Travels with Chico

I was packed up and ready to leave. My little red and rusted s-10 pickup was filled to the top, camper shell filled, and small enclosed trailer meticulously filled and balanced across the axels. I was off to a new town, a new college, and a new degree, when my friend, poet, and advisor, Jeanne, called me to tell me that she had a dog just for me. Dogs are her thing. Two unaltered male Portuguese water dog puppies showed up at the local Humane Society. I was packed and ready to leave. I didn’t even have a place to live yet. I asked my climbing partner and friend Dave to go look at the puppies because he worked close by. He walked in there, both puppies rolled over onto their backs and submitted, but one of them peed all over itself. Dave didn’t call me to tell me anything, he simply paid for little mangy black puppy who didn't pee on itself and brought it to me. He reminds me to this day that I still owe him that money. When he stepped down from the back of Dave’s little fuel efficient Toyota Matrix, the dog was covered in dreadlocks, and his eyes hidden behind the drooping eyebrows. He shyly smiled up from behind them. He was (and still is) a nervous dog. Jeanne gave him a quick bath. My mom was there and as I removed things out from the front seat, she put them into her car for me to get later. The dog and I loaded up into the truck, he nervously looked at me, and I named him Chico for the town we were leaving.