The Peace of Pi
It didn’t go away. Everyone said it would go away, but it had not, as yet, subsided. The pain of losing Oscar, our dachshund of twelve years, had left me in a low funk, of which the likes of Earth, Wind and Fire, Bruno Mars, Tower of Power, and The Dog-Father himself, George Clinton, could not funk up.
It had been three months since that little, warm roll of doggie dough had smiled and wagged at us. His little paw prints, still fresh in our hearts. Everywhere we turned, there was a sad reminder of something about Oscar. His smelly harness we couldn’t throw away, the bed only he would sleep on, or briefly, the food that would no longer vanish after being accidentally dropped on the kitchen floor. We even missed his farting.
“What’s that smell?” Wendy would ask me while sitting quietly in our living room.
“That’s fresh air, honey,” I would reply, and Wendy would nod, understanding that she could no longer smell the stale mustard gas aroma that used to the air.
Gracie, our other far more nimble dachshund had slowed down considerably. Her Alpha-dog status now only honorary after losing the only other dog she commanded. Leading a pack of one is still far more important than just leading yourself, and Gracie knew it. So, needing to be faster and jump higher slipped away, replaced by slumping through the house with head held low.
The loss of Oscar had created a void and melancholy in the atmosphere around our family that was palpable. His shadow touched all we attempted to do. Our hearts were all heavy and sore from the shock and pain of losing such a bright spot in our lives, which Oscar was. It was a bright spot that was missing from our lives that Wendy intended to do something about.
Saturday morning, March 14th, 2015 our family had opted for a late wake-up in the master bedroom. How this works, is around 5:40 am, our son Zachary comes into our bedroom and fires up a movie on our TV. I then try to sleep through whatever he chooses. After about an hour of that, Wendy noticed what was on and changed it to something better. Grace is usually in our bed too, and she will either stay under the covers or lay right across the bed. But on this day she opted to curl up between Wendy and I.
Wendy had chosen Best in Show, one of our family’s favorite comedies. It’s a mockumentary style film about competitive dog shows featuring a great ensemble cast. I casually watched with one eye as I lounged about. Wendy, ever the multi-tasker, crushed her way through tasty after delicious level of her candy-pattern game, while laughing at the jokes we had heard many times before from the movie.
“Do you want breakfast?” Wendy asked me.
I immediately over process this question. She wouldn’t ask if she didn’t want breakfast but can clearly see I’m trying to sleep. So that means she’s hungry and wants breakfast. When I wake up and want breakfast, I get up and make breakfast for everyone. Wendy knows this, and likes when I make breakfast. I make good breakfast. But I am not hungry and don’t have an impulse for breakfast. Does Wendy mean donuts? No, because her question did not contain the word donuts. Wendy is purposeful with her words. Why does she want to know if I want breakfast? She rarely encourages me to eat. Shoot, there are times when she actively tries to stop me from eating. But she’s bringing it up, so she must believe that breakfast should happen. Is she offering to make breakfast? No, she is just asking if I want it. She is very thoughtful, but wait—why now? Why breakfast and why me? She doesn’t like my pancakes. That’s insane! I make THE best pancakes in the Western United States, but I’m sure she doesn’t want those. I would want them. The boy definitely would want them, but Wendy doesn’t. To me, breakfast and pancakes go together like breakfast and pancakes do. Why doesn’t Wendy like my pancakes? Everyone loves my pancakes. Kids want to sleepover—not just for the company of my delightful son, but realistically there’s a strong case for my pancakes. But Wendy likes eggs. My eggs ARE pretty good. No, they’re great. My eggs are fluffy, never scorched, incredibly tasty and made with cream cheese, chives if I’m feeling fancy. Am I feeling fancy today? No, today is decidedly non-fancy. Wendy wants my eggs. She might want them in a wrap or burrito of some kind. Do we have the ingredients? No, we are out of cream cheese and milk but might have a couple eggs. Not good enough. If you attempted breakfast this morning, everyone would be disappointed. No donuts for me, no pancakes for the boy and no fluffy, awesome eggs for Wendy. Still, what she said was, “Do YOU want breakfast?” Me. It’s a clear question that I can answer “no” to, but that wouldn’t be true, now that I’ve spent this two seconds thinking about this. I really do want breakfast. But everyone will be disappointed. Go with a grunt, but not indicating an answer either way. See if she will give you more information. Maybe she’s offering to make breakfast.
“Hrmmpf,” I grunted.
“That’s it!” Wendy said sharply, “we are getting a dog today.”
“No,” I said firmly, snapping up meeting her gaze. “I mean, no?”
“Yes, we are getting a dog today,” Wendy clarified.
“We are getting a dog?” Zach chimed in from the floor at the foot of our bed, “can we get a puppy?”
“Hell no,” I said, “everybody just go back to what you were doing.”
Zach, understanding the family dynamic and where to apply pressure, crawled up next to Wendy, opened his eyes extra wide and cuddled into his mother, “Please Mommy? I’ve always wanted my own puppy.”
“Let’s take a look online,” Wendy said as she swiped off of her game and began her search.
To be fair. I had admitted earlier to Wendy that I did log in to petfinder.com just to see what was out there. When I did, I was reminded what a tremendous job taking in a pet can be. Having just finished with a dog that had many health ailments and all that comes with them, I remembered that being free of that was very nice. I mentioned that I looked at dogs to empathize with Wendy wanting another dog, but also to build the case against it. No dice.
“We are not getting a dog today and we are certainly not getting a puppy,” I attempted to assert.
“No puppies, but we are getting a dog today,” Wendy said, pulling up adoptable pets in our area on the Internet, “here’s one…”
“I’m not ready for another dog. It’s too soon,” I attempted to reason.
“You are miserable. You and Gracie both are sad and lost around the house. All your joy is gone. Put some pants on and let’s go get a dog,” she said.
“All of my joy isn’t gone,” I attempted to counter. Wendy responded with an exaggerated look that seemed to ask if I was actually trying to pass that line off as the truth.
Still, all of this felt rather impulsive, and when the impulsivity alarm in someone heavily medicated for Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder goes off, you can be sure that the impulsivity is rather extreme. It’s on par with punching someone at a bar. The idea seems very rewarding, but there are many consequences that can be overlooked.
When we first took the doggie plunge and adopted Gracie, we had done hours of research on dachshunds. We weighed pros and cons against other breeds. We had a kennel, collar and leash before we even picked her up. We had books on and read articles on dachshunds and pre-registered for dachshund rescue before getting her from a reputable local breeder.
It was the same deal with Oscar, we took the time and found the right dog for our house. Now, it seemed like all that prep time was to be abandoned in favor of pointing at a furry face full of teeth and taking it home to live with our small child.
Before I knew it, Wendy was on the phone to a local shelter asking about a dog she had seen on petfinder.com. Wendy actually dialed the phone herself, which is something she rarely does. This was a bad sign.
Wendy asked about the dog and was told that it had already been adopted. Wendy’s voice fell and my hopes were bolstered by the news that the dog was now gone. But Wendy stayed on the phone. She should have hung up. “Dog gone” should equal “hang up.”
“Oh, that sounds great!” Wendy told the person on the phone, “We will be there in twenty minutes.” She hung up the phone and popped out of bed with purpose.
“We will be where in twenty minutes?” I asked.
“The shelter, the woman said that the dog we liked was adopted but she just got a big load in from Los Angeles,” Wendy said as she began to get ready to go.
I imagined a dump truck full of stray dogs, tipping a small mountain of them into a chain-link enclosure.
“Load of dogs from Los Angeles?” I said aloud to myself as I pondered what that meant. Was it five dogs or fifty? Were they all in their own travel kennels or were they sliding into each other through their own filth in the back of an old, surplus, former Frito-Lay panel truck? There is no way that the smell was good in any of those situations, but I assume any aroma that may have effected the driver was probably burned off by the radiant glow of the driver’s sainted halo for saving the lives of a truckload of dogs and then driving through the night to deliver them to freedom. That person must be the canine Harriet Tubman.
And these aren’t Washington dogs. What would they be like? Would they be rail thin and need colonics and yoga? Would some of the dogs be bilingual? That would really help Zachary with his Spanish, or possibly another language—though it’s most likely Spanish.
What if there are dogs that are members of gangs? I know not all dogs from Los Angeles are in street gangs. I’m not naive though. Some of those dogs are bound to know what it’s like on the streets.
And all of a sudden, I’m in the car. That happens sometimes when I start imagining stressful scenarios. Somehow we made it halfway to the shelter with Wendy giving me directions. Zach is asking Wendy about different kinds of dogs. Gracie is in her travel crate, probably thinking she is going wherever Oscar went on his last solo outing from the house. I’m still not sure how I made it all the way to a part of town I’ve never been too, which seems dangerous considering that I’m driving.
I’m still very much against this decision.
But now you’re asking, “if you were really against getting a dog, you wouldn’t have gotten into the car.” But you would be wrong. I only went along with this because it has been brought to my attention on several occasions that I say, “no” too much. I do have a habit of shooting down adventurous ideas when I feel the time is wrong. I own that. And when I think of all the “noes” that I have racked up, or when they are brought to my attention during a debate of whether or not a new furry family member should be added to our family…well, it carries quite a bit of weight. So, the leverage was pushed and the coupon for “one big yes” on any family decision had been cashed in.
This feeling of guilt, and the promise that we would be visiting the shelter “just to take a look,” had put me in the car with Wendy, Zach and Gracie.
Many independent animal shelters are operated by good people who work long, thankless hours simply to ensure the irresponsible pet decisions of others are taken care of and shepherded to loving homes. The shelter we headed too was no exception.
It was what they call a “no-kill shelter,” meaning dogs that were about to be euthanized for simply existing would be rescued to these other shelters whenever possible to spare a good dog’s life a little longer. It’s actually more depressing than it sounds.
The place was…humble. The entrance to the shelter had a baby gate added to the security of the main escape hole. This required us to open the glass door and then begin solving a puzzle to unlatch the sturdy, swinging section. It was unsolvable, like all baby gates. But we were quickly aided by a young volunteer, who made it look easy.
The front room had several couches draped in sheets, an oval rug in the middle of the floor, and a fairly well organized feel. There were several small dogs milling about the floor, in varying degrees of breeding. Some were scared, some barked and some immediately wanted to know why I was there.
The initial experience was brought to a screeching halt, as I threw my arms up to prevent my family from following me in.
Danger. There was danger, of the kind that requires absolutely no sudden movements. I felt it first, then rewound the scene in my mind’s eye to place where the sensation was coming from. Urgent danger, but no sudden movement. My hands stayed outstretched as I dropped my gaze and then my chin, down to the desperate situation from which I had absolutely no control.
A pit bull, chocolate in color with a ribbon of vanilla splitting its forehead, stood in front of me with his head between my legs. That is what I felt. This mass of muscle was giving me a thorough examination and I squelched an interjection as I received a muzzle nuzzle in and around my two closest bodily friends.
In that brief moment, my mind went through all the information I had ever seen or heard of on pit bulls, and why a fully grown specimen would end up in a shelter. If given the choice, I think having this or a shotgun pointed at one’s crotch would be a toss up. However, I would have preferred the unreal shotgun situation over the very real possibility of my nest having a couple eggs snatched from it.
“Oh, he’s friendly,” came a voice out of my sight lines. I wasn’t making any sudden moves. “But if you brought another dog, I need to lock this one up. He will rip your dog to pieces.”
She didn’t say, “they won’t get along,” or “the dogs will fight.” What she meant was, no matter what size or kind of dog you bring in, this dog will immediately turn your dog into hamburger. She said it as if she could not imagine a scenario where a dog could defeat this dog; this dog that currently had its unbeatable jaws full of muscle-shredding teeth just one centimeter and some Target-bought khaki fabric away from turning me into a Ken doll.
The woman called the dog away, and just before it pulled away to obey the command, I dropped my gaze to meet his. Our eyes met and he kept my gaze as he turned and trotted off. His face gave me the look a middle school bully gives an oboe player after being proactively stopped from pummeling the oboist by a passing teacher. The muscles under his fur rippled and flexed as he made his walk to his makeshift solitary confinement. The sight made me wonder how much time the dog spends at the gym.
Sharon had an Eastern European accent and gave us an exhausted smile as she shook our hands. This was her shelter and we could tell she was doing the best she could. One doesn’t run a no-kill shelter to get rich. There is a dedication that drives an animal lover to do this, and by this, I mean put every single dog’s needs ahead of their own.
Sharon had been up all night managing a delivery of dogs and now she was happy to take us back to meet some of the dogs that showed up. I’m certain that at that moment, the wildest dream in her exhausted brain was, “maybe these people will take them all and I can retire.”
We left Grace in the entry room in her kennel, preparing to go in and meet the new family member. Several small, but friendly mutts hid and emerged from hiding places like the munchkins of Oz, coming to see the young dachshund who came from afar.
“No puppies,” I said to Wendy.
“We are just looking,” she said. I didn’t know if she believed the lie she was telling me.
“Just… No Puppies.”
“Oh, absolutely no puppies,” Wendy said emphatically.
When the door to the main kennel opened, we were hit with wave of sound and odor. Dozens of dogs were barking, echoing off the warehouse walls. The smell was a mixture of urine, feces and a strong cleanser. Dogs poop and pee, so lots of dogs means lots of poop and pee; it’s to be expected. The cleaner made everything seem alright though.
Why am I holding this tiny dog? Her eyes are so big and she’s licking my face very quickly. She can’t seem to get close enough to me and her eyes…her eyes…
Wait. How did this happen?
I had to stop and think. I walked in, poop and pee, we looked all over the kennels… what happened?
Okay, I walked in, stinky, looked at the lake of fur in several different chain-link enclosures. There’s the tiny dog, doing everything it can to get to me. But it’s a puppy. No puppies. So why am I holding it now? How much time passed?
One more time: I walked in. Stinky. Lots of dogs. Puppy escaping. We aren’t getting a puppy… so I look away at a very sweet looking pit bull.
In the middle of an enclosure, surrounded by a dozen nervous, barking, larger dogs, a tan and white young, but grown pit bull looked up at me. She was calm and curious. She sat still and she watched me walk over to her.
I asked Sharon about the pit bull and Sharon explained to me that the pit bull was a rare Parvo survivor as a puppy. She said when a puppy contracts the Parvo virus, they rarely live without a large amount of nurturing. That means the sick pups must be held and loved a whole lot, in addition to medicine and monitoring to keep them alive over a period of weeks. The result being a very strong dog that is well socialized. This is how you create a 120 pound lap dog.
I put my hand in for the pit bull to smell—my non-dominant left hand, I’m still dog-prejudiced a little. She smelled it while looking at me sheepishly and licked my fingers, either lovingly or hungrily. I got in with her and she let me pet her and then, in the ultimate act of doggie trust, let me rub her belly. She was so soft and very sweet. We are just looking at dogs today.
Over my shoulder, the same, tiny, black and white puppy that had been trying to escape caught the eyes of Zach and Wendy. They started over to it and I could hear Zach start to ask about it as he pointed excitedly. NO! NO PUPPIES!
“HEY!” I hollered back at them, “come look at this sweet girl,” hoping I could break them away from looking at the puppy.
Wendy and Zach snapped away from the tiny Holstein-spotted quadruped trying to get to them and immediately walked over to the dog who had casually stretched out, letting me rub her down.
Wendy got the rundown from Sharon on the pit bull and was very interested in learning more. Zach started to give her some pets too and seemed enthusiastic. The dog was very well behaved in a place where the easiest behavior is misbehavior.
“We should see if she gets along with Gracie,” Wendy said.
“I’ll get a harness,” said Sharon before I could protest, and she slipped away to find a leash.
“But we aren’t getting a dog,” I said to Wendy, who looked at me and expertly nodded her head with an expression that walked a line between: “Of course we aren’t getting a dog, this is just for Zach,” and “Of course we are getting a dog, you’re just too stupid to realize it yet.”
We took Gracie and the pit bull outside for a quick walk and let them sniff each other out. Gracie didn’t hate the pit bull, or at least was scared or smart enough to know not to antagonize this dog that weighed seven times what she did. They seemed to get along fine. What would it be like to have a very little dog and a very big dog?
That was when it hit me about our living situation. At the time, we were renting a home from a man who begrudgingly allowed our two wiener dogs to live there after he was placed in an awkward situation by the property management company. The landlord tolerated the idea of our two dogs because we had great references and because they were small. Pit bulls aren’t small.
Pit bulls also have the dubious distinction of being, well, pit bulls. There is a definite stigma attached to these dogs because they are often bred for fighting and aggressiveness. I’ve always thought they got a bad rap, but I doubted our little community would allow one either.
Now I had to explain to the family, which was going to break everyone’s heart and I again would be the bad guy who says “no” and doesn’t want a dog. What was worse, was that this dog was very sweet and I was really starting to like her and could see her being one of the family.
What the hell was I doing at a dog shelter? I can’t handle this. I love dogs. This is a terrible idea.
Why am I holding this puppy?
We took the pit bull back in, all of us a little disappointed, and I explain to the pit bull that it isn’t her fault and I was sorry to get her hopes up. She looked at me like she didn’t understand what she did wrong. Zach and Wendy looked at me like they knew what I did wrong though.
We stood there, and all of a sudden, I see the black and white puppy squeeze out from under her enclosure and in a flash, she was jumping up on Zach who was simply delighted. His pleasure manifesting in a cacophony of squeals and giggles that instantly intoxicate a parent’s soul.
This moment caught us up to what was happening in my arms. That was definitely the puppy I was holding. I ended up holding her after she stopped licking my son’s face and he needed to pass her off. I didn’t want to hold her.
Puppies are absolutely vile and horrible creatures. They crap all over everything, walk through it and step all over your carpet and furniture. They pee everywhere, staining and smelling up the place with their inexhaustible urine supply and they roll in it and then rub up against you so then you smell like you wet your pants. They chew up everything with their cute little mouths and then they are very sorry that they did it, and look at you like they’ll never do it again, but then they can’t help it; they do it again immediately. They’re always licking you and wanting to be near you and they snuggle in close and fall asleep on your lap because they are just so tired from running around, playing with anything they see. Puppies are always loving you and granting you all of their loyalty and constantly there when you’re sad to give you some of the most sincere empathy you’ve ever encountered… It’s disgusting.
This little puppy fit in one of my freakishly small hands. She was vibrating with energy, yet burrowing her nose into my neck. Her soft, pink-padded paws batted at my ears playfully, when she wasn’t looking into my eyes, actively engaged in trying to steal my soul.
It’s all in the eyes for a dog if you look hard enough, even for a young puppy like the one I was holding. If you look long enough, you could see their past, present and future. Whatever simple hopes and dreams a dog has are carried in the glassy orbs planted in the ocular cavities. This dog was showing me fear and hope, swimming in chase around her wide, brown irises.
It would be a pure fairy tale to think that this dog saw us walk in and chose us to be its new family. You want to believe that is true, that it was meant to be that family and dog would have found each other thanks to divine intervention.
Sure, it’s a beautiful thought, but the reality is that this dog wanted out of the horrible situation it was in. The puppy was scared, alone, trapped and probably getting pushed around by all the other scared dogs at the shelter. The puppy did whatever it could to make something happen, and that meant working hard at escaping and pleading its case to us as best it could, through licking and eye contact.
Maybe the dog wasn’t meant to meet us in a magical sort of way, but I can tell you what is real. That dog worked hard for a shot at us and I respected it for that. It broke out of a strong cyclone-fenced enclosure and ran straight for our weakest link, which was the boy, knowing we would give in to whatever he wanted. You had to respect this little dog’s gumption.
Gracie was the last test. Gracie had been lonely without Oscar to kick around the house. The loneliness manifesting itself in grumpy, low-energy days, lounging around our house. So when we stuck this new little puppy with her, it was easy to misread annoyance for excitement. They got along alright, it seemed. Gracie rolled her eyes at us as if to ask, “you’re not seriously considering this, are you?”
Gracie was right. We weren’t there to get a dog and we certainly weren’t there to get a puppy.
“Steve, go get the money from a cash machine to cover this dog’s donation fee,” Wendy asked nicely.
“But we aren’t getting a dog,” I said.
“Just…just go get the money,” Wendy said, using some kind of Jedi mind-trick on me.
I drove alone with my thoughts to extract the cash donation for the shelter. In my mind, I doubted that the money was to be exchanged for a dog. I justified getting the cash by telling myself that no matter what, we needed to help this shelter out and a donation like this would help me walk out of there dog-free, without the guilt of not having helped the shelter.
I returned with the cash. Wendy was chatting with Sharon and holding the black and white, tiny dog as Sharon put away the syringe and medicine from the shots the dog had just received.
“Steve, give Sharon the money,” Wendy smiled and nodded encouragement to me. I handed Sharon the cash.
Wendy now had a purple folder with many pieces of official looking paper. There were papers with codes and stickers marking dates for vaccinations and checkups. “Rat Terrier/Jack Russell Terrier” was the breed designation.
I didn’t know much about either breed, other than the TV show Frasier had a Jack Russell on it and the dog seemed nice. Plus, that show won a few Emmy awards, so a Jack Russell couldn’t be that bad. The “rat” part of rat terrier sounded less appealing. Was it a dog cross bred with a rat? I know there had been several new breeds of dogs that had emerged over the last few years and I sincerely hoped nobody had been crossing rodent with canine species as a hobby that took off and somehow became legitimized.
We took the purple folder, Gracie, our portable kennel and the little dog out to the car and got in. My hands wrapped tightly around the steering wheel as I transferred some of my frustration out of my body.
This dog wasn’t anything like Oscar. It didn’t have Oscar’s face or easy-going temperament. It wasn’t even a brown wiener dog. It was just some little puppy that couldn’t sit still and didn’t want to stay where it was. But that was how this dog was exactly like Oscar.
Much like Oscar, when we came to meet it, it was happy to see us and ready to leave and start a life with a family that would love it. Very much like Oscar, it came to us immediately and would not let us leave without them. So we didn’t leave it, we left with it. We left with a new damn Damm dog.
Wendy could see the resentment and frustration clouding my face as we drove away from the shelter. “Steve, we can take her back…” Wendy said, but I cut her off angrily.
“No! This is a HUGE mistake Wendy!” I was upset.
“We can take her back right now if you want.”
“Noooo,” I said in a long, bitter tone, “We can’t take her back.” I squished up my mouth into a tight frown and shook my head as I drove off out of the parking lot.
“We can,” Wendy corrected, wanting me to know that we really did have the option of returning the dog.
“No, we can’t, because I love her and nobody will ever take her away from me,” I said with a finality.
“You said this was a mistake,” Wendy asked with confusion.
“Yeah, I know, it can be both things,” I said, “this is a mistake but I’ll be damned if I’m going to take her back to that shelter. What kind of monster would take that sweet little dog back to a place like that?”
“So, you want to keep her?” Wendy asked.
“No! I don’t want to keep her, but we are keeping her because I love her.”
We drove for a while in confused silence. Wendy confused by my conflicting statements, Zach by the fact that we were leaving with a strange dog and I was just confused period.
(More silence)
“What should we name the dog?” I asked, after a good minute of flipping my attitude.
I kind of wanted to name her something odd and quirky like Banjo or Rhubarb.
“How about Rhubarb?” I asked.
“Like rhubarb pie?” Wendy clarified.
“Hey, it’s pi day, three-fourteen. Maybe we should name her Pi,” Zach said.
It turns out, whenever you complete a circle, even a family circle, you have to get the formula right. So in that perfect moment, we began to rebuild our broken family circle by plugging Pi into the equation, and that’s the Damm truth.