“Grace With Fur On”

Many of you who know me……know Ludo.

He’s my adopted retired service dog and has been my constant companion for over two years.

He often goes to work with me. He greets everyone who comes to my office. He offers his love and support constantly. I mean, seriously, if I get up to walk to the kitchen, he “snaps to” as if we are about to partake on a quest for the Holy Grail!

He is the epitome of “man’s best friend.”

He was trained to respond to anxiety and sugar issues (though I’m not sure how the latter works), and he lives up to this often. If I’m having a hard day, he comes to me and buries his head in my lap because he is CONFIDENT that, if I pet him, I will feel better……and I do.

This is a dog that is fully dedicated to me, and to our family. He loves me unconditionally, even when I am having a bad day…..even when I am not who I should be……he is still there……still loving me……still excited to see me……still present.

There is an old saying that goes something like this:  “Lock your dog and your wife in the trunk of your car and see which one is excited to see you when you get back.”

I honestly don’t know where that old saying comes from…..nor do I know who would even think of that kind of thing (probably a caveman), but it has a kernel of truth to it. It doesn’t matter how long I’ve been gone; Ludo is happy I’m home. It doesn’t matter if I made mistakes in my work, Ludo thinks I hung the moon. He doesn’t care if I was impatient that day, or if I said something I shouldn’t have, or if I wasn’t as productive as I intended, Ludo loves me and shows me grace……..grace, with fur on.

And that means a LOT. Ludo’s grace and love have carried me through many a distressing day.

And before Ludo…..there was Harvey.

If Ludo is my spirit animal (and he is, by the way), Harvey was just my buddy. And whereas Ludo is loyal to a fault, Harvey relied on me and clung to me in a way that was visceral.

Harvey was a 7 lb toy poodle…….a small, grey, dynamo. And, over the years, he and I became joined at the hip.

In fact, he saved my life once.

No lie…..in the grand tradition of Lassie and Benji and Rin Tin Tin, Harvey had his proverbial, “Timmy’s stuck in the well” moment.

It was 2020, though it could have been 2021….and I had Covid pretty bad. If you remember that time, it was a time of “isolating” and I was sleeping in our bedroom while my wife had gone to my daughter’s room to literally “avoid me like the plague.”

In the middle of the night, Harvey went to her room and let out a kind of hybrid mix of a cry and a wail. Seriously, it was the closest thing to a siren that a dog could emanate, and he kept it up until she woke up. Annoyed, she thought he needed to go outside but, instead, he led her to me, where she discovered that my fever was well over 104 degrees, and I was shivering like crazy. To this day, I believe he saved me.

If Ludo is my compadre, Harvey was my pal….and one of the hardest days of my life was Thanksgiving, 2023, when we had to put Harvey down due to kidney disease.

Grace…..with fur on.

Harvey……Ludo……they have taught me what it means to be loved unconditionally….how to “receive” love even when I know I don’t deserve it.

And that…..as many of you know…..is hard.

We often talk about the difficult of loving others sacrificially….unconditionally…..but, for most of us, it’s harder to receive it. It’s tougher to let down our guard and really let someone love us.

Why?

Well, for one thing we know we don’t deserve it. We know what we’ve done….who we’ve been. We are well aware of our worst moments, the moments that we are SURE would disqualify us from being loved.

And, well…..it’s hard to receive love because it makes us so darn vulnerable!

And “vulnerable” does not go together well with the word “safe” and, well, we really like to feel safe.

And yet…..a mentor told me a long time ago. If we ever want to be truly intimate in a relationship, we must learn how to not just GIVE love, but to RECEIVE it.

And I am learning.

Not perfectly. Not even well, half the time. But Harvey began my lessons, and Ludo picked up the baton.

How about you?

Are you able to receive love from others?

Can you let down your guard long enough to allow others to love you?

Or are you caught in that vicious cycle where we are DESPERATE to be loved, but TERRIFIED by it all at the same time?

We pursue love ferociously, only to scramble away when it’s offered.

We do our best to be noticed and affirmed, only to slough it off or reject it when someone tries to edify us.

And so, we live life feeling lonely, even when we’re surrounded by people.

We are both desperate and terrified of love, and so we spend life in our own little prison; longing to be released but not knowing how to live on the “outside.”

We all need a Harvey or a Ludo……a presence in our life that unconditionally loves us no matter what, and one that feels safe enough for us to take it in.

But here’s the deeper truth I’m still learning.

The kind of love that Harvey gave…that Ludo gives…that kind of steady, undeserved, always-there love…that didn’t originate with them.

It’s a reflection of something greater.

God’s love is like that. Not because we’ve earned it. Not because we’ve been good enough. Not because we’ve finally gotten our act together. He loves us fully, completely, and consistently…even on the days we know we don’t deserve it.

The question is not whether that love exists.

The question is whether we will let ourselves receive it.

And maybe that’s why something as simple as a dog can feel so powerful. Because in those moments when we let down our guard just enough to take in their affection, we are brushing up against something deeper.

Something truer.

A small glimpse of grace.

Grace…with fur on.