photo friday: pets

I’ve missed the last two weeks of Photo Fridays, and for this week’s theme, yeah…I don’t really have a good photo to show. The theme is pets, and though while in my recent life I did once have a pet, he has since passed on.

I miss you, Igs.

ANYWAY, so in place of a photo about a pet, you get a photo of a cake and a story about the woman whose cake it was, and her former pet.

As you may know, my best girl Mare is a funeral director. (See: slightly twisted, yet incredibly tasty and awesome cake at her rehearsal dinner.) She comes from a funeral business family. She also married a funeral director. Basically, it’s one big happy dealing-with-dead-folks family. Good times.

Back when she was in dead school, Mare lived in a cute little apartment that happened to be near my office. To save myself from an insane commute I’d occasionally crash at her place and we’d drink our faces off and eat pizza.

PS—remind me to tell you the story some time about how I once made her laugh so hard she barfed up a pound of Lou Malnati’s. One of my prouder moments.

So this one time, I’m over at Mare’s place, and she’s…doing I have no idea what, futzing around in her closet or something, and I’m aimlessly wandering around her bedroom picking things up on her dresser and putting them down, jewelry, knick-knacks, photos, and I notice a photo of Sammy Kravitz, Mare’s dog that she had in high school.

“Aw, Mare, this is a great photo of Sammy!” I said, picking up the photo. It was a photo box, and I twisted it around to see if there were more photos of Sammy on other sides.

“Yeah, that’s Sammy,” Mare replied.

“No, I said it’s a good picture of Sammy,” I restated.

“Yeah, and I said that is Sammy,” she repeated. I looked at her dumbly. “Sammy is in the box,” she said, nodding her head toward the square in my hands. I looked down at it, semi-grossed out, but more just what-the-fucked out.

“What?”

“Yeah, I was home a couple weeks ago and I saw that sitting on my parents’ entertainment center,” she explained. “It’s been sitting there for years and I never fuckin’ noticed.”

“Sammy’s been dead since we were in high school,” I said.

“I know!” Mare said in disbelief.

I quickly put Sammy back on her dresser and backed away. “I think I’m just going to…go..in the other room,” is probably what I said as I scuttled into the living room.

The moral of the story: be careful what you pick up on your best friend’s dresser, because pets are family,  too.

See what other Photo Friday participants are blogging about today over at Calliope’s blog! Probably something a little less…well, less.

What?

Oh, whatever. YOU have a best gal who is a funeral director and let’s see what stories YOU come up with.

Heh.

guess who comes to dinner

There are five of us who eat the human food, and one who just licks the floor. Every once in awhile she’ll try and snitch a piece of pork, or maybe a cracker from the table, then looks at us, surprised, when we reprimand her.

“Whaaaat?” she seems to question.

Or rather, since we’ve decided if she could speak she’d have a Russian or possibly German accent, it’s more like, “Vhuuuut?”

While we eat and shoo her away, she mostly skit-skats around the apartment, licking up any corner of the kitchen floor previously unlicked, peeking into the dressing room before claiming it too dark to venture into, then stretching out on the rug (in the winter) or the hardwood floor (in the summer) for a bit while we blather on. By dessert she is up and sniffing again, weaving in between bodies and legs, looking for a pet behind the ears, usually ending up next to, if not half on top of, Everyone Needs A Julie.

Because dogs can always sniff out the non-animal people in a crowd. And then make a beeline for them.

Not that ENAJ kicks puppies or burns ants with a magnifying glass or anything remotely near the sort, she is just not, by her own definition, an animal person.

And yet Greta looks at her with such adoration.

“I luhf you,” she seems to say, and sometimes she even seems to bat her eyes.

Can dogs bat their eyes?

No matter.

And then even ENAJ can’t resist Greta.

A couple of times, we’ve stayed so long and talked so much, well past dessert even, that Greta just gives up, puts her head on her paws and snores away until it’s time to go.

She is our barometer like that.

Clearly the sign of another successful dinner.

check your six

This is Rosie.

Rosie is one of Captain Deb’s dogs. She’s a red-heeler, border collie mix, which means she’s super smart and constantly working.

The dog, for the life of her, can’t walk in a straight line from one area of the house to another. If wants to go upstairs—and the stairs are inches from where she may be currently sitting—she’ll get up, walk to the other side of the room, check out the dog crate, come over to the chair where I’d sit, check me out, hop over to the couch, where Captain Deb would sit, and finally finish out the loop at her original spot before finally going upstairs.

And that’s when she gets up of her own volition. When you’d actually ask her to do something, go get something, it took twice as long. And when she’d get antsy to do something, herd someone, Captain Deb or I would simply call out:

“Rosie! Check your six, girl!”

And she’d get to work.

A quick lap around the kitchen, make sure everyone was accounted for, make sure we were all okay. A cross between a hostess and a governess. Did we need anything? Can I get you something? Why aren’t you sitting in your seat? Why are you standing? Sit down. Sit doooown! I can’t keep track of both of you if you are in separate rooooms!

Captain Deb and I trekked out to the Iditarod re-start in Willow, Alaska, and we brought both dogs with us. They were happy to stay in the back of the truck and man the premises, watching Iditarod fans slug to and from their cars across the frozen lake, hauling chairs and grills and blankets and jugs of various hot liquids. By the time we made it back to the truck late that afternoon, the sun just starting to think about dipping down behind the horizon, Rosie was desperate to get out of the truck. Probably to pee mostly, but also to stretch her legs and do something, herd someone, move something.

So the Captain locked on her skis, hooked Rosie up to her belt, yelled something akin to “GO DOG GO!” and off they went. Around and around the frozen lake, Deb on skis, Rosie happily running with all her might to pull Deb.

Besides our two-mile hike through unbroken snow a couple days later, I don’t think anything else we did on the trip exhausted the poor girl so much.

Rosie, that is.

Deb was tired, but not so much that she felt the kitchen floor was a fine resting place.

“Rosie! Check your six, girl!”

What? Where? Who? Can I herd you now?

edge of your seat

I know you’ve all been wondering, and I’m happy to tell you (in case you don’t keep up on these things and/or read, oh, say, the Anchorage Daily News) that Lance Mackey was the winner of this year’s Iditarod race. This is his fourth win (four back-to-back wins, no less), and he rolled (sledded?) into Nome on the 16^th, and for those of you who are counting, that is nine, NINE, days of mushing across the state of Alaska. Where it is very cold. And full of snow. Still.

As of yesterday, about 15 mushers and their dogs were out of the race completely, and a goodly amount more had yet to land in Nome.

Not sure if the canines pictured above made it in, but I hope so. And I hope they get a big ol’ steak for their reward.

at the starting line

It is Day 5 of the Iditarod race, and according to an article in the Anchorage Daily News, the race for first place is wide open. I’m told that it won’t be until about Day 8 that the first teams start crossing the finish line. We won’t be there in Nome to see it, but Captain Deb and I were in Willow to send them off, following them over the last few days from the toasty warmth of a military base.

woe to me

Before Duncan came around, Toby was the baby.

He was good at being the baby.

He liked to stare at you with woeful eyes, pleading with you. “Just one more pet? One more ear scratch? I love you.  Please? I love you very much.”

And then he would lounge contentedly on you for as long as he pleased.
Because he was the baby.

And babies do that.

But now Duncan is the baby.

And Toby?

Not so much the baby anymore.

Farrah

Every week it gets harder and harder. Pulling up to the shelter, slowly walking down the row of cages, all the expectant faces looking at you with gentle curiosity, the question, “Can you give me a forever home?” written from eyes to muzzle. No, I can’t, I want to explain to those sweet things. I’m only here for one of you, just to release you for a couple of hours of frolicking in the park. Don’t worry, though, there are more of me coming to get more of you today, I want to say. You can tell the ones who have been at the shelter a long time, barely glancing up, not getting very excited, used to humans coming and going but never sticking around for very long.

And then there is Farrah.

She was my dog on this week’s hike, a 5-month-old Akita/Lab mix, a puppy in her prime. A puppy with a serious case of the crazies.

The minute I opened her kennel she was out like a rocket, something I was warned about after the fact by the program director. “Yeah, I figured that out,” I responded drily to him, explaining that she had shot past me and one of the shelter volunteers but was thankfully nabbed by a second volunteer down the row. It took me a full minute to get Farrah’s leash on her, so full of energy was she that she couldn’t calm down and flailed and flung her body about. She pulled me out the door, pooped in the grass and then pulled me in one direction while I tried to guide her in another, toward the car. Happy to be free, she came along nicely, but balked at getting in the back seat.

“Farrah,” I said, “I’m bigger than you. You’re getting in the car.” And I picked her up and plopped her in. She did laps in the backseat as we drove, nosing the window a little, trying to look out the back window and banging her head on the ceiling where it met the glass, mistaking the umbrella I’d stupidly left on the backseat as a chew toy, and trying to climb into the front seat.

“Uh-uh,” said, pushing her back. “Dogs ride in the backseat.” I was firm. I was standing strong. Farrah stood with her back paws on the backseat, front paws on the console, unsteady and not yet grown into her galumping paws, stretching her head and neck out to rest it on my shoulder as I drove. “I could help you navigate,” those big eyes seemed to say. And then I was weak. Farrah was now in the front seat, sliding all over the place. “Here, let me be more helpful!” she seemed to smile at me as she tried to climb into my lap as I drove.

“Farrah, you are not a lap dog. You are not even a lap puppy,” I tried to explain to her. She didn’t seem to care. What’s this? She sniffed heavily at the rearview mirror. “Farrah, it’s just a mirror.” “I must sniiiiiiiifffff it. And this thing, too. These air vents.” Sniff sniff sniff. “And you! I must sniff you!” Sniff sniff sniff.

At the park, she strained on her leash, so excited, until I thought she would either choke herself or give herself a hernia. She did neither, though she did make a mess of the water bowls, plopping down in front of one and throwing a paw and forehead into it in an attempt to drink. I looked over at one of the other volunteers who stood with dog named Scrappy-Doo. Scrappy-Doo seemed calm, cool, and collected, taking in the sights and sounds of the day’s hike, seemed content to sit at the volunteer’s feet until he was told otherwise.

Farrah, meanwhile, had stretched her leash as far as it would go and was eating another dog’s barf.

She didn’t care for the gentle leader that we put on her, tried to swipe at the day-glo orange bands around her muzzle, but holding the leash taut and leaving little slack so her head had to stay up made her forget about it as we tromped into the woods. It was only when I decided to experiment and let the leash out slightly that she remembered the leader was there and instantly her forehead was on the ground, her front two paws clawing at it, her little body flailing around as she freaked out until I pulled the leash back, gently tugged her head up, and kept her walking. In general she did fine on the hike, didn’t need to be at the front of the pack, didn’t seem to notice the other dogs, but just that every once in awhile, BAM! It was like someone has popped a speed ball up her ass and she went nuts, pulling this way, no! this way! wait! that way! There are red marks on my hands from trying to keep her under control on the leash.

By the end, poor girl was worn out. She plodded along the last stretch and I thought, “Ah, she’ll sleep on the way back to the shelter. She’ll be a calm dog in the backseat.”

Not so much.

As soon as we approached the group and her gentle leader came off, Farrah was all over the place: clumsily trying to paw at the water bowl and drink at the same time, nosing up to other dogs, leaning against me when they got too close, sitting for half a second before running in circles as one of the volunteers tried to take her picture.

In the car on the ride back, her energy reserve seemed to regenerate. And multiply. “Backseat. Front seat. Can I sit on your lap? No. Backseat. Front seat. How about now? What’s this bag down here? What’s this? I have to sniff it. How about now? Can I sit in your lap now?” She was the freaking Verizon Guy of dogs.

She bounded out of the car and into the shelter, but balked when we got back to her cage, like she could sense this party trip was coming to an end. Normally this is the part of the day that makes me sad, that makes me give the dogs a quick kiss on the head before hustling them into their cages and quickly walking away. With Farrah, I hustled her into her cage, slowed in fastening the lock, and quickly walked away, sad as usual, but also just a bit relieved.

My God, she was such a puppy.

I’ve never been so exhausted after a PACK run in my life.

keeping watch

Just making sure none of those pesky squirrels try and steal the potatoes my sister is growing in the backyard, lest he have nothing on which to pee.

In the Bag

I wasn’t kidding when I said Greta rides in Vera Bradley to Tuesday Night Dinners. She really thinks nothing of it, though she probably wonders how, exactly, she got stuck with this slightly strange mama and her friends. But yet, still better than being at the puppy mill.

The Hard Part

Last Saturday was another run with the dogs. This time, I volunteered to not only run with one of the pups, but also transport a canine to and from the shelter. It was gray and cloudy when I arrived in the morning, but the rain was still holding off thankfully. I pressed a finger to the buzzer and a shelter employee cracked open the door, looking at me carefully.

“I’m here to pick up one of the dogs for the PACK run,” I babbled to the woman in excitement.

“Which one?” she asked, her brow creasing.

“Oh,” I said, panicking a little. “I don’t know. They didn’t say which one specifically. The email just said that Smitty, Peach, Maxwell and Mimi are running today. It didn’t say which one I had to pick up, it just said that Smitty and Peach and…” I would have just kept repeating myself, but the woman cut me off.

“Okay,” she said, “why don’t you take Mr. Smitty, he’s in the front office upstairs. The leashes are by the door. I usually use the red one.”

I followed her up the old stairway. The shelter is a narrow space tucked among other storefronts. If you weren’t looking for it, you would probably miss it; it looks more suited a space to be a family-owned hardware store rather than a place to house and train homeless and surrendered animals.

In the front office there were two kennels on the floor, and a wall lined with more. The wall kennels were full of kittens, the two on the floor each holding a dog. A new addition was in the kennel in the corner, a toy poodle, and in the other, Mr. Smitty. He looked at us expectantly and stood up as I undid the locks. I reached for the leash and he wiggled excitedly.

“I usually make him sit before I put his leash on,” the woman told me. She had patted Smitty and greeted him cheerily as he romped a bit outside of his kennel, and from the tone in her voice I could tell that she adored him immensely. This was the third run I was attending, the third time I’d met Smitty, and I could understand.

Smitty happily hopped into the back seat of my car and off we drove to Rock Creek Park. After checking the sights out the back passenger window, then the back driver’s side window, then back again, Smitty delicately hopped across the middle console and into the front seat where he sat nicely and navigated for me out the front window.

When we arrived at the park, I thought the toughest part would be surviving the run. Smitty was a bundle of energy, running up to the bigger dogs, and then quickly backing away, letting out a few raspy barks to let them know, “I’m here. I’m totally scared of you, but I’m here. And don’t you forget it.” I, however, had not been running in about two weeks, had done no exercise more strenuous than putting on my socks in about a week. But as he wiggled around as we gathered up with the rest of the dogs and the humans, I gave myself a hearty mental slap and told myself this wasn’t about me. It would be awful for me to be lame now when this is the only time Smitty will have to get out and run like the wind on his little legs for the next two weeks.

So we ran. We stopped for a couple of water breaks, but we ran the entire almost-4-mile run. Other dogs weren’t a distraction for Smitty, he didn’t bark, he didn’t tug at his leash, he just pushed his ears flat and skittered his little paws across the pavement. And at the end of it, he sat. He snuffled a few times at the grass and took interest in the other dogs again, but without as much force as before. We chatted and visited with the other dogs and humans, then bid our goodbyes.

In the car on the way back, I ignored the wet paw prints on my tan seats, smiling at Smitty as he stood perched in the middle, looking out the front windshield. Confident that I knew where I was going, he sighed and curled up into a ball on the back seat, exhausted from our adventure.

The shelter isn’t very far from where we ran, and our car ride took seemingly no time at all. And too quickly we were buzzed back into the shelter, scampering up the stairs, Smitty sitting nicely so I could take him off his leash. The toy poodle in the corner whimpered excitedly new bodies in the room, and I crouched down in front of Smitty.

“Thank you for running with me,” I said, sighing. “I’ll see you in a couple weeks.” I gave him a kiss on top of his head, then scooted him gently into his kennel. As I pushed the flap locks into  place, Smitty stood there looking at me curiously.

“Oh, we’re done?” he seemed to ask. “I liked that a lot. Will you come back? I like to go running. You’re not staying?”

And behind me I could hear kittens mewing and nibbling on their food, and the toy poodle in the corner was positively working itself into a frenzy, and Smitty just looked up at me with his buggy eyes and his wrinkled underbite, wondering why I was leaving, where I was going, was I coming back.

I don’t know if I’ll be volunteering to be a transporter anymore.