In 2010, my son finally convinced me to get him a dog. This was no easy feat. I had said no for years, assuming that the last thing I needed as a single mom was yet another “baby” to raise. Wasn’t I busy enough??

So instead, we adopted nearly every kind of pet possible in an effort to placate my son (and daughter): cat, cockatiel, bunny rabbits, tortoise, snake, bearded dragon lizards, blue belly lizards that the cat brought in (at one point we had nine in an aquarium at one time), Pacman frogs, random frogs caught in the backyard, and countless fish. None of them helped in slowing down the request for a dog.

But they finally wore me down. I had two rules:  we had to get a dog from the pound, and we were not going to get a puppy. That’s when we found Captain, a white scruffy terrier mix who shelter workers guessed to be about 2 years old. And our lives forever changed.

I know nothing about dogs. We had one dog when I was in high school, but I literally had nothing to do with that dog. He was my mom’s best friend. And I could not have been more uninterested in that dog.

I continually ask myself how we ended up picking this guy? How did he end up coming to live with us? Turns out, he was house trained (in six years he has never had an accident). He doesn’t shed. He has not ruined anything (There was an incident where he chewed a corner of my son’s baseball glove and one when he chewed a corner off the top of my daughter’s leather boot, but from the stories I have heard, I understand that is nothing!). He has been a breeze. And we picked him simply because he was cute. That’s it! We were incredibly lucky.

Captain, with his carefree energy and unbound fun, has brought a loving chaos to our house. As my daughter once said, he fits in perfectly with our family. He has given us immeasurable joy and laughter.

And what does any of this have to do with writing a screenplay? He became my inspiration. His story needed to be told.