Is a pandemic a good time to get a dog?
“Why are you giving her away?” I asked.
“It’s not my dog. It’s his dog,” the dark-haired, pregnant woman told me, pointing at her boyfriend. “Also, I’m not a dog person. I’m about kids,” she added, rubbing her belly and eyeing her 18-month-old who was dressed in parachute pants and a crop top.
I don’t know her name and if she told me, I forgot. So let’s call her Tina. Either way, Tina was standing on my porch with her toddler, boyfriend and a dog that was not hers.
I heard the dog, Marley, needed a new home from my mom — she rescued one of her dogs from a woman, Andrea, in her neighborhood who helps dogs find new homes. So over a couple of glasses of Chardonnay, my mom showed me pictures of Marley, a six-year-old German Shepherd, and I agreed to adopt the dog. Why not? There’s a pandemic. The kids are bored. My husband and I are tired of being their playmates.
Cody, the boyfriend, explained to me that he’d had Marley for six years, since she was a puppy, and now with one child and another on the way, he didn’t have the time to devote to her anymore.
I looked down at my two children. “Well, is she good with kids?”
Oh yes, they told me. Their little girl was the same age as our daughter, Isla, and the two got along great, Cody said.
“I just hate dirt,” Tina scoffed, “Marley brings dirt into the house.”
I looked at my daughter, sitting in the yard, digging in the dirt and rubbing it in her hair.
Cody began to weep, and then said goodbye to Marley.
She was ours. But first we had to go buy food, a bed, toys and treats. Cody and Tina brought nothing of Marley’s to help her feel safe and comfortable in our home.
Our 4-year-old son, Archer, made Marley uneasy. His energy and the way he ran through the house triggered the dog. He was just playing like he normally does, but she wasn’t used to a bigger kid. Marley snapped at him a few times and then she bit him. Apparently, I’m “about kids” too because I called Andrea and told her to come and get Marley.
“Let me call her previous owners,” Andrea told me when I called her to tell her Marley wasn’t a fit. “I live so far away.”
Andrea called me back and said Tina told her Cody was sleeping so they couldn’t come and get the dog. “Can you keep Marley until tomorrow?” Andrea asked. It was 4 p.m.
What choice did I have? Andrea agreed to pick Marley up by 11 a.m. the next day.
My husband and I put Marley in our fenced backyard with her bed, food and water, and then I ran to the store to get groceries for dinner. While I was in Safeway, Andrea called me to tell me that one of our neighbors called Cody (his number was on her tags) and had Marley. Apparently, I hadn’t locked our gate. I went home to retrieve Marley.
While we were eating panko-crusted cod and asparagus, Andrea called again. “Marley got out, again,” she scolded. This time the damn dog jumped the gate. I got Marley from a different neighbor and put her in a bedroom for the night.
Andrea called me in the morning and said she had a great idea: we could swap dogs. She’d take Marley off our hands and in return, give us a stray dog off the reservation that she found. I told her I’d have to talk to my husband. He heard this conversation, and from the bedroom yelled, “NOOOOOO!” Sorry, I said, my husband says no more dogs for a while.
I felt a pang of guilt when we handed Marley back to Andrea. Were we horrible people for “rescuing” and then abandoning a dog? Not as bad as Cody and Tina, I decided. Let’s be real: They are worse than us. They had Marley for six years. We had her for 18 hours.
There was just no way I was going to risk the safety of my children. Dogs are animals and animals can be unpredictable — especially around kids, who are also like wild animals. When my nephew was two, a dog bit him in the eye, nearly tearing his tear duct.
A week after Marley left our home, my husband found a litter of six lab puppies at a shelter in Casa Grande, who had been abandoned in a field. They were seven-weeks-old. The four of us hopped in the car and drove to the shelter. Five of the puppies were black and one was yellow, dusted in black. They were all adorable, but the yellow one took to us right away. He was ours. And it’s a good thing because after we chose him, we learned all of the others had already been adopted.
Our son named the dog Duke Max Ensell. The two chase each other through the house, take baths together and wrestle; while our daughter throws her peas, carrots, and tennis balls at him, and on one occasion tried to put her finger in his butt.
Sure, it’s one more thing to take care of, but it’s also a nice distraction. And since we are stuck at home, we have the time to put into training him.
And if you’re wondering about Marley: The last I heard, Andrea found Marley a home with an older woman, who reported no bites. And in this pandemic-life, I consider this a win-win situation.
