One More Time, Pet Project

by David Howells

T’is a Fur, Fur, Better Thing

  The morning featured tea, raisin bread toast and poached eggs at the dinette as the sun rose above the City of Madison. From their vantage point, only the tallest buildings were visible in the distance. That suited the reaffirmed couple just fine. The yard was now being considered as a canine playground, and both wondered whether the dog house would ever be used. The fence was about four feet tall and there were a lot of breeds that would take that height as a fun thing to sail over and take off running. Sam wondered if they’d have to invest in one of those ‘invisible fence’ things.

  There was a dish washer, but neither made much use of them in the past. It seemed easier and quicker to do a quick wash, wipe, and store. It was more romantic, too.

  Sam pulled out his laptop and did a search for the regional SPCA. The website popped up with all kinds of choices to advance to, though cats and dogs were primary in the background motif.

  The dog page had options of small, medium and large. That stopped progress right off the bat. Neither wanted to touch that subject with a ten foot leash for the time being. Elsie said the obvious. “Let’s just go there, Sam, and let God do the rest.”

  Elsie drove while Sam navigated. Neither had been to the SPCA before. It was just on the outskirts of the city and seemed pretty sizable a place. The main entrance was easy to find and the parking area showed quite a few vehicles. Both wondered how many were customers versus workers. Did most people volunteer? Surely someone got paid something, like the vets and administrative staff.

  The doors were automatic and opened into a waiting room area where there were several people seated with different sized carriers next to them. Both wondered where one got carriers…pet supply? Here? Could you rent them or did you have to buy one? The smell of animals was definitely present, but it wasn’t overpowering. Two young women and one young man all in blue scrubs were flitting about either entering information onto paper forms on clip boards or interacting with the people with the carriers. There were random barks that seemed muted by either distance or closed doors, and seemed to have a slight echo-quality to them.

  When no one approached them after about five minutes, the couple walked up to the enclosure with a counter and tapped the bell they hadn’t seen earlier. They heard a “Be right with you”, but didn’t get a lock on where it came from. Ten seconds later, a woman popped up from behind the counter, giving Sam and Elsie a start.

  “Sorry, computer connection got pulled out. Can I help you?”

  Sam said, “We’re here to look over your dogs for a possible adoption. How does one do this sort of thing?”

  Elsie added, “We’re Sam and Elsie, by the way.”

  The young woman smiled and nodded. “Eustasia, and no clue why. Mom liked the sound of it. Hang on. I’d take you myself, but we have to get the link back up. TOM! POOCH PATROL! Tom will help you in a sec.”

  Sam and Elsie looked to where Eustasia had called out to for a moment, then turned back to thank her, but she had disappeared. Sam leaned over the counter slightly, but couldn’t spot where the helpful lady had vanished to. He turned to Elsie and said, “Trap door?”

  “Can I help you?” The couple didn’t have quite the startle reaction, but it was still a little unnerving.

  Elsie looked at the man and then down at his sneakers. “We’re Sam and Elsie, and you people need to wear bells or something.”

  Tom laughed. “We get inspired by the cats. But you two are wanting to check out our faithful canines. Great! Got any preferences? Size?”

  Sam piped up with ‘little’ at the same time as Elsie chimed in with ‘big’. Tom saw the older couple snap attention to each other, get all gushy and hugged.

  “Riighht. I can see you two have talked this over very carefully. No problem. We have all sizes, from delusional rats to Olympians and everything in between. Not much on the purebreds, but personally I’ll take a mutt any day. Smarter, fewer health issues, easier to train, often with longer life spans. Come on with me.”

  Still chuckling and giggling, Sam and Elsie held hands and cheerfully followed their guide through one of the sets of double doors exiting the waiting room. Half an hour later, the couple sat in the waiting area while Tom let another person into the cat hallway. Both were overwhelmed.

  “Sam…it’s not fair. I want all of them.”

  “Elsie, be reasonable. They’re not corn muffins.

  “Did you see the size of that Mastiff? He outweighed ME!”

  “I can’t imagine what it would take to feed something that big. I thought there weren’t any purebreds. And that Chihuahua. What kind of nervous tic did that poor guy have? He didn’t walk across the floor…he vibrated.”

  “OK, Sam. I want all of them except for those two. That’s fair, isn’t it? We don’t want to be greedy.”

  “Elsie…are you saying you want more than one?”

  “Well, that would nix any arguments in the future. A big one for your childhood memories revived, and a small one for my lap. The back yard can certainly support two, and that would give each of us a leash to hold on walks.”

  It seemed to make sense to Sam. He wanted to take another walk down the dog aisle, now that he had more options suiting his own preferences now. Elsie had the same thought.

  Tom was back five minutes later. “Thoughts?”

  Elsie said, “We had a conflict of preferences before, large versus small. We decided to get one of each.”

  Tom cocked his head, suggesting that stealth may have been picked up with cat exposure, but their head expressions were pure canine. “Smaller and larger? I may have something for you. Does age make a difference?”

  They hadn’t thought of age. The thought of puppy-type cuteness was counter balanced with spreading papers all over the house. They said they weren’t locked into a specific age, but wanted something not on its last legs at least.”

  “Hang on, folks. Let me sail this by you. We got two dogs that grew up together with a Military couple with the Reserves. Husband got called up to active duty and shipped overseas. He didn’t make it. The widow wasn’t with it to take care of anyone except herself at that point, and their kid. I really didn’t want to break up the pair. They’re kind of bonded. Smaller one’s a cocker mix, larger is half retriever, half mystery, girl and boy respectively. Both are three and a half years old, house broken, full shots and neutered already, so you save on that charge. I’ve been dreading splitting them up. You game to take a look at them?”

  Couples are unique, just as individuals are. Though most communication between two individuals is verbal, greater intimacy expands the palette to include posture and facial nuance. The longer the partnership, the greater confidence there is in reading each other. Sam and Elsie had not been a ‘couple’ for very long, but they had been close friends for many years. So, with that foundation of familiarity, the practiced eyes of Tom caught their two faces turn to each other, the most subtle of change on the corners of their mouths upwards, then both faces turn back to him. His subconscious evaluated and comfortably came up with a diagnosis of a long-time-connected couple in a fraction of a second. His internal diagnostic process now waited to see who was the alpha, which would be revealed in who it was that spoke the decision. His comfort zone was briefly shaken when both the man and the woman said, “OK,” simultaneously.

  Sam and Elsie sat in a small room that had two metal fold-out chairs. That was it. This room needed little else, other than a window to let in sunlight. Its purpose was to provide a comfortable space for interspecies introduction.

  “Oh, Sam. This is so exciting! I’m getting goose bumps.”

  “And I got terminal warm fuzzies competing with my butterflies. Now, before we get all gushy, I think we need to take a breath and look at this clear headed. I tell my people not to buy the first thing that catches their eye. Cars, dogs, same rules. I’m sure we’ll like these two well eno
ugh, but what if there are another couple of canines that are absolutely perfect and designed for us?”

  “That makes sense, Sam. You’re right. I’m glad you’re here to keep me level headed. Right. We interact with these two, take notes, and have Tom or whoever bring by others to make comparisons with. You know, we could check the paper and Craig’s list, too. The internet will list local breeders, if we have an eye for a particular breed.”

  “There you go, Hon. Get ALL the facts. This decision will be with us for a very long time. We’ll make the right one, together.” Sam held out his hand, Elsie took it and they gave a firm shake.

  The door opened a crack. They could hear the light sound of pads and nail clicks on the tile. Earlier strong resolve showed some stress fractures. Tom told them through the opening, “Normally we introduce doubles one at a time. Trust me on this. I’m bringing in both at the same time. They’d be more hyper if I separated them right now. You two ready?”

  Sam went for calm bravado. “Bring in the first candidates, Tom. We’re ready.” Elsie caught the tone and added a stiffening of her own spine to the front. The door opened and Tom stood with short leashes held on two dogs.

  Elsie’s eyes locked on a long-eared long-haired cocker mix whose fur was the color of molasses, with white spots that made you think of a fawn’s protective patterning. Sam’s resolve was rudely shaken by large, soulful brown eyes from a face that looked like it came off a hunting magazine’s cover. He had a puzzle pattern of white and brown. Tom lengthened the leash on the cocker, who seemed to know where her bread was buttered and padded tentatively towards Elsie.

  “Oh…”

  The dog stopped just at Elsie’s feet and looked up into her eyes.

  “Oh…”

  Tom said, “Her name is Fawn. No mystery on why, eh?” Fawn stood up on her hind legs and put both paws on Elsie’s lap.”

  “Ohhhhhh….”

  Sam tore his eyes away from the scene and towards Tom. “I think she wants to buy a vowel.”

  Tom nodded and began to lengthen the retriever’s leash. Sam was impressed with the calm demeanor and patience the dog exhibited during Fawn’s introduction. The animal sat in front of Sam and placed his head on his lap. There was only a mild hesitation as memories of his childhood’s best friend came to the surface to encourage head and ear stroking.

  “His name is Jigsaw.”

  Their combined walls of planned perspective were piles of rubble. There would be no more candidates, no internet research, no newspaper classifieds. Tom ‘sealed the deal’ simply by letting go of the leashes and saying that he had to go get their files and would be back in about ten minutes.

  Though he was personally busy melting, Sam caught Elsie rummaging through her purse, pulling out a comb and a pair of scissors. Elsie just said that old habits were hard to break, and began to comb and snip some of the knots she’d found in Fawn’s long hair. The dog had no problems with that process at all. It was attention that she had hungered for. Happily humming, Elsie now had Fawn standing cross-ways on her lap, combing and snipping until the unruly fur started looking more ‘show dog’.

  By the time Tom came back with two manila folders, there was a sizable pile of fur in front of Elsie, who had by now been turned to the opposite direction. He looked at the pile of fur, and then the dog that might be seen walked by someone who could afford a designer collar with matched leash. “Ma’am? You do this for a living? I mean, wow! She looks amazing.”

  “Oh, my, no. Well, not exactly.” More snips. “I used to run a hair salon and…hmmm.” There was one stubborn knot on the left haunch that needed excising. ‘Snip’. Done. “I sold the Salon a while ago and…hmmm.” She turned to Sam. “You know…”

  Sam turned to Tom again. “Who grooms your animals here?”

  “Jane Haskins comes by every few weeks and donates her time. She owns ‘Pretty Paws’ on the other side of town. We include her card in the adoption packets as sort of a barter, but, well. No offense to her since she doesn’t charge us or anything, but, wow. You ever think of doing this for real?”

  On the ride home, Sam explained again why they couldn’t bring home Fawn and Jigsaw that day. SPCA ran background checks on people for the sake of the pets. Having the vet give both a good once over was also a wise step. But there was another subject that had to be addressed.

  “Hon, might it be dangerous? Some of those dogs are rescues and who knows how much abuse they’d been through. You could get hurt working there.”

  “Point taken, but people do this for livings. There’s got to be ways around that. I’m going to do some research at home. I remember your dog at the groomer’s. There was a platform that raised up and down so the groomer didn’t have to bend over much. She never needed a muzzle on your Blackie, Gracie said, but maybe that’s standard until the dog gets used to the process. I’m going to need some brushes, some way of shampooing, rinsing and drying. I can get my feet wet by donating time at the SPCA and other shelters until I’m established, then have my own little part-time place. It’s perfect!”

  A new business, Sam wondered? They were retired, kind of. But hardly a day went by he didn’t have someone call about automotive mentoring, if not a couple. Maybe instead of favors, he could have his own little business as well. If he actually charged for his expertise, maybe people wouldn’t be so fast to call on him, and that wouldn’t be so bad. Before things changed with Elsie, he relied on his car connections to give purpose and company in his life. He didn’t need that as much anymore, but more bucks in the bank wouldn’t hurt. And if Elsie likewise had a small business where she could name and alter her hours on demand, well, wouldn’t it be nice to have the where withal to do some world traveling?

  “Hon, where would you set up shop? Would that be something you could do at the house? We’d have to check the zoning on that, maybe apply for a variance. I’ll look into that for you. By the way, let me bounce some ideas off of you about a ‘Sam, Your Auto Purchase Mentor’ service.

  That evening’s sunset viewing on the porch had a much happier time of it than the day before.