I'm Major Jackson, and this is the slowdown.

I'm writing today with a gray and black dog snoring at my feet.

When our terrier thin became a part of our family, I wasn't ready to welcome him.

Several weeks after moving to Nashville, I had to return to Vermont to tie up a few loose ends.

While I was away, Buzz, our elderly golden retriever, had to be put down.

Dear Buzz, who gazed at us as if we all walk with a thick nimbus of gold light around our heads.

I justified my absence with flimsy reasoning.

So my wife went to the rescue shelter without telling me.

I happened to FaceTime while she was sitting down on the floor with a scraggly four-month-old puppy between her legs.

Guess what? Look. Isn't he cute? She said.

With my guilt of not being there and her alone in a new city for at least several more weeks, I couldn't say no.

By the time I arrived back to Nashville, they had a serious bonding thing going.

He slept in our bed. Even in the days of Buzz, I avoided turning our bedroom into Noah's Ark.

I insisted on a dog crate.

Thus began a month-long argument between me and my wife.

Then had a habit of digging where I lay as those searching for, I don't know, a bunch of treats sewn into the mattress.

His intense burrowing as well as his claws were terrifying.

We argued, and I won.

But then one evening, I accidentally did not latch the crate securely.

And I woke up the next morning with Finn stretched across my leg, snoozing away.

When I stirred, he galloped up and gave me the sloppiness of kisses.

When I left the bed to make coffee, he jumped down and walked beside me.

...