A Canine Christmas Wish

When I ask a dog to do something like Sit or Stay, I never expect him to do it, but am pleasantly surprised when he does. The same goes with my requests to the universe--perhaps because I don’t so much as request as I state my need. And in case you haven’t noticed, “you don’t always get what you want, but you get what you need.”

“Marty needs a home by December 22^nd.” That was the statement sent up into the ether, and what came down was a plan of people, timing, and goodwill to make it all happen.

Amanda said to me as we walked back to our vehicles from delivering Marty to his forever home, “You said you’d get him a home in two weeks, and you did.” I didn’t get Marty a home; it takes a village to save a dog and a few benevolent spirits to make sure everyone hits their mark and plays out their scenes appropriately.

Marty, My Boy

It’s been said that one can learn to love another—such as it was in arranged marriages and people settling for their less-than-true-love. In some ways, I think dogs do this—at least with fosters. I mean, Marty is a good dog, but he’s not my dog. I’d like him to respect my requests, do as I ask, and be a gentleman. Up till now, he’s managed most of those things, but last Sunday night he showed me that perhaps he started to accept that I was his person, and he was a bit pissed about me leaving him out of my adventures.

We spent the afternoon at an adoption fair, which pretty much consisted of me sitting in a chair and Marty napping on the ground for three hours. At least we were outdoors, and I got to meet a few more rescuers.

Since Marty was so sleepy, I figured an evening alone on the couch for him would be welcome. He could nap, and I could attend a holiday party. I wasn’t worried about him alone in the house; I’d left him numerous times, usually for short stints to the grocery store or running errands. Since Christy introduced him to the front window, this is now what I see every time I back out of the driveway:

And, when I return, the very same face:

I hoped he always left the window shortly after me leaving and through canine psychic ability just managed to appear there right before I arrived back. When I returned Sunday night at 11:30, only five hours after leaving, he wasn’t at the window, and I discovered he did a lot more than just walk away from the window once my truck was out of sight.

I opened the back door to find everything that was once on the kitchen counter now on the floor. 

Nothing appeared to be gotten into. His old dog food bag was torn, but not ripped open. His dishes were both empty and had been slipped about. The dining room table seemed almost intact except for the tipped over bag of biscuits in the center of the table. Biscuits, bones, and shrapnel of half-eaten treats littered the floor and seats.

“Marty, what did you do?” I asked, containing my anger and surprise, the big beast cowering beneath me. He discerned I wasn’t exactly proud of his accomplishments.

I looked into the living room. The blanket of the couch was tossed about and the center cushion was lifted out of place, a tear that went straight through the cover, inner cover and the cushion.

“Marty, this is bad!” I yelled, pointing. He lowered himself on the dog bed and turned his belly toward me, expecting punishment.

“What else did you do?”

There was still three more rooms in the house to check.

The front room has nothing in it, so there was nothing to destroy.

In the office, I found my desk chair had been rolled across the room and was up against the file cabinets. The printer cable was on the ground. I must not have had it attached to the laptop, for that at least was safe on the desk.

“Bad dog!” I said to Marty who squinted, and wished he could cover his ears, rolling them back far and down.

The bathroom was untouched (unless he drank out of the toilet bowl, but it looked full enough.)

And then the bedroom.... the blankets and sheets looked as if someone had had quite a good time in various positions. The pillows were scattered. Bone juice was smeared across the sheets under the pillows, on the pillows, in the sheets. And one pillow had a tear in it through the cover and into the padding.

“This is bad!” I yelled again at Marty who was now on the dog bed in the bedroom, as he had gone on the tour with me to view the carnage of his five-hour unsupervised romp.

We went back to the kitchen.

“Marty, this is bad! Why did you do this!” I yelled at him. I didn’t touch him. He cowered again, rolled over and pissed on himself and the floor, expecting to be beaten.

“I’m not going to hit you, Marty! But I’ve very very angry! I don’t even want to see you! Just stay here!”

I don’t think I needed to tell him to stay. I looked up at the counter to grab a paper towel and realized they were gone. The roll sits vertical on a stand, but it’s not a spindle—it’s held on the top and the bottom of the roll. I was a little perplexed. I didn’t remember using them up. Did he eat them?

I grabbed another roll and cleaned up the piss on the kitchen floor. I went back to the living room to see that he had also leaked urine on the dog bed while he had watched me take stock of the couch. It was then that I saw the roll of paper towels.

On the coffee table, lying neatly horizontal, was the roll of paper towels. Next to it was a wad of a few sheets, used and damp, as if someone had tried to clean up some wet mess, and then put the used sheets on the corner of the coffee table.

Now I was really confused. I made a quick call to the one friend with a set of spare keys to my house. “Hey, this is going to sound strange, but were you in my house tonight?”

He said No, which was the answer I was fully expecting, but I had no explanation for the towels. He and I chatted, and while I was about to chalk it up to friendly helpful spirits, he was more concerned that some living, breathing human being at been in my house while I was away and spooked Marty.

But all the doors were locked when I got home—including the deadbolts. Some stranger came in, cleaned up some dog messiness, then locked the door behind themselves, never leaving a trace? That seems unlikely. (Yes, in my mind, less likely than a paranormal experience.)

My friend came over anyway, just to help me work through this, as the idea of a live person violating my space was way more scary to me than a dead one appearing out of thin air.

“Marty, who was here tonight?” I asked the silent and still dog in the kitchen. Not that I would get a response. But I had to ask. This was one weird night.

My friend came over and began his Mythbusters’ trials, showing me that perhaps Marty could have taken the roll off the counter with his teeth. True, but it would have unrolled, was my answer. “He could have carried it neatly to the coffee table,” he proposed.

“Yeah, and then rip off three sheets, mop up where he spilled his water, but after managing that, couldn’t figure out how to open the trash can in the kitchen and deposit the used towels?” I replied skeptically.

This entire time, Marty was in the kitchen in the dark, laying low. He knew I was mad. But the damage was done. There was nothing he could do to reverse it. Although it really made me wonder if perhaps someone had been here with Marty.

I had come home to the office chair being moved before, so that wasn’t a big deal and Marty was fully capable of doing that. Everything else could be explained with simple canine sugar-rush after eating biscuits and bones. Or separation anxiety. Or boredom. Or just getting even for me not taking him with me.

But the paper towels...

Marty never told me who was there, and when I was finally too tired to analyze it any further, my friend left and I went to bed.

I was hesitant to leave Marty home alone again, but Tuesday night I had a movie premiere to go to.  (Being unemployed now, I have time to actually socialize.) This time, thinking maybe the silence was bothersome to my boy, I left the TV on for him. I filled up his water bowl to the very top, in the hopes that wouldn’t be an issue. I left food for him, and gave him a few treats. I told him I had to go on another adventure without him, but his job was to watch the house.

Five hours later, I returned, wondering what mess I would encounter. He wasn’t at the front window, which made me happy. I went around the back and snuck a quick peek through the back doors. I saw the back half of his body on the couch... on the red couch, not the beige blanket. Okay, that’s not so bad. Maybe all will be okay.

I opened the kitchen door and walked in. He greeted me, but his tail was down, unsure of my reaction.

“Hi, Marty, were you a good boy?” I asked, surveying the counter and the dining room.

“Looks good so far,” I said to him.

I didn’t want to engage him in a happy welcome unless all really was okay. A quick walk around the house proved that he hadn’t been in the bedroom, and the office looked relatively untouched.

Marty returned to the living room and there was the scene:

The blanket was fully off, and there in the center of the couch, right where he had been sleeping, was my hiking boot.

How could I be mad now? The boot wasn’t wet or chewed on. The laces were intact. Upon flipping up the blanket, I discovered a bone trapped in its wrinkles. Perhaps when putting the pieces of my place back together on Sunday, I inadvertently trapped some good food in the couch.

So, in the end, just a shoe. One sad, lonely shoe. My heart ached a bit for Marty. He thought I was his person.

On Wednesday, I went out again on my own, leaving Marty in charge of the house. When I returned several hours later, he was still in the front room, keeping watch out the window. And there, next to where he sat, was one Nike sneaker.

Now I was really sad for him. I gave him a welcome greeting, and told him he was a good dog. If he needed a piece of my footwear to feel better, then so be it.

Yesterday, I went away for two hours, and when I returned, my Nike sneaker had made it half way across the kitchen floor, but no further. Perhaps I returned mid-act, or perhaps he was going to try to live without it.

People ask how fosters do it—how we don’t get attached. We do get attached. More painfully, the dogs get attached to us. That’s what’s going to kill me. I love this little guy, and I’ll miss him. But what will shatter my heart is the look on his face when I leave him with his forever people.

And that day is fast arriving... that day, is tomorrow.

A most fantastic couple, Jim and Denise, inquired about Marty and we met up on Thursday to see if indeed it was love at first sight. It was. They loved Marty, and Marty seemed to really like them too. 

I watched Jim walk Marty out to the baseball field, and was thrilled to see Marty playful and happy, mouth open and relaxed, enjoying Jim’s company. And of course he loved Denise—Denise is a woman, and Marty loves all females of any species.

They had looked at a few different dogs, but this one was the best. So chill, so beautiful, so exactly what they were looking for. They had had two dogs: one lived to the age of 15, the other to 17. They clearly are incredible canine guardians. They love mutts. They have a house. They’ll take Marty with them everywhere. And, they want to spend Christmas with him, so they want the adoption to move swiftly.

I will miss this kid greatly. He’s a special old soul, and deserves his forever people. Jim and Denise will be wonderful to him, I have no doubt. But I worry because Marty has just now in the past few days begun the habit of snuggling with me, resting his head on my lap while he snoozes on the couch. 

And since Thursday, I’ve allowed him to sleep on the bed at night, knowing I won’t get any more chances to do so. As often as he can, he scooches up to the head of the bed to gaze as closely as he can into my eyes (and to feel the pillows under this head.)

I can only hope that he will love Denise and Jim quickly and forget about me. That’s the flip side of fostering that hurts me so much—it’s not the getting attached and missing them; it’s the wondering how they will trust their hearts to love again and trust that this time, it really is forever. I feel like Marty believes I am his forever person, and when I show him that he was mistaken, will he ever allow himself to love again?

I believe dogs’ hearts are stronger than ours. They love more deeply than we can grasp, and they are loyal to the death. But even so, I can’t help the guilt of knowing I broke one’s heart. I know I did good by him, and I don’t regret doing it; I just wish that one day we humans can come up with a way of letting our canine fosters know that we love them, love them so much, that we’re not their life-long companion, but are just here to help them find their true love.

Marty, tomorrow you will go to your forever home. I hope you know that I truly do love you and never want to hurt you. You were never meant to be mine, but I am so blessed to share your journey with you. Tomorrow your new life begins. But for now, let’s just live in today, and cuddle just a little bit longer.

It Takes a Village

It’s been said that it takes a village to raise a child. It takes a just as much to save a dog. Now that I can leave a dog alone in a house, I’m free to vary my efforts and contribute to other causes while fostering.

On the literary and political front, I’ve joined C.R.O.P.S. (Citizens for Rescue Only Pet Stores) in Burbank, and am contributing my written brain spewings to various publications in order to get the word out about our cause:

Burbank Leader Mailbag - November 27th, 2012

and again the following week:

Burbank Leader Mailbag - December 5th, 2012

 

And yesterday, I joined with other rescue volunteers to assist in the Mass Canine Exodus of East Valley Animal Shelter.

S.T.A.R.T. (Shelter Transport Animal Rescue Team)  -  no, I didn’t also volunteer at S.C.U.B.A. or any other acronyms this week – does long haul transports to the Pacific Northwest. It’s much like the run I did with Misty last year, except these guys go all the way to Tacoma, Washington, the truck is appropriately designed, and the run begins at the shelter not a Home Depot. 

Eighty dogs were taken from death row, walked and cuddled by strangers, put into crates, and twenty-four hour later began new lives in Oregon or Washington. 

We strangers gathered to save as many dogs as we could and help out in any way we could. It gave me joy to see even a kid there—a kid who could have been home playing video games or going to a dance lesson. She told me she wanted to do this because she loves all animals, not just her cat, and really wanted to help.

There is hope for the future.

Humans, as a species, tend to have a propensity to avoid conflict (unless it’s to their benefit.) No one wants to get involved. Take for instance Wednesday night: as I walked along the Chandler bike path, I saw a man and woman talking while two dogs ran to and fro in the street and across the path.

“The little white one started chasing me while I was running. I don’t know whose they are,” the man was saying.

The woman, seeing my vicious put bull, called out: “There’s two loose dogs here!”

I calmly replied with a smile, “Okay, thank you.”

I then joined in the conversation as I watched the Maltese bound down the hill onto the street, only inches from an oncoming car.

“Well, they’ll find heir way home, right?” the two people seemed to convince themselves.

I was not so convinced.

“The dog ran up to you? Then she needs help finding her way home,” I proposed.

I must have interpreted the dog’s meaning correctly, because she ceased playing chicken with the cars and ran up and jumped into my arms. Poor Marty just looked up at me and sniffed the Maltese’s butt.

The Maltese jumped out of my arms and took off toward her long-haired Chihuahua cohort.

The two people walked away. Ummm....

And there I was left, Marty and me, with two dogs about to get hit by cars. They might know exactly where they live, but they were in mortal danger because they’re idiots and don’t know the dangers of vehicles.

I had to trust that they wouldn’t attack Marty. I went over to the neighbor’s lawn they were currently on and bent down. The Maltese came to me with ease. I knew I could get her any time. So I let her run around and focused on the Chi. He came to me, I grabbed him, and he thrashed about, sinking his teeth into my hand. I thought he’d stop, but I finally let go, realizing he would break the skin if I didn’t. As he raced away, the Maltese jumped on him, admonishing him for such treatment.

I couldn’t do this alone. I asked a woman running if she knew these dogs. She said No and asked if I was trying to get them and what I would do. I told her the shelter was closed for the night, but I could get them and bring them home for the night. I’d check for a micro-chip in the morning. They had collars, but no tags.

And so the good woman Jessica (whose name I didn’t learn until our mission was completed), joined me in the chase of the canines.

We didn’t want them running back and forth across the street, so we stuck to the north side, and had a feeling they lived on one of the side streets. The Chi was proving to be a difficult boy. Jessica motioned toward him half a block away and he let out a blood-curdling scream as if being murdered. Then he took a sharp right at the corner and ran into the dark neighborhood.

I knew he’d stick by the Maltese, so we needed her to lead us to him. We had seen someone come out of their house during our pursuit and call out something, but we didn’t know if it was the dogs she called for. We returned to her and she said she didn’t know them, but offered us a leash to borrow.

We put the Maltese on the leash and Jessica led her to find the Chi. Meanwhile, my gentleman Marty was by my side, quietly complacent, just along for whatever adventure I might be on, and probably secretly hoping this wouldn’t eat into our normal walk time.

We found the Chi at the end of the block, and all of us went to the ground to avoid scaring him. He was timid, and I wasn’t going to try to get him since he bit me last time. Jessica was brave enough to take on that task.

“I wish I had treat,” I said, and then remembered that as a foster, as any respectable dog owner really, there is always poop bags in my back pocket and treats (or remnants thereof) in my front pocket. Sexy, huh?

I pulled out the stale treat and broke it into the tiniest bits possible for the teeny tiny dog. I threw a piece in his direction. The Chi took the bait, and I continued to toss tiny bits to him as he got closer to us. The Maltese and Marty wanted in on the deal, but I promised Marty way better treats at home and asked the Maltese to get out of the way.

Sure enough, with a little patience, and me feeding the Chi treats, Jessica began petting him, and eventually hooked her finger around his collar. I unhooked the leash from the Maltese knowing I could just pick her up later, and I carefully clipped it into the Chi’s collar.

Success! The Chi felt tricked, but was okay with it and out of biting range on the ground. Jessica had driven to the bike path (I’m one of the few lucky people who can walk to somewhere I can walk in LA.) Rather than walking all the way back to my place she offered up her car to transport this motley crew.

She had a compact hatchback. She opened the door and retracted the seat. She motioned for the Chi to hop into the back seat, but wasn’t having any of it. I, holding the Maltese like a football and still hanging onto Marty’s leash, offered to go in first. I clamored in with my usual amount of grace, landed in the middle of the backseat, and asked Marty to join me. Such a great kid he is! He’s never been in a backseat, but he followed me there now, and when he was blocking the Chi’s way to the floor, I asked him to come up on the seat next to me, and he obliged without incident.

Finally the Chi jumped in, Jessica handed me the leash, closed the door, and I, three dogs, and this good Samaritan drove toward my house seven blocks away.

As I sat in the woman’s car (we still hadn’t even gotten each other’s names yet), my hope in humanity was renewed. The thing is, when you’re helping animals, people tend to assume you’re not a psycho-killer and will gladly assist you--even drive you where you need to go.

I got to the house, put Marty inside, and then went to the garage where I had been storing Marty’s crate since he graduated from that to the couch. I used Marty’s leash on the Maltese and set up the crate. I then went back out front where Jessica stood with the belligerent little devil and took him from her.

“Are you going to take them to the shelter?” she asked.

“I’m going to try not to,” I told her. “I’ll put out a Found ad, let the shelter know I found them, and see if I can check them for a micro-chip in the morning.”

I thanked her, and it was only then that we got each other’s names.

I let the two tiny dogs stay in the crate while I asked the universe for some assistance in getting me to be in the right place at the right time. I grabbed Marty from inside and headed back out to Chandler Blvd to return the leash to the kind neighbor and hopefully hear somebody calling out dog names in the dark.

After leaving the leash hooked on the inside of the woman’s gate, Marty and I walked along in silence. I tried to open myself up again to be guided appropriately. I wasn’t getting any signs (except to not go down one dark alley.) I walked out of the alley and took to the sidewalk.

I was about to give up hope when I saw an older Korean gentleman standing in his gated front yard, looking perplexed. “Excuse me, sir,” I said and he turned to me. “Do you know anyone who has a poodle-like dog and a Chihuahua?”

“Yes. Yes, I do. Me!” he said.

“Oh good!” I said, thanking the universe for leading me here at the right time. “I have them back at my house; they were running around the street and I didn’t want them to get hit by a car.”

“Oh my goodness, thank you, thank you. It seemed quiet out here, so I came to check on them and I couldn’t find them. I think one of the kids must have gone out the gate and not latched it properly. I’ve been looking for them for half an hour.”

“Do you mind walking back to my place? I have them there.”

“Of course, of course,” he said.

He brought his leashes and together we walked back to my place. He told me their names: Zoë was the Maltese and Panda was the Chihuahua. He’d only had them for a month and a half. He hadn’t even taken them out for a walk because his children wanted to take them, but he didn’t trust them with the leashes.

Here’s a little bit of wisdom for you: If you don’t take a dog for a walk, eventually the dog will take himself for a walk.

He thanked me profusely and told me he wanted to give me gifts for Marty for taking the trouble to help. I said it wasn’t necessary, and was glad they were safe. I was even more glad that I didn’t have to take them to the shelter.

This afternoon, between Marty-publicity events, I got a knock on my door: the man and his three young children (all under the age of 10), were standing there with a bag of biscuits for Marty. I wish I had had time to let them in, but I was running out to get Marty to an adoption event.

It took three people—and the right timing--to get those two dogs home safely.

The transport took a dozen or so people on the day of transport, but many more who contributed financially to the cause, and the people who chose the animals and made way for them up north. 

On a grander scale, for all the lost and homeless animals, it takes thousands of people and coming at the problem from all angles. There is no one single solution to clear out America’s animal shelters. There’s shifting of inventories as this transport was. (I later learned that while this was going on, over 300 dogs took flight from Van Nuys airport to various rescues across the western states through an airplane transport group called Wings of Rescue.) There’s the legislation to stop pet stores from selling puppy mill animals and instead require them to acquire their “inventory” from shelters and rescues. There’s spay and neuter education; volunteers holding clinics and pushing education to teach people why they should get their dog or cat fixed. There’s fosters and volunteers, people who pull animals before they’re euthanized, drive them to safety, network them across the internet, do home checks and process adoption applications and hold events to raise money or adopt out animals.

Never underestimate your own value. Just one person isn’t “just.” 

Join an effort, be part of a team, give a dollar to a needy shelter, provide some love and a walk to a terrified shelter dog, foster a kitten, or give the greatest gift of all: your heart and home to a homeless pet in need. 

You’re not “just” one person; you are the world to that one animal who needs you, and you can make a world of a difference when you join forces with others. Every soul matters: yours, along with every single one behind animal shelter bars. Please remember them all this holiday season, and throughout the year.

Epilogue:

Be warned that when you are the world to one dog and you leave to have adventures without him, he might just act like a jilted lover and go through your purse like Marty did to me. 

As retaliation, he had to wear the reindeer antlers for five minutes. 

He agreed if that's what I was doing with other dogs, then he would happily stay at home and patiently await my return.

The Office... Dog

It takes a certain personality to handle office life—a personality that I don’t have. Therefore I never expect a canine to have it either. Granted I don’t work in a “real office.” The thought of spending 25 years in a cubicle on the 27^th floor pushing paper around and going to staff meetings makes my palms sweat and my heart race.

In the career I’ve chosen, “office life” is a little bit unorthodox. Rarely are cubicles involved; the office can be anything from a fold out table to a room in a 19^th century building with an executive desk. Depending on the circumstances, we can play tunes, talk loudly, curse creatively, and at this particular studio, bring a dog to work.

I was surprised to learn that Marty does indeed have the personality for the office. Maybe not cubicles, although unlike me, I think he’d fare well there too. Granted, there were challenges to overcome this week.

Marty has taken well to car rides. Unlike many dogs who prefer to just curl up and sleep, Marty likes to ride high and alert in the passenger seat, watching the world through the front windshield like a proper co-pilot should. The first couple of days I had to assist him in getting up into the seat, but now as soon as I open the door, he expertly hops right up to the floor, crawls up on the seat and gives me a lick on the face while I buckle him in.

Marty was up for following me wherever I took him until it came time to enter the building. I was supposed to have gotten a “permit” for him, a canine badge to allow him entry. However since I had made the decision late Sunday night to bring him, there was no time. I was told to just keep him on the down low, and if anyone questioned me, just say it’s in the works.

So, I was a little annoyed with my cohort that I was supposed to keep incognito, when he balked at going into the building. Awkwardly carrying my usual work bag, his day bag, a water bowl, and a dog bed, I was not in any physical position to fight with a stubborn dog on a harness.

Marty backed up and crouched down (his preferred protest position), taking advantage of all the gravitational pull he could muster and refused to even look at the front door. As more employees started to walk by, I started to panic.

“Marty, come on. It’s not the vet’s,” I harshly whispered and then, against every training suggestion ever written and much to the probable horror of onlookers, I dragged him across the threshold.

Once inside, I felt the need to explain myself and Marty to the people who witnessed this. “He’s never been in here before. It’s new to him.”

Marty was cowering, unable to move on this new floor surface which wasn’t just flat tile or linoleum; it was a bumpy rubbery surface that he had never experienced before.

I didn’t want to traumatize him with the elevator, as I can understand that this is a scary new thing, so I opted for the stairwell, unawares that this was just as frightening.

Marty had been going up and down my deck stairs perfectly fine, but a full flight of concrete stairs is a very different thing. He lowered himself to the ground and again, refused to move.

I urged him onward, and while I watched him awkwardly try to navigate the stairs, I was reminded of Dew, my timid two year-old Missouri driving partner. Marty had never seen stairs such as this before. I figured going down the stairs would take some serious courage, but up the stairs, in my simple human mind, seemed perfectly easy. Not so, for Marty.

Marty made it a couple of steps up and then turned to go back down. I gently coaxed him on, and he made it to the first landing. He shivered and lowered himself to the floor, and then tried to go back down the stairs.

“No, honey, come on, you can do it; it's just a little further now.”

He didn’t believe me. He refused to make eye contact, and instead wallowed in his fear.

“Marty, sweetie, you can do it,” I said, also crouched down on the stairs above him trying to get him to come to me (not that he always did that even on a flat surface.)

Marty did indeed rise to the challenge with me pushing him (or in this case pulling him) until he got to the final landing and collapsed all the way to the ground right in front of the door. Now we couldn’t get out of the stairwell.

“Marty, come here, come away from the door. I can’t open it if you’re in front of it.”

This has been a common misunderstanding—one we have every time we leave the house. He doesn’t grasp that standing directly in front of the door prevents me from opening it. But this time it was blind fear, not ignorance, that stopped him from getting out of the way.

When I gently shoved him, he stood half way, and I realized that he thought he was going to fall down. He was uneasy on the floor, seeming not to trust that it would hold him this high up. I had not ever seen a dog react in this way, as this seemed like a gross over-calculation for a canine.

I opened the door and Marty entered, ears flat, half-walking, half-crawling. But then alas, the oasis he had been searching for: carpeted floor.

Marty rose to his full height, and although timid in the new surrounding, he at least had solid footing. We trekked down to the end of the hallway, into my office, and the moment I placed the dog bed on the floor, Marty plopped down on top of it content as could be.

I had put the dog bed behind the empty desk across from me, creating a cave-like hovel for him. I wrapped the tie-out from my backyard around the bottom of the desk a few times and then attached it to Marty’s harness so he was free to roam the room. Silly me has only either a 4 foot leash or a 40 foot tie-out; it’s all or nothing, no in between. The tie-out got tangled around the desk and appropriately allowed Marty only about 10 feet, the perfect length to get him to the doorway of the hall.

Of course he never really went to the hall. I could come and go to the copy room or kitchen or anywhere for minutes at a time, and Marty simply stayed on the dog bed. He seemed disappointed that he wasn’t allowed to stay at home on the comfy couch all day, but had to settle for the mediocre dog bed. However, I couldn’t afford the time loss going home in the afternoon for a couple of hours. So, he was stuck here.

Marty has a live and let live policy. Even now as I write this at the coffee house, I’m watching him simply looking at the birds only four feet away from him. He’s not chasing them, just watching them. He’s pretty aloof to other dogs, content to say Hello if approached, but otherwise ignores them. I think this might be his natural mellow attitude, but it also could be a sign of his pure laziness.

So lazy in fact, that eating lunch didn’t even warrant scooting his rear end up into a sit position let alone stand.

I have since learned to place the plate far enough away from  him that he’s required to move his lazy ass in order to dine.

I often worry that my fosters are bored as they have no playmates, but with Marty, I feel as though he’s perfectly content doing nothing. He doesn’t have high expectations; just being is quite enough for him.

Since the stairs proved terrifying for him, I taught him about the elevator, even though I felt rather silly taking it to go only one floor. That too, frightened him—and why not? It is a small, closed-in metal box that moves of its own volition, and once the doors close, you’re trapped in it; when the doors open, a whole new scene presents itself than when the doors had closed. After four times, Marty was okay with this new mode of transportation. But I still wanted him to conquer the stairs. What if he had adopters who lived on the second floor of an apartment building? He needed to master stairs.

My boss brought in his gorgeous and exuberant golden retriever on Thursday. I thought this would give Marty an opportunity to play, but instead Marty let out a warning growl before even seeing the new visitor. I said hello to Hudson, the two year old Goldie, and realized that maybe Marty could simply sense this kid’s energy. Marty was completely opposite on the energy scale. Hudson was clumsily and frantically running about and didn't seem very bright. Marty is more of the cranky-old man grumbling if you jostle him awake in the early morning, and intolerant of shenanigans.

On our afternoon walk, Hudson went into the building ahead of us and I watched him go up the stairwell. I then challenged Marty, telling him he couldn’t be outdone by that silly boy. Marty gave it his all, and although there was some stopping and starting, he did make it up the stairs. And much to surprise, going down the stairs was no trouble at all for him later that evening.

I must retract my initial statement that Marty is unadoptable. He just needs an understanding and caring adopter who can help him gain confidence—someone who takes him on new adventures and gives him the proper time to adjust.

Due to my snap judgment though, Amanda now believes that Marty can only go to an “experienced adopter” and that he requires extensive training. Christy came by and met Marty this weekend, and said, “Are you kidding? This dog doesn’t need training. He’s the perfect dog—just lazy and willing to chill out.”

Does Marty always listen to my requests? Of course not. He’s got a mind of his own. If he’s walking away from me and I tell him to come back, he pretends as if he can’t hear me at all. But if he’s on a leash and he walks away and I stand my ground, he stops and waits for me.

Marty would make a great office dog, or bar dog—the mascot of a store or public place where he could greet people when he was feeling outgoing and then sleep in the corner when he got tired of it all.

Whenever we’re driving around town, I see him living a trucker’s life, on the open highways of America, taking in the sights of the ever-changing landscape. But I know he’s a bit timid around new places, and although driving is his thing, truck stops might be a bit overwhelming for him.

Marty’s potential new life is limitless. But he needs to find it soon. If he doesn’t get a home before I leave for the holidays, he’s going to get shipped back to the ranch, where he’ll most likely live for many more months, tucked away and inaccessible to finding his Forever Person who I am convinced is out there waiting to meet him.

If you or someone you know is looking for a mellow companion for long drives up the coast or long days in the office or business venture, check out Marty’s ad. (Ignore the “experienced adopter” line,.. and yes, he’s still listed as Starlight, but consider that his “AKC” name; he prefers his street name Marty.)

http://www.adoptapet.com/pet/6742829-malibu-california-australian-shepherd-mix