other dogs and people outside our family.

So now, when he meets another dog, he doesn’t lead with curiosity. He leads with fear.

The fear sounds like aggression. It looks like aggression. But in six years he has never hurt another dog. He simply doesn’t know how to make friends. His instinct is to create distance before anyone has the chance to reject him.

Yet we know he knows how to love.

He adores his people. He wrestles and plays constantly with Rocky. He is gentle, joyful, and endlessly affectionate at home.

That contradiction has made me wonder about people.

I wonder how often the person who is quick to honk, flip someone off in traffic, snap at a cashier, or start a fight over a parking space is acting from something that looks like anger but is really fear.

Maybe they never learned that most people are safe.

Maybe they never got enough practice believing that strangers usually aren’t enemies.

Maybe, like Charlie, they walk into every encounter expecting conflict instead of connection.

Not everyone, of course. Some people are simply mean.

But Charlie has made me a little slower to judge.

Because every time he embarrasses me on a walk with that ridiculous, prehistoric growl, I remember that twenty minutes later he’ll be asleep with his head on my lap, convinced that being as close as physically possible is still not close enough.

My dog is a instigator, troublemaker, agitator, and overall menance with other dogs.

But he is also the biggest love in this house.

Sometimes the loudest bark isn’t confidence.

Sometimes it’s fear.

It was always silly of me to think that I wouldn’t outlive my mother.

She died at fifty-seven—suddenly, out of the blue. My life afterward was forever changed, some of it for the good, some of it for the bad. The bad is obvious: a sadness that filled my heart and clouded my days; a shock to the system; the loss of my foundation, my rock, my home. The loss of her. Of all the special days—and the ordinary days—that she was no longer part of.

The good part was unexpected. Her death reframed my entire consciousness. It made me less afraid—while also giving me a more balanced perspective on living. Whether it was public speaking, running a marathon, or starting law school in my forties, I was undeterred. What was the worst thing that could happen? To me, it felt as though the worst thing already had.

But as I approached the age of fifty-seven, I felt oddly vulnerable. Mortal.

It helped to think about what my mother’s life had been like in the years before she died. A daily drinker since her twenties, my mom could barely wait until 5:00 p.m. to pour her first scotch “on the rocks.” She kept pace with my alcoholic father when they were together, a dynamic that wore on her in unhealthy ways. She was always chubby—a word she used to describe herself—her legs splattered with varicosities that ached at the end of a long day.

It seems strange to me now that I didn’t notice all of this more at the time. The drinking. The toll it was taking on her physically and mentally. I knew she wasn’t especially happy—but I never thought she would die. I don’t think our culture really considers that drinking can kill you. And technically, my mother did not die of alcohol; she died of a heart condition. But the daily drinking surely didn’t help, and most likely exacerbated her death.

Even knowing that—seeing the differences between her lifestyle and mine—turning fifty-seven felt ominous. Surviving the year felt uncertain, as though maybe I wouldn’t make it. I know it doesn’t make sense, but that’s how it felt in my body.

That fear was enough to motivate me to give up alcohol—my joyful companion for decades. Knowing it was causing me anxiety and stress, knowing it was only hurting my body, believing that it may have contributed to my mother’s death—all of that crystallized into a simple idea: I wanted to be as healthy as possible. I wanted to control what I could, to live as long as I could, to be alive for my children. That was enough.

As it does, the year flew by. A cliché, yes—but as I get older, time really does move faster. And guess what? I survived fifty-seven. I’m fifty-eight now, and it feels different. It’s strange that she never got to see it—either herself turning fifty-eight, or me turning fifty-eight.

Her legacy lives on in me now: this alcohol-free self who still remembers her smile, her laugh, and the joy she took in being my mom.

My mother’s death changed me—mostly for the good. But every day, I would trade all of it just to see her face, hold her hand, feel her hug.

Or pour her a drink.