Maggie Summers

Maggie is the SME "therapy" dog (not a trained, registered therapy dog),  though her job description predates SME by several years. She first appeared one Sunday morning when someone abandoned her near John and Machelle’s home. Young, fully house-trained, and heartbreakingly sweet, she arrived full-grown but with her baby teeth still intact—confused, alone, and very clearly someone’s former companion.  When no owner stepped forward, Maggie stepped into the Summers family permanently.  Her arrival has been their blessing ever since.

At SME, Maggie divides her time between John’s office and Machelle’s, maintaining beds in both locations like a true professional. She specializes in emotional support, stress detection, morale boosting, and providing well-timed reminders that breaks are important. Her contributions include snoring softly during creative meetings, greeting visitors with enthusiasm, warning the household of the many wild creatures who roam the property—chipmunks, squirrels, deer, turkeys, and the occasional armadillo—and alerting the founders to every package left on the porch.

Maggie’s personality is a blend of gentleness, affection, and fierce independence—almost catlike in her self-assurance. She adores belly rubs, loves to travel (going wild the moment her harness appears), and insists on her morning ritual of vitamins and a Greenie while sitting up on her hind legs to beg—a trick she invented all on her own. She sleeps on the bed, dreams with tiny “Bloop!” half-barks, and, when nervous, produces a hysterical wrinkled-nose “stink face” that she now deploys strategically whenever she thinks she might be in trouble.

Maggie has accompanied John on mission trips to West Virginia, traveled with the family to East Tennessee, Arkansas, and Dauphin Island, and has claimed an overstuffed paisley chair as her personal throne. She is definitely family through and through—excited when her humans return home, sad when they leave, and always ready to tap a paw impatiently when attention is required. As much a part of SME as its founders, Maggie brings comfort, laughter, and a grounding presence to the Summers household and to the creative work they share.