Does God make the baddest ones the cutest?

By McKenzie Morrell

After the sudden death of my childhood dog, Brandy, my father made it pretty clear that a new pet would not be in our family’s future.
My mother, sister and I begged and pleaded. We even put together a PowerPoint presentation in hopes of convincing my father that a puppy was just what we needed, not to replace our beloved companion but to honor her.
After a few months he finally caved and we were on a search for a new family addition.
We ended up rescuing a puppy from a shelter in Little Rock, Arkansas… random right?
I thought so.
Our new pup got to take a plane ride right into New York, where we eagerly awaited his arrival. When we went to the pick up section at the airport an employee who told us that our puppy was a few minutes away greeted us. A small cat-sized carrier moved towards us on the conveyor belt… all of us looked at each other stating that that couldn’t be our dog. Keep in mind the dog we rescued was a golden retriever, lab mix. There was no way he would fit in that carrier… even as a puppy.
Needless to say, it was our bundle of joy; the 6-pound-pooch was adorably snuggled in the cat-sized cage. He was so tiny, we definitely didn’t expect him to be so small but were extremely excited to finally meet the little nugget.
Khody is our puppy’s name, weird spelling right?
You can thank my sister and I for that.
We wanted to get creative, and I think we succeeded. For the first few months he was very shy and quiet. He’d nestle right into your body and stay there for hours.
Well, his mellow personality couldn’t last forever right?
As he got older, he became more playful but still very quiet, I honestly don’t think he barked once for the first seven months of his life!
Now when he wants to get our attention, he nibbles at our feet, or paws at our arms.
Oh, and did I mention he cries like Chewbacca?
Yep, that sound comes out of his puppy dog mouth and we nearly pee ourselves whenever he does it.
Khody’s a little pain in the butt, he does the craziest things and sometimes isn’t the most well behaved dog on the Earth.
But we love him.
My mom’s right when she says that God makes the bad ones the cutest!
Our new family member has his moments, whether it’s chewing the carpet, or biting our feet whenever we try to leave the house but well all agree that he definitely was worth it. Sometimes my dad says we’ll send him back to Arkansas if he doesn’t get his act together… but he’s lying, he loves that dog as if he were his own child.
I’m pretty sure Brandy would have liked Khody. She never got the chance to have a pet companion but Khody definitely would have been her first pick… at least that’s what I think.
Our household will continue to experience Chewbacca like noises from our adorable pooch…
The funny thing is I’ve definitely convinced everyone around me that puppies from Little Rock, Arkansas are without a doubt masked Star Wars characters.
Ha.

Editor's note: McKenzie Morrell is a journalism student at Southern Connecticut State University.