Meet The Princess

And that's how it all started.

Our lives have become much happier since she started living with us.

And that's just the beginning.

Come, meet the princess.

Leia, the furry princess.

Finally, we have our own house. We lived in a rented flat in London for a very long time. It was not a place to have a dog. I mean, many people do and they are happy, but somehow, either to me or David, it did not seem fair or right to keep a pet indoors. Where I grew up, we had a big house and garden, plenty of space for a dog, or cats later on. I felt bad about the idea of having a dog in a small, closed space, where it could not be able to run free.

Now, finally, we have our own house.

The thought of having a little four-legged friend keeps popping up and I am hearing about it from David, too.

The first Saturday morning that we are both off and free from other engagements, David asks if I want to go to Shenton Park. Yes! It is a dog's refuge home and we would love to rescue one. He is telling me not to be disappointed if we don't get a dog during the first visit.

We may have to go back a few times before our application is accepted.

I understand.

I am happy we can go.

It is about a half-hour drive from home and, by the looks of it from outside, it is a very busy place. We walk into the reception room, and a nice young lady explains to us how it works. She gives us a map of the shelter and a piece of paper with numbers from 1 to 5. We go through the paths; there are many kennels, too many for me to understand why. I don't want to understand right now, I just want to take home all of them. I start writing the names. I have only five places. I want to write more. David looks at me and says, "We can only take one dog. The five numbers on the piece of paper are for your preferred choices. If number one is not available because it is already taken by another family but not picked up yet, they will move to your number two and so on. But you can only take one dog home."

I can feel a big ball growing in my throat. I am so grateful for my sunglasses. Nobody has to know and see that I am crying, not even gone through half of the shelter.

I am not sure if I want to keep walking around the kennels for much longer. I catch a glimpse of David, and my tension eases. He is smiling, looking straight ahead. I follow his eyes, and I can see what he sees. There she is: a happy, jumping, calling, 'look at me' little Princess. She is wagging her tail like crazy, running from one side of her kennel to the other, but her eyes don't leave us. She is constantly looking at us and smiling with the biggest smile she can afford. David looks at me, I look back at him, and we know it. She needs to be ours.

We always made the biggest decisions just by looking at each other. A couple of months ago, we went on a house hunt—three weekends in a row, one open house after another for about four hours a day. And then we saw THAT house. We walked through, inside, outside, separately and together. We met back in the kitchen, we looked at each other, and we knew it was going to be our home. David asked me, 'Do you love it?' I said, 'Yes,' asked him back, 'Do you love it?' He said, 'Yes.' We put our offer in.

The same happened here. We looked at each other, I looked at the plaque on the kennel and wrote the name: 'Asher' on the piece of paper given to us earlier.

David just nodded. We went back to the reception, another lady checked something on the computer and smiled. She said: 'Asher is free, we will bring her to our grassed play area, so you can meet her.' We walk out of the building with one of the volunteers and turn left as advised. They bring her in. She is a happy little bundle of joy. She is running, playing with David, trying to climb up my leg, smiling. She has a mixture of light colors on her fur, some white, some beige, grey, and funny brown bits just by her jaw on both sides.

I love her.

I can see that David loves her, too.

There is nothing to think about.

If we can, please, we will take her home now. The lady volunteer goes and talks to the manager.

They both check our details. They smile. Asher can go with us back home today. We are so happy.

I feel exceptionally emotional and just have to finish off with the formalities of signing adoption papers. We go to get a few toys and other pieces for Asher, we don't have anything at home.

We get a bed, a leash, and a seat belt strap for traveling. I am so happy, someone is taking a final photo of us holding smiling Asher and we are free to take her home. I don't realize I still have tears in my eyes. I sit with her in the back seat and David is making sure that we are both strapped in before we drive off. Asher is a bit agitated at first and moving around, her breath very loud. She tries to walk on the seat and all over me. I keep stroking her and telling her that it is all alright. After a few minutes, she calms down completely, sitting comfortably in her seat, with her chin on my thigh. She is just looking at the world passing by through the car window.

David is looking at us in the driver's mirror.

He says: 'We have to change her name. Asher doesn't suit her.' I agree.

I know that dogs are given their names in the shelter depending on the day of the week they were admitted.

We get home, I take Asher out of the car and let her run around the house first. She likes that very much. Then, we open the door to the back garden, so she can run free and sniff her new place. She is very excited, runs on the pavement but looks around - at the grass and then at us, and then chooses to walk on the bricked path around the garden, instead of walking on wet winter grass!

I look at David and he says: 'Her name is Leia. Princess Leia.' And I smile with agreement.

She is such a Princess. Our very own Furry Princess.

She runs back to the living room, straight to her basket. She settled right in.

She loves us very much and we love our little girl very much, indeed.

Thank God for the day we found her.

And that's how it all started.

Our lives became much happier since she started living with us.

And that's just the beginning.

Come, Meet The Princess.

Leia, The Furry Princess

#princess #shihtzumaltese #shentonpark