Smid...

Smid was a puppy given to my children, by their mother. Her boyfriend wouldn't let her keep a dog at their house, so he got to live at my house.

When she brought him over, he was this fuzzy, white and brown, ball of fur. Dark eyes and black nose. He was cute as a button, as most puppies are. His ancestry was questionable. Allegedly, a Maltese/Fox Terrier mix. The hope was that he'd be more of the Maltese-type and weigh under 10 pounds, rather than take after the 15-20 pound Fox Terrier. He was more in the, none-of-the-above category. His adult weight settled at 22 pounds. Not a big dog but not a little dog.

What to name the puppy became the discussion. Being a puppy and having children to play with, he loved to play. He had needle sharp teeth and a little growl that sounded something like one of those model airplane engines. Someone mentioned that he sounded like the noise a possum makes. I can't confirm that. I've never heard a possum make a noise that didn't sound like a hiss.

We all agreed that he sounded, in his own way, like he was "vicious". Coupled with those needle-teeth, he was. We decided he was "Sid Vicious". Named after either the pro wrestler or the punk rocker. We didn't care which. We started calling him, "Sid" or "Sidney", which somehow morphed into, "Smidley". I'm not sure how. Surely it happened over the course of time and through attempts at humor. "Smid" became the short form of  "Smidley". He was called Sid/Sidney/Smidley/Smid almost in equal measure. He knew who you were talking to, and about. I think he mostly clued in on the inflection. After a while, my daughter and I started saying, "Smid", dragging out the "s" and using some sort of inflection like when Jerry Seinfeld said the name, "Newman". It was unique between Smid and his humans.

Smid, very early on, coming out of his stance.

More later...