The Other Woman

Among our friends, Dave and I are very close to two women who live near us. Stacy is a friend from college who lives about 10 minutes away. She was actually friends with Dave before I even met her. And our friend Cindy, who lives about 20 minutes away, but works about 5 minutes from our house. I met Cindy through work when I first moved to Massachusetts, and Dave and I have become good friends with her and her fiance, Keith.

Since Dave has been home, and especially during the summer, we joked that Cindy and Stacy were his girlfriends. Stacy, being a teacher, would come over during the day to use our pool. And occasionally pining for some human interaction, Dave would go to lunch with either of them.

But now there is another woman in my husband's life. And she's in our house all the time. I'm pretty sure Chiquita is in love with Dave.


Don't get me wrong, she loves me and wants to play with me, snuggle me, and all the stuff puppies want from their people. But she loves her some Dave.

When we first brought her home, we wanted to establish boundaries, so we only allowed her free reign over the kitchen and the living room. We shut the doors to all the other rooms in the house, even when we were in them. So on Day 2 when Dave went into the office to do a little work, Chiquita was not pleased. Apparently my presence in the kitchen wasn't enough for her since she proceeded to wait for Dave right outside the office door.

Yes, we really are that pathetic.

Of course, once she heard me preparing a snack, I was her best friend.

It's been pretty funny, seeing Dave walk around the house with a dog-shaped shadow. Chiquita loves to sit at the front door or look out the front window. On Sunday, Dave was rotating the tires on his Jeep and taking out miscellaneous stuff from having gone 4x4ing on Saturday. This meant several trips from the driveway (which you can see from the front windows) through the gate on the side of the house (which you can see from the side door) and through the backyard (which you can see from the backdoor) to the bulkhead (which you can't see from anywhere, especially if you're only 23 inches tall).


Chiquita was so sad that she could see Dave in the driveway, but that she couldn't get out there to be next to him. She whimpered and barked a little bit. But the absolute funniest thing was when she figured out where he was going when he left the driveway. I think she thought he was coming back in every time, and her plan was to meet him at the door. But which door? So she ran from the front door to the side door. Wait, he's not coming up the steps. To the back door! He's going past the deck. Now what? At that point she would start to run down the hallway. But then she realized all the doors were shut and there were no windows to see where he went. And every time she would look up at me with the saddest, most confused look on her face, as if to say, "My Dave keeps disappearing! Where does he go?"


I lost track of how many times this scenario unfolded, but I don't think I'm underestimating at 8 puppy panic attacks. So of course, when Dave finally did come in, I had to document the greeting.

Sorry the lighting is pretty terrible. But you get the gist.

Chiquita's a licker. Big time. We discourage jumping, but I certainly wasn't going to be the one to reprimand her for this one. Since Dave was the one that freaked her out, he was going to have to deal with her. She really wanted to lick his face, but she settled for completely washing Dave's hands and arms.

I'm not actually jealous, because she doesn't try to interfere with Dave and I nor does she exhibit guarding behaviors of Dave. I'm certain her attachment is just because he's with her all day. Since Dave was out on Saturday, I spent the whole day with her and she was just as loving with me.

Until Dave came home.