Santa Monica is a soothing place to be locked down. I moved here from New York for four months in November with my two adult kids after I lost my beloved husband, Harry Evans. I couldn’t face the task of finishing a book in our empty country house where for years we’d shown each other our pages at the end of the day and laughed over chicken pot pie. Meanwhile in Manhattan, I was tired of pretending that freezing outdoor dining, with buses barrelling past, was like sitting on the sidewalk at Les Deux Magots in Paris. With the California sun on my back at breakfast, and the orange trees in my garden, I have the calm I need to reflect on happy times with Harry.
The theft of Lady Gaga’s French bulldogs sent a chill through the serenely ensconced household. Just before Christmas, my daughter Izzy took possession of a three-month-old English bulldog, acquired from Linda’s Klassy Kennel in Oklahoma. I was dubious. Izzy is a documentary producer who travels a lot, I’ve always been a cat person, and a red-state bulldog would surely bark for Trump. But as a flow of snaps arrived of a splotchy pink-snouted puppy — a runty number four in the litter — I started to feel the excited stirrings of cross-species motherhood. Three days before Christmas we got the call. An RV van driven from Oklahoma would meet us in the car park outside an Anaheim 7-Eleven at 8 p.m. There, a bearded dude emerged and handed Izzy a small bundle.
What else could it have been but love at first sight? Gimli, as Izzy has called her (after the wise dwarf in Lord of the Rings) is a ‘bulldoglet’ from heaven.
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