I’ve seen my dad teary-eyed on a handful of occasions. I’m sure you could guess the obvious milestones and passages, but the one that surprised me the most was when he opened a rectangular package wrapped in pink paper on Christmas morning 2020. The end of the worst year. We should have known given how it all started… Our precious baby girl, Lucy, saw the end of a very long and well-loved life in the second week of January. She was 16 and the cutest little miniature long-haired dachshund you’d ever seen. Lucy. Also known as Lucifer. 

She was Daddy’s girl. The dog he did not want, and had to be begged to and negotiated with on the sidelines of a youth soccer game on a November morning. We were there for my sister’s game during a short-lived career, lasting only that season—but one we were grateful for. It was there, on the fields of Heardmont Park in Oak Mountain that we met a litter of newly whelped dachshund puppies—and where I made the greatest argument of my life for a 15th birthday gift. Lucy rode in my lap all the way home.

When I left for college four years later, I made another convincing argument. But my parents’ was stronger. Lucy would not come with me until I got through my first semester at Auburn and was settled in my new life as an independent college student. It’s not like I would never see her. My parents, being season ticket holders at the time and having a conveniently planned bedroom in my apartment, visited almost every weekend—Luce-Goose in tow. 

At the end of November, Lucy came and stayed with me—slept under my Charlie Brown Christmas tree, waddled through Samford Lawn, and snuggled on my pillow. But someone at home missed her. And it was very clear that she missed him as well. After finals, she snuggled in my lap for the ride home to Birmingham, and the two were reunited for good. 

Lucy and I stayed very close, and Dad and I shared custody for the most part, but their bond had become something special—and was still evident 13 years later when he tore open that wrapping paper. There she was, life-size in her old-lady fur, graying eyes, and pink puppy coat—frozen in watercolors the way we will always see her.

He said it was the greatest gift he’s ever received, and I don’t even care if that’s not true. It was absolutely the greatest gift I’ve ever given. And every day he gets to say, “Hey Luce” when he walks in his office, and she spends the day looking over his shoulder—just a little less needy than before.