one year gertaversary.

memorial day will forever hold a special place in my heart. yes, it's a day to remember and celebrate the men and women who devote their lives to serving and protecting this country. yes, it's a day to kick up your feet and relax. yes, it's a day to binge on mass quantities of bbq all day and chock it up to the age old 'but it's a holiday' excuse. but memorial day is also the day that i welcomed gertrude into my heart and home. let me take you back to the day that we found each other. cue the dreamy flashback music.


anybody who knows me well knows that i've always wanted my own dog. i can't even begin to calculate the amount of time i spent scouring petfinder.com and craigslist to find my furry buddy. last memorial day my parents, brother and i were planning on doing our patriotic duty (spending lots of money to stimulate the economy) by visiting the woodland mall. before we left for the mall, i browsed craigslist (per usual) to see if any new dogs had been listed. an ad for a great dane named porta popped up with a fuzzy picture, so i couldn't really see what she looked like. not thinking too much of it (i had sent messages to many ads at this point with no response), i sent a quick email to the seller and we were out the door on the way to the mall.


about fifteen minutes later, i got a phone call from porta's seller. she asked if i would be willing to come meet the dog, but i figured it would have to wait since i was on my way to get my shop on and didn't want derail the family's plans. after i hung up the phone, my dad said we had better just make a slight detour to visit the dog since she was located in grand rapids. a little while later we pulled up to a house in grand rapids and met porta. she was one of three dogs in a modest sized home with four generations living under one roof. needless to say, there was a lot going on under one roof. the owners decided that i was a good fit for the dog and i decided that the dog was a good fit for me. my family and i left to go shop for a few hours and gave the family time to say goodbye to porta. when we returned a little while later, we had to fit a big great dane, a bigger great dane cage, all of our shopping purchases, and four people into my parents' car. it was a tight fit, but we managed. obviously i changed her name. all i could think of was porta potty when i heard the name porta. it had to go.


so that's the story of gerty. for all of the chaos that she's brought into my life, she has also brought so much joy. she's a constant companion and frequent source of laughter. she's a lot of work, but i'm okay with that. i love that gerty girl.