You Had Me at Woof: How Dogs Taught Me the Secrets of Happiness (8 page)

I really had my mind focused on Violet. On the first day of school, the kids went for about two hours. Most of the parents looked at it as an opportunity to get some errands done, but I sat outside the classroom with knots in my stomach. It went okay. The next day was three hours, then four, then a full day. The addition of each consecutive hour brought more anguish to my child. I sat in the dimly lit hall outside her classroom. The school was built in the 1920s; it was a grand, Gothic structure with enormous windows and high ceilings in the classrooms. It felt like a real school. In fact, I was reading Frank McCourt’s
Teacher Man
while I waited for her and his descriptions of the first schools he taught in in Manhattan and the Bronx sounded very much like this place.

I thought a lot about how I was not able to give Violet the same choice I gave Otto. She had to go to school. Well, she didn’t
have
to go to pre-K, but my sense was that if we pulled her out because she was sad and missing me, kindergarten, which was required, would be that much harder.

I thought about a day when I had been trying to teach Otto manners. He developed this habit of barking like crazy at other dogs, or not barking at them and waiting for them to smell him; then he’d try to bite them. I hated saying, “My dog’s not friendly,” so mostly I’d just pull him away. Initially, though, it was a shock to me. Every time he did it, I thought it was an aberration, there was something provocative about the particular dog he was biting; it was not his fault. But then I started getting it, that he was the one with the behavioral issue. So I had one of my talks with him.

“Listen, you have got to get it together. You’re not going to have any friends! No one’s going to want to hang with you. They’re already starting to think you’re a jerk. It’s not my problem, it’s yours! If you don’t want to behave, you’re going to be the one who is embarrassed out there in the world.” I used every psychological trick in the book. No little dog was smarter than me! In the end, he decided he preferred his method of communication, and I was right. No one invited him to any of the big doggie birthday parties.

With Violet, it was different. (Strange, but true!) I had a greater responsibility for developing her social and emotional skills. Otto would never be going places without me, but we assumed, one day, that Violet would.

By the Monday after the first easing-in week, my daughter’s response to my leaving her at school was no less dramatic than the climactic scene in
Sophie’s Choice
. In Violet’s four-year-old mind, I was leaving her. Plain and simple. She cried and clung to my leg so that the teacher had to pry her off me and hold her, and then I would leap out, as the assistant shut the door behind me to keep her from escaping. I walked down the hall as her screams echoed,
“Nooooooooo!!! Mooooooooommmmmmmmmm! Please!!!!!!!!!”

First she had gotten upset when we arrived at the classroom, and the next day she worked her way back to getting upset when we arrived at the school, then when we walked up Broadway, then when we were leaving the apartment, waking up, the night before, etc. . . . When I got her to school, the kids looked at me like I was dropping off a wild thing. They stared at us as they settled into their puzzles and counting games. Those first few weeks, the teacher wouldn’t put her name on her cubby because she didn’t think Violet was going to stay in the class. For me and for Violet, getting her to school was the hardest thing we’d ever had to do.

The teacher suggested having Paul take her, since maybe she wasn’t attached to him in the same way and he could just leave her. On the day we decided to try this method, they left and all was quiet. All morning I didn’t hear a peep from him, so I figured the drop-off must have gone smoothly. At around noon he called me from his cell phone. He was
just leaving school.
He actually did worse than I did. So the task went back to me.

When it was clear that she was going to school whether she cried or not, Violet settled in and became a model student, which for pre-K pretty much means not biting or spitting (and for this she won Student of the Month for September!). I happily turned my attention back to rescue.

I arranged my first transport for a sweet, senior Boston named Daisy. She was coming from Somethingsburg, Pennsylvania, and ending up in Nowheresville, New York. I figured it out on Google maps and set a plan into motion; it would kick off Saturday starting at 7 A.M. Friday night we were sitting down to dinner and I got an e-mail. Subject: PROBLEM WITH DAISY’S TRANSPORT. It seemed that the mother-in-law of the guy lined up to drive the third leg of the trip on the New Jersey Turnpike was in the hospital. The third leg was the hardest to fill, so unless Daisy was hiding her ability to fly, we were going to have to cancel the trip. That wasn’t good. Her foster family had worked very hard to find someone willing (and qualified) to adopt this senior rescued dog with a possible two years of life left—condition of that life not guaranteed. If we canceled the transport, we’d lose all of the people who had set that Saturday aside to make that trip.

If I had a car, I’d have driven out there and taken the leg myself. I looked at the New Jersey Turnpike online for the three hundredth time. It seemed like it should have taken about an hour to drive from one end to the other, but that’s just not the case. I started walking around in circles, like one of my dogs, and biting my nails.

Paul looked at me with simmering annoyance. Every spare second I was either on Google maps or on the phone with a long-winded volunteer explaining to me all the reasons they couldn’t help and how much they wished they could, blah, blah, blah . . . I was screwed. I e-mailed a guy who worked with a neighboring Boston terrier rescue group in Pennsylvania, and he forwarded my e-mail to his transport contacts for other breed rescue groups. One of them e-mailed me back. His name, appropriately, was “Dick” and his e-mail address was [email protected]. What he wanted to tell me was that I had no idea what I was doing, I didn’t know how to go about arranging a transport or contacting “folks who work pretty darn hard at these transports,” and that he saw my e-mail signature and maybe I think that I’m sharper than him because I live in New York City, but he and his country friends . . . And then I stopped reading; I didn’t have time to be berated by a Dick (though over the next several weeks I composed dozens of choice e-mail responses in my head). I started making calls to everyone I knew and around 1 A.M. I found an angel willing to fill in the final leg even though it meant her only day off from working at Kohl’s department store (one of her two jobs) would be spent chauffeuring a dog. I burst into tears from exhaustion and relief. Not for myself, but for Daisy, whose elderly owner had gone into an assisted living facility. Daisy, who’d had one happy home her whole life and was now on to the third one in a month. And as I got into bed I said, “I’m never doing this again!”

Paul, who was asleep facing away from me, said, “Yes, you will.”

“Then,” I responded, “you have permission to kill me.”

In between the rescue adventures, I felt so elated not to be fostering or figuring out a transport that it gave me the illusion that my normal life was better than it actually was. It was calm, quiet, with just one little dog. I kept up with the Yahoo! group, but my work had gotten particularly busy so I was less available.

One day I read a post from Jane, the intake coordinator. It listed several different incoming dogs that I wasn’t going to foster—it also mentioned an unknown number of Boston terriers being surrendered by a guy who lived in Washington Heights. He had six dogs, was on disability and welfare, and he just couldn’t physically or financially care for them. His social worker was the one trying to get it arranged and wanted to get it done in a hurry, before the guy changed his mind. Since I considered Manhattan my territory, I offered to get the dogs and then whoever was fostering could pick them up from me. We all agreed and then I didn’t hear about it for a while. Until Jane called me.

“The gentleman is ready to surrender two of the dogs and we have two foster homes lined up,” she said. “Would you like to call him and make the arrangements?”

“Sure,” I said.

“He talks a lot,” Jane said. “He had me on the phone for a good hour.”

“What’s wrong with him, do you know?” I asked. “I mean, why is he disabled?”

She didn’t know, but she was very relieved when I said I’d communicate with him. His name was John and he was waiting for my call.

I hate talking on the phone. The only time I talk on the phone is on my cell phone when I’m walking somewhere; otherwise I’m an e-mailer. Knowing that I had to call a yap-per was making me nervous, so I did what I do when I want a call to be short. I stood up and put on my coat.

I dialed and did a dance of joy when his machine picked up. “Hi, John, this is Julie from NEBTR. Just want to talk about arranging—”

“HELLO, JULIE? I’M HERE!”

No! I’d been so close! He picked up and then I heard the telltale signs of someone settling in for a long conversation—the scraping of a chair, the “hold on while I turn this down,” the pouring of a beverage.

John didn’t care if I was standing or hanging by my toes; he was going to tell me the long story of his life in three acts, with no intermission.

I heard about his childhood around the corner from where he lived now, as a devoted son and student at Our Lady of Boston Terriers. He was a very successful party planner who knew all the famous people and, “Life, Julie, was good.” He took forty minutes to explain this.

Then, he continued, not so good. He bought a female Boston terrier puppy for his mother, and she named her Rachel. And then his mother died. So of course he took Rachel. Then he bought a male puppy for his lover, who named him Pedro, and shortly after that, his lover died, and John took in Pedro. “And then I stopped buying dogs for people!” he said. Then John got sick and lost his job and now he was on welfare. In the meantime, no one ever had Rachel or Pedro neutered. One night Pedro had a couple of drinks and Rachel looked good and the next thing John knew, Rachel was having puppies. So six dogs were all living with him and his roommate (an unrelated person renting a room from him), and he was going to court for some reason, after which he’d have money, but right now he was flat broke and needed our help. Other than his being very long-winded and crying too much, I liked John. I asked him if he wanted to bring the two dogs down to me.

“What? Today? Oh, no, that’s too soon.” I made him cry. “I need time to say good-bye.”

“Okay,” I said. “Next week?”

(
Dogs barking
.) “SPARKY!!!
¡Cállate!
”

“It’ll have to be before next weekend because I’m going to Puerto Rico [he pronounced it
Pwayrdoh Dreeko
, as if he were a native, even though he was of Greek descent and from New York]. . . . It’s my birthday and I’d rather have less dogs here for my friend to watch.”

“Uh, okay. Bring them whenever you want.”

“I can’t bring them to you! I can’t afford that!”

Ah, yes. He was going to Puerto Rico for his birthday but he couldn’t afford cab fare to my apartment.

“I’ll pick them up, then,” I said. “Tell me when.”

He took a deep, exasperated breath, indicating that he was having a little trouble with my lack of sensitivity and my rushing him.

“Okay, why don’t you let me know when you’re ready,” I declared.

(
Tears again
.) “I’m sorry! This is just very hard for me.” (
Dogs barking
.) “FRANKIE, SHUT UP!” (
Back to tears.
) “I’m just. . . . I’m doing the best I can.” (
Dog barking escalates
.) “FRANKIE!!! FRANKIE!!!!!”

“I’m going to let you go. I’ll speak to you next week.” I hung up the phone with a swell of relief. My therapist had many times suggested I’d be good at her job, but I didn’t think I could handle it. Ever. I’ve realized that I can be very good at helping other people with their problems, but I just don’t want to get deeply involved unless they’re family or friends. John was like a giant octopus with all the arms and suckers trying to pull me into his maelstrom. So I put on my imaginary space suit to keep John at bay.

The plan for the John situation was that a new foster volunteer named Jen would pick up the two dogs from him, but I would meet her there to help her with the surrender.

A flurry of communiqués went between Jane, John’s social worker, and me. The social worker was really hoping we could get more than the two dogs—especially since John thought Rachel
might
be pregnant again. (In other words, she was.) I did a lot of oy-veying to Jane, and now Mary Lou was involved because she had had litters of puppies before. We all thought it would be best if when I went to John’s, I took a look at the other dogs and the female to assess the situation. I didn’t know what to look for in a “pregnant bitch,” as they kept calling her, but I thought I’d be able to tell if she was unwell.

We were finally set for a Saturday morning. I’d meet Jen at John’s at 9:30. She’d be coming in and taking both dogs, keeping one and meeting up with the other foster family to drop off the other.

On the subway up to John’s, I thought about his pups. What if one of them was like Otto? I’d have to take it. What would I tell Paul? The dog had glue on it that attached itself to me. It would be temporary. I got to the station stop in about ten minutes. Being unfamiliar with the neighborhood, I’d printed out a map. I turned onto John’s block and was looking down at the map trying to figure out if the building would be on the north or south side of the street when I heard his voice. “JULIE! UP HERE!” I looked up and saw a ripe, round face in a window. “STAY THERE. I’LL BE RIGHT DOWN!”

This neighborhood, Washington Heights, had been quite desirable years ago. My mother’s grandmother had lived nearby. The buildings were large, prewar, and built for living. In the 1970s many of them fell into disrepair and stayed there while crime statistics escalated. There had been a recent resurgence of interest in the area and it was now on the upswing, but many parts of it were still stuck in the gloom. This was one of those buildings. It had a small plaza with benches and the front door was now glass and aluminum and locked, though I imagined in the 1940s there had been a uniformed doorman and a fine awning.