I love having a dog in the family.

This picture of five-year-old Kelley shows me with a Maltese-like dog owned by family friends. I loved that dog, and wanted one of my own. My father, however, had allergies and dogs bothered him, so having a dog in the house was a hard “no”, until my dad’s cousin, also allergic, told him about breeds she could live with. The cousin’s family had a series of Kerry Blue dogs, but poodles were, at that time, considered the very best non-shedding dog.

When I was eight, for my birthday, my parents relented and found someone in nearby Kitchener, Ontario who had three poodle puppies for sale. There was a brown poodle in the litter, who my father thought we should name Toby, because his rich brown colour reminded my father of the label on Charrington Toby beer, brewed then in Canada by Carling’s. (Remember, my father was the manager at the local Brewer’s Retail, now the Beer Store.)

Looking back, we made mistakes raising Toby. He guarded his food, for one thing, something you can train a puppy not to do. This was the first family dog, so I and my parents certainly didn’t know then what I know now. Toby had seizures regularly and was on medication for his lifetime. The puppy sellers weren’t professional breeders, and they speculated our dog may have had some kind of injury at birth as Toby’s mother, first time pregnant, went into labour when the family was not home, and the puppies were found in some distress after birth.

In my adult years, I’ve provided a good home for three dogs: one was a handover from a friend who was moving to a new city and a new job where caring for a dog would be difficult; and the next two were rescues fostered by volunteers – one had been found wandering the streets of Aurora, Ontario, and the other was found in the Hamilton area. The last of those dogs died many years ago, and I have been wanting another dog for what feels like a very long time.

Chris, then my partner and now my husband, did not see the attraction of having a dog. He only saw the admittedly true downsides of a dog in residence. You can’t decide to go away for a weekend, spur of the moment. You can’t make spontaneous plans, even in town, without factoring in walk times and doggy dinner times. There is risk of damage in your home, if the dog is a digger or chewer. Horror stories from neighbours whose dog swallowed a car fob twice added to his “who on earth would have a dog in the house?” argument. And there is the expense, not just for the dog itself, but ongoing food, veterinary and grooming bills.

Once we finished our house renovation in 2023, and were well and truly settled in Stratford, my pup pining grew. A few years ago, a university friend who’s in New Brunswick adopted a gorgeous little dog named Milane, a Coton de Tulear. Turns out she was a “retired breed mama” – well cared for by a Canadian Kennel Club certified breeder. Once Milane had her last litter of pups around age five, the breeder looked for a loving retirement home for the dog, and my friend provided it. I was besotted, following Milane’s daily life through my friend’s facebook posts.

Because of his positive experience, I thought, this is the way to go. So in spring 2024 I started reaching out to Canadian Kennel Club breeders in Ontario, focused on cute-overload “fuzzy little white thing” styles of dog. After a few email forays, I connected with Patricia Kastanek, who runs Fairhaven Bichons on a farm in the Beaver Valley, about a 90-minute drive from us.

Usually Patricia has one mama nearing retirement in any given year; in 2024, she had a couple more and suggested we drive to Fairhaven to meet the dogs. That late spring day, we met Sky, an absolute doll who curled up in my arms; Pearl, a bit bigger dog who Patricia explained takes some time to warm to strangers; and Ruby.

Ruby was considered the reigning “holy terror” of the kennel – boundless energy, “too smart for her own good,” voracious seeker of food. “She can climb a six-foot chain-link fence,” Patricia said. I couldn’t figure out how a dog could do that – until I saw Ruby gamely hoisting herself, paw by paw by paw by paw, up the shorter pen fence that surrounded the outdoor meet-and-greet area Patricia set up for people visiting dogs, be they retiring mamas or puppies ready for their new home.

“We’ll take Sky,” I said. Sky, however, had another family interested: they had Sky’s mother, Violet, and wanted to get a second dog. The only question was, did they want to adopt in 2024, or later on?

That family decided they indeed wanted Sky in 2024; Patricia told me later this dog left soon after we met her as Patricia decided not to breed Sky again. There was a fourth mama, Maya, who was pregnant during our spring visit: for health reasons, no-one outside the immediate family who live at the farm interacts with the mamas during their pregnancies. Patricia thought Maya might be the best fit for us but we would have to wait to meet her until after she had raised and weaned her puppies.

In August 2024, we got the call to meet Maya, so another trip to the Beaver Valley. In the intervening months, my husband had often chuckled at the stories of Ruby’s antics. I agreed we could meet both dogs again as Ruby was not yet pregnant with her final litter.

The long laneway into the farm had just been regraded and there was dust everywhere. The normally white Bichons were decidedly sandy coloured. I could tell Chris was attracted to the lively Ruby, but I didn’t really want a dog who could, and did, jump up on kitchen counters and scarf any food she found there. I asked if we could take Ruby on a walk on the laneway, out to the road, and spend some time alone with her. And suddenly, we had a very different dog. She walked well on her lead. She looked up at me for signals. There was, under all the shenanigans, a dog who could be trained and would respond to focus and attention.

Maya, it turns out, was skittish that day. She really wasn’t interested in being near us.

So we committed to Ruby – one of a set of mamas at Fairhaven named after gemstones. She would be bred in the fall, then give birth, raise puppies, wean them, undergo spay surgery and recover. We would take her home likely in February 2025. By then, she would have just turned six years old.

Once we brought her home, I gave Ruby a second name: “Ruby Joy”, because of that boundless energy.

Very quickly, she settled with us. Her mother, the previous “holy terror” mama known as “Crazy Rosie”, had done the same settling with her retirement family. They are both dogs who like a lot of attention, and perhaps they acted out so nuttily when at Fairhaven because they were one among many other dogs, and one way to get craved attention was to pull their stunts.

Over the past year, Ruby has grown confident in our small-city setting: in her first week, she splatted to the ground, limbs akimbo, when a bus went by. She’d never heard something like that before. She now goes to dog-friendly coffee shops and happily visits table to table. She has her routines with us and generally is one chill, content dog. The only things that rev her up are the doorbell ringing / guests arriving (she calms down immediately upon being fed a treat) and when we come home after having been out. It’s the only time we get a glimpse at the old “nutty Ruby” as she runs in circles, then jumps and jumps as if she has springs in her legs.

Ruby also used to dash through any open door she’d see: she had zero “recall”, as the dog trainers call it. Two weeks in, she led Chris on a merry morning chase through our neighbourhood when she slipped by him as he was shaking a mat out the door. After that, we hired a trainer to work with us. Now, instead of crowding us and trying to get through our legs as we leave the house, she registers the signs that we’re leaving and usually takes herself off to another room to curl up and sleep.

I recognize that people are bonkers about their dogs. I could bore you with all the gushing love-struck bits that are part of life with Ruby: we sing to her (a lot), adapting song lyrics or making them up. Ruby has (objectively, not gushily) very thick fur, even for a Bichon: petting and stroking her is one way to breathe slower and enjoy a lovely moment even when the news cycle is horrifying. She has grown to trust us more with each month; she now seeks, and gives, affection more readily. Initially she bonded more to me, a physical and gender replica of Patricia, her previous caregiver. But, in recent months, she’s become more egalitarian in her puppy love, seeking scritchies and treats and belly rubs from my husband, as well. The first time she barrelled for the door to greet him as he was returning from a solo outing was a time of great household happiness.

Recently I read This Dog Will Change Your Life, a book by Elias Weiss Friedman, who makes his living as The Dogist, an Instagrammer who photographs dogs mostly in New York City. I thought the book would be silly-fluffy but in fact it’s a great read, and he covers the dog waterfront: international rescue adoptions; guide dogs; breeding issues; unwanted dogs and shelters. He writes that while every dog is different, “at the same time, all dogs are the same: they increase and intensify the human capacity for love, joy, and honesty.”

Happy Adoption Day, Ruby Joy Teahen. May the joy you bring us increase and intensify for many more years to come.