So, I’m driving home from a friend’s house on Friday night and who do I see at the stop sign? A little, white poodle…no parent, no leash, no idea that she is “thisclose” to getting hit by an oncoming car. I had to pull over.<\/p>\n
Let me just say that I am a devout, dog lover, with a lot of baggage. I still think about my first dog, Brandy, a German shepherd who came trotting down my street one afternoon when I was a kid. She was happy-go-lucky, lovable and since she was trained-to-a-T, my mother acquiesced to my pleas to keep her when nobody came along to claim her. I adored Brandy, probably still have a picture of her somewhere and was devastated when we had to give her away when we moved. It took me forever to get over that, but I always believed my mother when she said that she had no doubt that Brandy was enjoying her new life with her new family.<\/p>\n
Since then, I’ve not owned a dog, but I have<\/span> been a great “auntie” to a number of my friend’s dogs. I’m definitely the one who will take someone’s dog to the dog park because I think that he\/she needs to run and hang out with other dogs. I’ve also been known to sneak in a few doggie treats when their parents aren’t looking and play tug-o-war with a rope for hours.<\/p>\n When I moved to L.A., I realized, almost immediately, that dogs rule this city. In fact, Los Angeles<\/span> magazine even dedicated an entire 2006 issue to dogs\/pets…see the adorable beagle on the cover image shown above? I used to feel like the only person who didn’t own a dog here, which was fine by me. I didn’t really have room in my life for a pet anyway. I was traveling a lot and honestly, the thought of having to walk a dog, twice a day, every day<\/span>, did not appeal to me. But then, I got really attached to a friend’s dog, who was just the sweetest, kindest and most fun cocker spaniel on the whole planet. Although she chewed up a pair of my pumps during one of her extended visits, I couldn’t be mad at her for very long. Sadly, she vanished one day. Maybe she slipped out the yard. Maybe someone snatched her up. Either way, we never saw her again and I was so sad, so worried. I made a promise to myself to not get too attached to any more four-legged friends because having to say good-bye is just too heartbreaking.<\/p>\n Then, a few years later, I saw a pitbull-type power-walking down the street outside my bedroom window one afternoon. The dog lover in me wanted to run downstairs and pull him out of the way of traffic, but he looked like he knew where he was going and honestly, I thought he might bite the hand that was trying to save him. I said a little prayer to the pet Gods and hoped that he’d make it to his destination safely. Sadly, he did not. Two days later, his lifeless body was laying on the grass, in full view from my bedroom window. I was sick with guilt.<\/p>\n So, fast-forward to this past Friday…there’s no way that I could just drive off after seeing a little dog walking the streets, by her lonesome. I pull over, get out of the car and approach the dog. I breathe a sigh of relief when I see that she’s wearing a collar, but when I turn it around on her neck, I notice that there is no tag. Damn. I go back to my car, pull the string from the hood of one of my sweatshirts and make a leash. I’m convinced that if we walk around the block, the dog will just direct me to her humble abode.<\/p>\n No dice.<\/p>\n After we pass a few houses, I realize that she thinks I’m taking her on a nature walk, rather than a short trek to her front door. Now I’m freaking out. I do not need a dog. I don’t want a dog. What am I going to do?<\/span><\/p>\n As I turn the key to my front door, dog in hand, I’m thinking that I can just take her to a local vet, see if she’s got a chip and call up her parents like, “Guess who I found?” <\/span> Before I can even think about finding a vet on Saturday morning, I start obsessing about where this dog is going to sleep [for the record, she jumped on my bed a few times, as if it were her<\/span> bed], what I’m going to feed it and how early I have to get up to make sure I don’t wake up to any “surprises.”<\/p>\n I wake up at 7am, exhausted, but am determined to take her for a quick walk around the block. I come back, crawl under the covers, and wake up two hours later to make a trip to a neighborhood vet, who couldn’t scan her for a chip because his machine wasn’t working. Brilliant. I head over to Petco and they can’t help me either. I then drive back over to my friend’s block with my fingers crossed in the hopes that there is a “I lost my dog,” sign posted around. Nothing. What am I going to do with a dog?<\/span><\/p>\n Then I have an a-ha! moment. Since I’m the one who took the dog, maybe it’s my responsibility to post signs. After all, I am<\/span> driving around with someone’s dog, right? So, I write up a few signs, grab some tape and head back over to the “scene”. I chat up a few people who pass by, some with their own dogs. They all applaud me for my efforts and promise to keep their eye out for someone who might be missing a dog.<\/p>\n It’s been 30 hours since I’ve posted those signs and not a single call. I’ve taken the dog with me to the farmer’s market, to the dollar store to buy a real leash and some dog food – hey, it’s a recession – and have even offered up one of my floor pillows for her to sleep on. She’s gone from whining when I leave the room to barking at me like, “Yo, where<\/span> are you going?” While I’m still waiting for someone to call about the dog, I’m wondering what to call <\/span>the dog – Fido, Puppy, Poodle, Kibble?<\/p>\n I do believe that everything happens for a reason, but I can’t figure this one out. I will do my best to be a good interim doggie parent, but I really do hope that someone calls to claim her. Like most dogs do, she’s sniffing every corner and trying to get a lay of the land, but I hope that she’s not too traumatized by the events of the last two days.<\/p>\n Because I’m still a sucker for a cute dog, I will take her for a long walk in the morning, with her new leash, even as I keep my fingers crossed that somehow, someway, we will find her way back home.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" So, I’m driving home from a friend’s house on Friday night and who do I see at the stop sign? A little, white poodle…no parent, no leash, no idea that she is “thisclose” to getting hit by an oncoming car. I had to pull over. Let me just say that I am a devout, dog… Read More »the (canine) parent trap.<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":2667,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"neve_meta_sidebar":"","neve_meta_container":"","neve_meta_enable_content_width":"","neve_meta_content_width":0,"neve_meta_title_alignment":"","neve_meta_author_avatar":"","neve_post_elements_order":"","neve_meta_disable_header":"","neve_meta_disable_footer":"","neve_meta_disable_title":"","_ti_tpc_template_sync":false,"_ti_tpc_template_id":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/reginarobertson.com\/rrrsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1646"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/reginarobertson.com\/rrrsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/reginarobertson.com\/rrrsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/reginarobertson.com\/rrrsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/reginarobertson.com\/rrrsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1646"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/reginarobertson.com\/rrrsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1646\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2668,"href":"https:\/\/reginarobertson.com\/rrrsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1646\/revisions\/2668"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/reginarobertson.com\/rrrsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2667"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/reginarobertson.com\/rrrsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1646"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/reginarobertson.com\/rrrsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1646"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/reginarobertson.com\/rrrsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1646"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}