What's In a Name?

Zundel at 6 years old with our first born child.

            It’s like naming your baby.  A pet in many cases is your baby.  You come up with that name that will last a life time.  A baby generally gets that most popular name given newborns at the time.  But a pet comes from oneself.  It’s like your own original idea.  The popular names out there may be your Bingo, Fido, and Lassie.  But you’re not looking for one of them.  And so; it was the case with my wedding gift.  We were just married and far from considering having that baby.

            “What can I get you for your first year anniversary?” asked my new husband.

            “But I don’t want anything,” I assured him.  “You’re all I need.”

            But he questioned further and simply wouldn’t take no for an answer.

            “Okay, I’ve always wanted my own puppy.”

            And so it was, we went to the only place we knew that we thought would have what we wanted.  We made a trip to the humane society.  We saw all the puppies and even grown dogs they had to offer.  We had plans of not leaving that day until we adopted one.  A puppy was what we came for and so we focused on them.  The perfect puppy would jump out at us.  And she did.  There was a puppy more active than the rest.  Where the paper came from, I had no idea.  But this one puppy was chewing on a piece of paper.  It was a little black puppy.  I never asked the breed.  She was the one I wanted and that was all that mattered at the time.

            “I want that one.”  I said.  I never dreamed that the chewing on the paper would wind up being a dog who would like to chew on things.  Marriage was a new thing to me.  And being an owner of my own dog was too.  Time would take care of both.

            “What do you want to name her?” asked my husband.  “It’s your dog and the naming is yours too.”

            “It’s Zundel!”  I quickly responded.

            “Where did that name come from?”

            “I had a friend once with that last name.”

            “Well, Zundel it is.”

            And so we left that day with Zundel.  What followed was an inside dog.  We got her spayed as outside she would sometimes go.  When asked what her name was by neighbors and such, I always got a strange reaction.  It may have been a strange name.  But it was my choice.

            One time my husband’s mother came for a visit.  She was from Texas and spent a week with us.  She was trying to make conversation with me often.  I knew from the start mother-in-law did not like me.  This is common sometimes with mother-in-laws.  But before she left and went back to Texas, she would manage to dig the hole a little deeper.

            She let Zundel outside and when wanted her back inside, she yelled for her.

            “Come here, Zundel!”  She apparently couldn’t let it go without turning to me and asking, “Who gave that dog such a dumb name?”

            “I did!”  I replied.

            Things got quiet and my mother-in-law walked out to bring Zundel inside.  The name of our pet is the name we give them.  It may be strange or dumb to others. We don’t have to ask approval.  Although Zundel and mother-in-law are both gone, the memory lingers.  A smile still comes to my face.