Another Good Dog

by Cara Sue Achterberg

  To the guy’s credit, he did say, “You’ve given me something to think about, but I just couldn’t ever own one.” And then he excused himself and avoided me the rest of the party. Can’t say that I blame him. Like Ginger, when I’m excited about something, I can get a bit over the top with my enthusiasm.

  When I got home, I took Ginger for a walk in the dark and wondered how many people were like that guy at the party. Would anyone ever take a chance on her, or would they recognize her pit bull ears and build and face, and click to the next dog?

  We all loved Gingersnap. Whenever I made any positive comments about her, the nearest family member would say, “See, we should keep her!” I’d shake my head. I did love Ginger, but her intensity and devotion raised the energy in the house threefold. Choosing to keep her would mean choosing to stop fostering. Nick and I argued this fact again and again, but he knew I was right. We loved dogs and we loved Gingersnap, but she took up all the available dog-space in our home.

  “She’s the most like Lucy we’ve had,” said Nick in one final plea.

  “She is,” I told him. “But I’m not ready.”

  *She was adopted by a local family seven days from her arrival on transport.

  †Always iffy when we’re talking about teenagers thrown together for the sake of their parents’ social life.

  ‡A VERY nice change after the run of hairy black Labs we’d had that spring.

  §I have a thing for long floppy ears.

  ¶Per ASPCA Professional blog.

  #This was cited again and again but I couldn’t find an official report giving hard numbers. After reading the data though, it’s not hard to imagine that it’s accurate, maybe even conservative. One article said that the Humane Society claims 50% of all dogs euthanized at shelters are pit bull breeds, and that 75% of shelters euthanize all pit bulls, regardless of temperament, age, history, etc.

  NINETEEN

  Vacation

  We settled into the knowledge that Gingersnap might be here all summer. It was time to get a new foster dog. I scanned the list of dogs arriving on transport and dogs being returned. Among the returns was Whoopi, an eighty-pound bloodhound. Here was the big dog that Ian was always begging for.

  Whoopi was even bigger in person. As her adopter talked to me about the difficult decision to return Whoopi, and details about her likes and dislikes, I simply marveled at the enormity that was Whoopi. All that skin. Hanging everywhere. I wanted to get her a headband for the extra flesh on her face so she could see better. She had a white scar ringing her hips where at some point in her life she must have been caught in a fence or wire, the result now branded her for life. Her long ears had hard, tiny lumps near the edges where shotgun pellets were embedded. I learned that when she came to OPH originally, she was heartworm positive and had been treated successfully. The rescue road had been long for Whoopi and it was far from over.

  After the returning adopters left, Whoopi ambled into the house, drool hanging from her enormous snout. I watched as Whoopi shook her head back and forth, batting herself with her mile-long ears, her face literally smacking her face, flinging dog drool on me, the wall, the cabinets, and Ginger who was standing there in awe.

  I showed Whoopi to the deck, she glanced around, spotted one of the cats and let out a beautiful hound-dog bay. It was seriously loud. Louder than Carla or any of the other hounds we’d fostered. Ian said later that when Whoopi was barking he could feel it in his chest. Ian and Whoopi spent a lot of time together. This was because he was the only person in the house large enough and strong enough to walk Whoopi without great personal risk.*

  As I might have mentioned, we live on a hill. Six acres of lovely countryside, but not a level spot of ground anywhere. Walking up the hill with Whoopi, she made a sturdy towrope and it was fairly easy going. Walking back down was another story. Once she had momentum on her side, I stumbled/ran/skied along behind her like some kind of Looney Tunes character, yelling, WHOA and pulling with both arms.

  Once in a momentary loss of sanity, I decided to take both dogs with me on my run. It was a beautiful day and it didn’t seem fair to take Ginger and leave Whoopi to howl her disappointment. Whoopi’s tail wagged and her snout was high as we set off. I’d barely gone a half mile before I realized I’d made a horrible mistake. It reminded me of a boot camp class I took years ago at the Y in which we had to tow truck tires across a parking lot. This was just like that, only imagine that the truck tires were gunning it in the opposite direction. Each time Whoopi bounded off on a scent, I braced myself and yelled, “NO, Whoopi!” Despite my protest, I was dragged forward scrambling to retain control, and poor Ginger was towed along behind me like a toddler with no options.

  Miraculously, we made it home, but I felt like I’d run a marathon. Whoopi plopped down on the deck for a nap. Ginger watched me faithfully as I stretched. I stroked her sleek head and wondered if Ginger and Whoopi would still be with us at Christmas. Not because they were bad dogs—quite the contrary—but there were complications involved with either of them finding a forever family.

  Whoopi was a hit at events. Bloodhounds are notorious. We smile at the sight of them—picturing a big droopy dog lounging on the porch of a falling-down house while a hillbilly sits beside them guzzling moonshine and cleaning his shotgun. I took Whoopi to a large pet festival at a nearby college and everywhere we went people smiled and pointed—“Look at the bloodhound!” Whoopi drew loud cheers in the Pet Parade dressed as a butterfly.

  Everyone loved her, yet no one filled out an application for her.

  But that was the thing—Whoopi was not an impulse buy. She needed a hound person. If you’ve ever met a hound person, you know what I mean. These are people impervious to drool, who instinctively keep their counters cleared of any food items and store their open bag of chips on top of the refrigerator. They take no issue with sliding glass doors snotted up at eye level. And when they hear a hound let out a long, loud bay, they say, “Isn’t that gorgeous?” instead of, “Will somebody shut that bleepin’ dog up?” They are in awe of a dog with the ability to sense a dropped cheese curl at fifty paces or the trail of a chipmunk who sauntered through the yard several days ago. Whoopi needed one of these people who would offer her the room to run and the freedom to sing when inspired.

  Gingersnap was lingering at our house for entirely different reasons. I hadn’t witnessed her at an adoption event, but I had taken her to enough of Ian’s baseball games to know that would be a disaster. She loved the excitement of the crowd too much. So much she couldn’t help but shout about it—nonstop. And she loved meeting new people. In fact, she felt the only appropriate response to new friends was to jump on them and lick their faces. Not everyone welcomed a facebath upon introduction.

  She also loved meeting other dogs, but she was that party guest who was still dancing on the tables when everyone else was looking for their coats. She couldn’t tone down her enthusiasm and was never deterred by a growly new friend. So, I could only imagine how an adoption event would go. There would be people and dogs everywhere. It would be simply too much for the sweet girl. She was a lot like John Coffey, the maniacally happy, people-loving foster dog we had back in the fall who also couldn’t attend adoption events due to his enthusiastic nature. John Coffey ended up in the perfect forever family, so I had to trust that Ginger would too. Still, because she couldn’t attend adoption events and meet potential adopters, the only way her forever family would find her was through the OPH website.

  The problem with that, though, was most people who paged through the website made their decisions based on pictures. And getting a good picture of Ginger was not an easy thing. She was in near constant motion, and when she wasn’t moving it was because she was sleeping. She wouldn’t hold still and sit pretty for the camera. What would be the fun in that when she could be licking the legs of the camera person or chasing down the butterfly that just passed by?

  And more than that, her funny, sweet personality was difficult to captur
e on film. For instance, the night before she was chasing fireflies. Totally adorable. But was there really any point in taking a picture of a brown dog at night?

  The next Saturday we were headed to the beach for a much-anticipated vacation. I could hardly wait for an entire week with two of our favorite families and most, possibly all, of my kids. Yay. No stalls to muck or weeds to pull.

  But there was a problem: I still had Ginger and Whoopi. At first I considered leaving them with our house/horse sitter; after all, we were paying her, right? But while I was fairly certain she liked animals, it seemed unrealistic to expect her to deal with an eighty-pound bloodhound with an impulsive nose, a maniacally enthusiastic face-slurping pitbull, and a snarly, grumpy, poop-rolling Gracie at the same time. No, I couldn’t ask this of my nice college-age house sitter who thought she’d been hired to care for the horses and water the plants.

  I was all set to send them to the boarding kennel, when an adopter for Whoopi appeared out of thin air! Now, sure, several others had backed out once the idea of an eighty-pound pet with an overactive nose and a drool setting had sunk in, but maybe this was karma finally paying me back. Maybe Whoopi’s forever family had finally found her. And then I checked Ginger’s OPH page and what? Applications! Somebody/somebodies wanted Ginger?!?!! Yay Gingersnap! She’d been almost adopted too many times for me to count those chickens, but I did it anyway.

  The reality of one or both being adopted before we left in four days was beyond even my optimistic nature. Applications were not processed overnight. References had to be checked, questions asked, interviews given. This takes time.

  I packed and planned and worried. Another foster, Juanita, who lived just north of us, volunteered to take Whoopi while we were on vacation. Ginger, though, would have to go to boarding. The idea that they might be adopted while we were gone was hard to bear. I acted all tough and I’m-not-keeping-them most of the time, but Ginger was another story. Not being able to say goodbye would be awful. She’d wormed her way into our hearts, mine especially. Even Addie, who generally tried to ignore the foster dogs and actively campaigned for switching to fostering cats, was still pleading for us to adopt Ginger.

  “I think this is the best one we’ve had,” Brady said, after once again arriving home from working in the deli at Giant, smelling like fried chicken, only to be tackled by Ginger who proceeded to lick him head to toe—and not just because he smelled of cold cuts. She LOVED him. And he loved her. Ian liked Ginger too. He enjoyed picking her up and cuddling her as if she were a lapdog.†

  As we talked about our predicament, Nick looked at Ginger, smiled, and said, “If only you didn’t bark.” She had interrupted more than one conference call. And me? I loved that dog. The idea of Ginger going to boarding and then being adopted without me just about killed me.

  By Thursday it was apparent that no adoptions would be taking place anytime soon. I made arrangements to send Whoopi to Juanita’s. Juanita had a fenced yard and several personal dogs of her own. More than that, she had an enormous heart. When she heard that Ginger was going to have to go to boarding, she emailed and said, “I think I could try taking both of your dogs.”

  “You are the very best,” I told her.

  She picked up Ginger for a “test run” to see if she could handle her high energy and to see how she was with her three personal dogs (two of which were pit mixes and the third was a blind and deaf mastiff). Ginger hadn’t been gone more than an hour when Juanita texted, “She is NOT going to boarding. She’s 150% love. She fits right in.”

  We took off for vacation comforted by the knowledge that both Ginger and Whoopi would be safe and happy at Juanita’s Puppy Palace. Meanwhile, the applications that looked so good earlier in the week faded away like all the others.

  When we returned from our vacation, I picked up Whoopi and Ginger from their vacation. They were tired, fat, and happy—the way everyone should be when returning from vacation. While we were gone they’d been spoiled rotten by Juanita. They’d had free run with her pack in her big, shady, fenced yard; they were allowed on the bed for naps, and even had a doggie swimming pool to cool off in.

  Ginger’s chocolate coat was shiny and sleek, and with the extra pound or two she’d picked up on vacation, she looked even more like a seal. Whoopi was sporting an extra roll around her shoulders. Ian lifted a few of her layers and said, “You could fit another dog in this dog.”

  Whoopi and Ginger seemed happy to be back with us, despite the downgraded accommodations. Back to wearing leashes. Back to being stuck in the kitchen. Back to snarly Gracie-dog ignoring them. Back to being hissed at by unappreciative cats. Back to being shrieked at for licking passing legs and hollered at for barking at the squirrels they were not free to chase.

  While we were on vacation, I had watched online as Whoopi’s status went from Adoption Pending back to Adoptable and then Adoption Pending again. The new adopters had emailed me with questions and were planning their trip to come meet her—driving all the way from Rhode Island! Everyone was now holding their breath, hoping this was the one.

  If there’s one thing I’d learned about the whole fostering and adoption process, it’s that the right family would eventually find these dogs. I’d seen it happen again and again. I remember thinking no one would ever adopt Carla and she landed in the perfect setup—in Indiana! And John Coffey? Same. Latest reports were that he was happy and healthy and very much appreciated in his forever home and still catching balls like a champ. Probably the one dog I worried the most would never be adopted was Hadley. And even Hadley found her person.

  When friends asked, “You still have those dogs?” I’d say we were just babysitting while Whoopi and Ginger’s future forever families were on vacation. They’d come for them soon, I wrote on my blog; I was certain. But what IF Ginger and Whoopi’s families never materialized? What then?

  *Ian sprouted up that summer and while he’d just had his fourteenth birthday, he was already six foot, 180 pounds. He’d taken up shot put that spring and had been lifting weights to improve his throw.

  †I guess to a person of his size, she was a lapdog.

  TWENTY

  Making a Difference

  Whoop! Whoop! Whoopi found her forever family! She left early on a Sunday morning for the six-hour drive to her new home in Rhode Island! By Monday we were already hearing how happy she was in her big fenced yard near the seashore with her two new fursiblings.* It was a great story that made my heart very happy. I did have to admit, though, it was also nice to finally wash our slobbered windows and not have to jump out of the shower and run downstairs in my towel because I remembered I’d left the butter plate on the counter.

  Ginger was still with us, with no adopters in sight. Ian said, “Maybe no one will adopt her and they’ll forget about her and we can just keep her.”

  “Probably not,” I told him.

  When Brady filled up our kitchen with college-age boys,† Ginger lay among them, licking their toes and waiting for the occasional treat. She was one of the gang.

  I didn’t bother with a leash when we went out anymore. I knew she wouldn’t leave me. She loved me too much. Sure, she’d get that cat up in the tree for me, but then she’d be right back. She did indulge in occasional staring contests with the chickens, and I was guessing if given access to them she might have taken it a step further, but she respected the fence that separated them.

  One morning I overslept, a rarity as I was normally up with the sun and hadn’t used an alarm clock in years. Nick was the first one downstairs, and as soon as he let Ginger out of her crate, she bounded up to our room, leapt on our bed, and woke me with kisses. What a happy way to join the world. The more I thought about it, maybe Ian was right. Maybe it would be best if no one adopted Ginger and she just stayed here indefinitely.

  I found it kind of telling that Ginger had lived in four foster homes in her nearly five months in rescue and every single foster family wished they could keep her. Her first foster mom stopped by to
visit her the week Whoopi left. Ginger hadn’t seen her in almost three months, but recognized her immediately—leaping and squealing with delight and covering Christine with nonstop kisses.

  Her second foster mom had to pass her along to me because of impending surgery, but while she recovered she was acting as the adoption coordinator for Gingersnap, and every time I saw her she said, “We miss Ginger so much. Our house is just not the same.”

  And then there was Juanita, Ginger’s temporary foster mom, who confessed, “I would totally foster fail with her if I didn’t already have three dogs.”

  She was that special—and yet she still had no adopter, and of late, no applications. I really didn’t understand it. The only explanation was her pit bull appearance. How was it our world had still not gotten past appearances? Would we always judge a book by its cover?

  That same week, ironically, I was wrangling with my publisher over the cover for my next book. It was hard to pick one image to sum up the complicated story I’d written. The cover was critical, though, it could compel readers to pick up my book or put it down. We had to consider every angle. Is a door just a door? What does it matter if the tree has fresh spring leaves or a splash of fall color? My ideas and his didn’t mesh so we went back and forth again and again with images. I was waiting for him to say, “Okay, never mind, it’s not up to you anyway.” In some ways that might have made it easier. The picture was important, though, so I wanted my say.