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.