who gets the pet can be a delicate issue for gay men . . . when David eventually returned from Florida, as i knew he would, he didn't try to reclaim Smokey which came as a welcome surprise, as emotioanlly dependent on her as i had become on her . . . does this man commit to anything or is he simply acknowledging that i'm probably the more responsible caretaker? . . . fortunately, our decision to share a house in the Pines offered the perfect joint custody arrangement . . . as soon as we arrived each weekend, we would remove Smokey's collar and replace it with a string of plastic pearls . . . with her graying snout, proud bearing and rheumy brown eyes, our housemates agreed she looked like an old dowager of uncertain ancestry . . . everyone quickly learned how to make her howl by saying sing, Smokey, sing . . . she even had her very own stupid pet trick, which we would make her demonstrate everytime someone new visisted the house: we would affix a leaf of iceberg lettuce to the roof her mouth and announce that she was doing her snake impression when she rapidly moved her tongue in and out of her mouth trying to dislodge the lettuce . . . we loved tormenting Smokey by simultaneously calling out to her to see who she would come to . . . i won only if it was close to her dinnertime which didn't bother me as much as u might expect . . . after all, she and David had been together three years before we met . . . i admired her loyalty and recognized that she had forced David and i to stay in touch during a difficult period when i would have preferred to cut him out of my life altogether . . . our housemates often would comment on the maturity of our relationship . . . we even shared a bedroom . . . and then David met the love of his life.