The companion piece to the story I told you on Tuesday is, of course, my story, and because I do possess opposable thumbs, along with a working knowledge of how they function against a keyboard, you shall witness text–lines and lines and lines of it–unfold before you on your digital device. It will be a technological curiosity, a dazzling display of Web wizardry circa late 90s, or whenever people still capitalized the word “Web,” crashing into your space-age doodad.
The original story was simple. In it, I would adopt a dog right around this time, thereby completing some kind of iconic Thanksgiving picture in my head, where family and canine alike are gathered around a roaring hearth on a chilly evening. We would go around the room, each giving reasons for how fortunate we are, and the pooch would partake as well, because she would know that this is the season for giving thanks. Also for tryptophan ingestion, but that’s tangential.
As is usually the case, though, simple quickly gives way to something far denser, and here we are. For starters, I’m pretty sure the dog doesn’t care what time of the year you adopt her, or whether it’s a national holiday, and the thought patterns probably go more like this: hungry, sleepy, hungry, thirsty, pee, sleepy, OH GOD WHERE IS THE DOG IN THE ADJACENT KENNEL GOING, hungry, time to poop. She doesn’t know this is when the Pilgrims first shook hands with the indigenous peoples, simultaneously thanking them for maize while transferring foreign pathogens. She doesn’t know about cornucopias filled with fruit. I mean, for fuck’s sake! I don’t even know what a cornucopia is exactly. Are there, like, cornucopia factories somewhere and, if so, what do they weave during the other 11 months of the year?
The real plan, then. I’m going to commit before New Year’s Day. You may wonder why, after all this talk about holidays, and it’s because surrenders typically increase after this time of year, or so I’ve heard. People may receive pets for Christmas, then realize they can’t handle them. Perhaps the festivities hit the budget particularly hard, and it’s time to pull back and roll out a clean slate, starting with a deposit at the local shelter. With this flood of new arrivals comes the need to make space, and you know what that means. I’m also going to find out which dogs are on the chopping block, if I may be blunt here. I imagine the ones that have been at the shelter the longest are on the short list, once the influx hits, and I’d prefer to look at this group first. Certainly I won’t adopt solely on this fact, since I’m going to have to live with this decision for a long time, but it’s a starting point.
You may accuse me of overthinking matters here, and you’d likely be right. The kennels will always be filled–slowly at times, quickly at others–and the churn will always be there, and the choice I make will be one grain against the gale. But this is a vote that truly matters to the party involved. It’s going to be a ballot done right.
Kennel by kennel, in one drab cell after another, stories were being written by animals who altogether lacked opposable thumbs and communicated mainly by barking. But the stories were nonetheless gripping, far outpacing that Da Vinci Code garbage, and when all was said and done, it was the same story–the same theme, really–for every dog: uncertainty. Large paws, small paws, all clicking to a tentative beat.
To be clear, though, the facilities were on the level with the humane society, maybe even a notch or two nicer, and with its colored roof and paved parking lot, it could have passed for a school or a church, were it not for the barbed wire fences. It was a gorgeous Sunday as well, 80 degrees in mid-November, sunny, the kind of weather that could only conceivably feel better in 1080p resolution. Few could complain. Few on the outside, at least, because the building interior was overwhelmingly blue, gray, and beige. The paint job, let’s be honest here, mattered little to these inmates, though.
This wasn’t my first kill shelter, but it was the first kill shelter I’ve visited in such close time proximity to a humane society, and the difference was stark. The largest change was in the general demeanor of the dogs, who were more subdued, more deferential. There was one jumper and a few of the puppies were sleeping, if I recall correctly, but by and large each dog, no matter the breed or size, would walk up to the chain-link, head slightly bowed at times, tail wagging hopefully. Heartbreaking, in a word, and this will only make it more difficult to choose.
The humane society dogs were comparatively more entitled, or as entitled as any surrendered pet can possibly be, and I know it’s ridiculous to say so. There was simply more napping, a lot less desperation, and a take-it-or-leave-it vibe. And with three squares, the occasional walk, and no looming threat of execution, who can blame them? Dogs can sense death, I believe, especially that of their peers. When my family dog passed away, I mistakenly placed his freshly made urn in the living room, much to the chagrin of the new dog. There was a lot of wretched whining until I relocated the remains to the garage before burial. Perhaps it’s a sixth sense, or maybe death itself commands a certain smell, but dogs know. They know.
And what I know is I’m setting up shop at this shelter. This is where the search ends, and the final stretch is falling into place. Time frame, full plan, the works. More on Thursday.
When you take the normal contour of blogs, where one post appears after the other in a steady flow of text, and fill it as I do with pronouncements of every kind, you may think I make good on my vows in the same sequential manner. We’ll discuss my desire to cook better, for example, and it might appear as if I’m ready to make the most delectable sandwich on earth the following weekend, only to do nothing of the sort. There have been some evenings in the past few weeks, in fact, where I’ve subsisted wholly on popcorn, which is as far away from cooking as you can get, short of running out the door and foraging for berries, then taking a bite out of the neighbor’s dog.
But it doesn’t mean I’ve forgotten about my culinary stake in the ground, nor has my desire to construct the perfect sandwich diminished. It’s there, in a crock pot brimming with other thoughts, simmering until I decide to pursue it. Really, it’s more a question of when, rather than if, and along those lines I’m looking at this weekend as a refrain on some pursuits from earlier this year.
For one thing, I’m still volunteering occasionally, though my motives for participating remain as single-minded as ever. It’s not my passion to serve recovering alcoholics, and I’m still deflecting that vile feeling of togetherness with the other volunteers, but it’s the beef that keeps bringing me back, specifically how to achieve an optimal texture. I’ve yet to formulate a reproducible method, so further research is needed.
Also, a dog. The humane society sounds great on paper, but after another disappointing visit last Sunday, I decided to expand my horizons and visit a different shelter this weekend. I simply haven’t been able to find any compelling rescues at the society, and more to the point one of the staff members seems intent on deciding which dog I should want, stubbornly insisting on the smaller breeds based on how big she imagines my townhouse to be. She also doesn’t have her front teeth, which for some reason undermines her credibility. It’s, like, I’m not looking for a mastiff, you toothless wench! Something in the 50-, 60-pound range with a mellow temperament. No, I don’t want to take the rat terrier for a walk. Go away, please. So, a kill shelter this weekend. Sure, I won’t be able to save them all, but I’ll be able to give one rescue the last thing she expects on doggie death row. An exit.