We have begun to look for dogs, albeit in a laid-back sort of way. It mostly involves my son and I stopping by the local animal shelter on our ambling walks and seeing if there's anybody new who's meant for us. He and I both have our favorites among the dogs who very clearly are not right for our family: There's a golden labrador retreiver that I could easily give my heart to, but already there in the cage I see that he can jump higher than our fence would hold. And there's a black lab that is as delighted to see my son as he is to see her, jumping and barking and carrying on (both the dog and my son, as it happens), but I can tell that that dog is the canine equivalent of my boy, and we've already got one of him. A clear case of doggie ADHD there. I had to laugh reading the shelter's description of her on its Web site, which reads in part: "I'm a very friendly young lady with lots of energy. I really need a home with someone who has lots of energy too. I need some obedience training but we can work on that together." With a change of gender, the same could be said of my son.
So far, we haven't found our canine match, but there is endless time. I'll admit to snooping around www.petfinder.org from time to time, searching for the perfect smallish dog, just as I used to poke around the on-line databases of adoptable children back when I was thinking about adding an extra child instead of a four-legged creature. There's an unsettling similarity between the two types of Web sites that someone who easily gets up in arms about unsuitable uses of the word "adopt" could probably, well, get up in arms about. I'm not, and I don't. I mean, just wook at all the wittle puppies! Maybe browsing is the next best thing to having one. And when my husband the non-dog-lover realizes that I'm talking about getting a pooch at the same time I'm talking about getting new living room furniture, that may be as close as I'll come.
Thursday, May 16, 2002
Putting on the dog
