Eva could take the car.
The hotel allowed dogs too.
The train was the problem.
Amanda and I were planning the weekend around Nation's Triathlon in Washington, DC. I had researched the options for bringing Eva with us and sent Amanda the useful version.
A car would work. I had specifically booked a pet-friendly hotel. Amtrak's rules looked less friendly, and the support-animal language did not seem to help.
Flying home might actually be cheaper than the train. Amanda could take Eva back Saturday evening, or stay an extra day. What I did not want was to deal with another round trip on Sunday after preparing for and racing the triathlon.
That was the honest constraint.
Race weekends create a selfish little orbit. Packet pickup, equipment, food, sleep, start time, and recovery all point toward one person. Amanda and Eva still had to get through the actual weekend.
Eva had been with us for years by then. Leaving her behind was not automatically simpler, and bringing her created a transportation puzzle that the race website did not cover.
She was not cargo to be moved around the calendar. She was our dog. If the weekend worked for her, it worked better for both of us too.
The email was practical, not romantic. Car, hotel, train, plane. Here are the choices. Let's talk when you get home.
That was a lot of our life together. I found an event. Amanda tried to make a normal weekend fit around it. We worked out whether Eva was coming too.
This time, the dog had options.