Chris Smith: Pretty soon here, the doc and Maggie Jane will be sharing a dog

Tucker Bierbaum misses having a dog, all the more so now that he’s living alone.

Since the emergency room physician and his wife divorced, he says, “I’ve found myself being really kind of lonely.”

Bierbaum had dogs for many years, but after the last one passed he didn’t go looking for another. His work for St. Joseph Health involves long hours and a good deal of travel, and he doesn’t want to be an absentee dog owner.

A few months back, he was talking on the street with a neighbor, Megan Sullivan, and mentioned how he longs for a dog but resists getting one because he’s so often not home. He remembers Sullivan joking, “We should have a shared dog.”

Two days later, the doctor received a text from Sullivan. She wrote, “Maggie Jane has a proposition for you.”

Maggie Jane is Megan and Sean Sullivan’s 6-year-old daughter. Bierbaum walked to their house and knocked on the door.

“Maggie sat on the couch with big eyes,” he said. The kid set out her proposal to the neighbor she calls Dr. B.

She told him her parents would be OK with their family getting a dog with him. The Sullivans would share the cost of buying and caring for a dog, and it would be a two-house dog.

Maggie Jane then sweetened the deal by saying that if she and her parents and two siblings wanted to have the dog at a time when he wanted it, he’d get first dibs.

Close to overwhelmed, Bierbaum told the child, “Maggie, you just got yourself a dog.”

Since then, bilateral discussions of a most-desired breed led to agreement on a Labrador/Golden retriever mix. Bierbaum searched online and struck upon a breeder in Virginia.

He told Maggie Jane he’d arranged for them to get a male puppy that was born April 10. She asked if the pup could come to Santa Rosa on April 11.

Bierbaum explained that puppies need to be with their ?mothers and grow a little before going to their new homes. He told her late in May he would fly to Virginia and pick up their dog.

“Maggie wouldn’t hear of me going by myself,” the doc said.

So on May 29, he and the kid and her dad will fly east to retrieve the two-family dog, whose name remains a subject of neighborly negotiation.

Understanding that this whole thing was Dr. B’s idea and that he is the majority shareholder, Maggie Jane nevertheless asked, “Can I have him on my lap we’re flying?”

Done.

HHHHHH

BOOKS AREN’T ALL that we can find at the Sonoma County Library.

A couple of talks this week and next will introduce inquisitive minds to the genealogy, Sonoma County history, databases and myriad of other information that pleads for discovery at our 14-branch library.

Presenting will be Joanna Kolosov, a UCLA- trained archivist who joined the Sonoma County History and Genealogy Library in 2017.

She’ll offer “A Road Map to Learn About History and Genealogy” at Hospice of Petaluma, 416 Payran St., on May 8 and at Memorial Hospice, 439 College Ave. in Santa Rosa, on May 15. Both talks are from ?5:30 to 7:30 p.m.

The program is free, and there will be light refreshments by Oliver’s Markets.

Dig in.

You can reach Staff Writer Chris Smith at 707 521-5211 and chris.smith@pressdemocrat.com.