We named him Obi.  We’d picked it long before we got him.  It is a Nigerian name meaning “heart,” and also the first name of the Jedi Master Obi Wan Kenobi from “Star Wars.”  We went to the pet store and got food and a crate for him.  He slept the rest of that first day.  

The first night, we put him to bed next to ours in a box that wasn’t quite big enough for him.  He slept there for two nights before we moved his crate into the bedroom, up on our coffee table at the end of the bed so that we could see him.  

We were in the thick of potty training and puppy raising and I was a nervous wreck.  It was so bad that I made myself physically sick the first week.  I was sure that I wasn’t going to be able to do this, that we would need to give him back.  This was so much harder for me than I had imagined.