Lessons Learned

Funny, but it seems like I learn more lessons about myself working at the shelter than I do about the dogs I take photos of.

Last week was a reminder about how sweet and cuddly the non-fluffy dogs can be.

Nadia (ID: 51692)

Nadia was my gentle Pittie mix of the week. She jumped on me a couple of times, but was treat- motivated and such a beauty. We got some wonderful headshots.

Warren (ID: 51994)

Warren was just a big goof. Yep, a big, sweet, goofy boy who was just looking for someone to play with him.

Denzel (ID: 51673)

Denzel and Ebony were the extreme cuteness puppy types. Denzel was a little shy, but he was definitely “working it” with the pawing of the air.

Ebony (ID: 51676)

And Ebony was so docile I could hardly get her to sit up for a photo.

I worked the Cary Rabies Clinic on Saturday and came to the determination that working with the public and their dogs was not my favorite. A couple of people were getting frustrated with their dogs (for no good reason, in my estimation) and I did not like how they treated them in their human frustration. Of course their dogs were acting skittish — there were dozens of other dogs there and just as many strange people!



Petunia (ID: 47086) & Copper (ID: 49840) - Fosters Available for Adoption



I’m looking forward to getting back to taking photos this week. I definitely prefer spending time with the dogs over spending it with the people. ;)

Reconciliation is the Only Option

I knew when I decided to become a volunteer at the Wake County Animal Center that it was not going to be easy. Everyone expected me to bring home a new pet weekly. After my orientation session, I realized that this job was not for the faint of heart. I learned that the difference between the county shelter and rescue organizations like the SPCA is that the shelter does not have the choice of turning animals away if they’re full. That leads to some very tough choices for the staff. I certainly wouldn’t want to be the one to have to make those kinds of decisions.

What I learned next as I met more and more of the people who work for the Wake County Animal Center is their incredible love for all the animals that come through the center. They want the strays to go home. They want the “turn overs” to find a forever home. They want the neglected ones to find loving homes with lots of good food and medical care.

They will do everything they can to make sure that everyone gets the best possible chance at finding a new home. When the shelter gets full, the people there get on the phones to find foster homes. Angeline, and now Joanne, work hard to have a growing list of people and organizations that are willing to foster animals. As of May 5, 2011 there are 38 dogs and 74 cats in WCAC foster care. That includes shelter staff who take home as many as they possibly can. Right now I think half of the staff has between two and four bottle-fed kittens they’re fostering. And when needed, other staff will call people they know to foster as well.

In a previous post I talked about how upset and angry I was about Sienna being euthanized at the shelter because of a URI. I understand why the WCAC isn’t able to be a completely “no kill” shelter, but sometimes that special dog or cat gets taken by the process, and sometimes it’s going to hit me a little hard; that’s what’s happened the last week or so.

Sometimes it’s tough on me not because the dog in question is a Chow, but because of the dog’s personality. I know I make it harder on myself by checking up on each dog I photograph to see what has happened to it. And I’m realizing that who that dog was at the time it was with me in the kennel may not be who it was with someone else.

Case in point: Raza, a beautiful Great Pyrenees, was euthanized earlier this week. The reason noted was “VERY [their emphasis] aggressive and charged one of the techs.” My first thought was “bull puckie!” Just a little over a week ago I and another volunteer spent ten minutes in Raza’s kennel putting him in costume and taking his picture. He was sweet and kept giving Jenny his paw to shake.

Then again, it has been with sadness that I have watched poor Marko slowly go kennel crazy over the past several weeks, becoming more and more aggressive until he too had to be euthanized. And the sad truth is that even if Raza didn’t go completely crazy like Marko, even one “red zone” attack makes him a danger to someone in a future home.

So, I could get angry and stop volunteering at the shelter. But if I stopped, what good would I be to all the other animals to come? So my only option is to reconcile myself to the fact that as the only intake facility in the entire county, the shelter will need a great deal of community involvement to gain “no kill” status. Until that happens, I need to be there to do what I can to get these guys adopted before they’re sent off to the Rainbow Bridge.

Of Our Four-Legged Family and Death

On April 6, Spice’s time had come and we called Dr. Frey of Peaceful Passing. He was 17 years old and had suffered from kidney disease for the last couple of years. He’d lost over half his body weight earlier in that period and twice he decided to stop eating. That’s when I realized he was a “social eater” and I started keeping dry food on my desk so he would snack while I surfed the Internet.

Following his death I began to ruminate on my grieving process – or the lack of one in my estimation of what grieving should look like – be it over family, friends, or pets. Death and faith have been a part of life for me from a very young age. I’ve been told that at my mother’s funeral (I was just 13 months old) I was running around like any toddler. Someone told my dad to make me stop, but he refused on the basis that he didn’t want me to see death as a bad thing. And in my experience although I miss the departed I am comforted that they are in a better place and no longer suffering.

Instead it’s the little things I remember that bring sweet memories and mini-moving pictures in my mind …

How affectionate Spice was this last year and the stretching out of his little paw as he lay in your lap asking for more chin rubs.

The funny noise Sugar’s ears made as she shook her head – balalalululump!

My Sugar

Sugar looking at you with such intensity as if she were using telepathy to tell you something – and then chuffing in disgust when you didn’t get it.
 
 
Daddy teaching me how to cook, fish, and shoot. Calling me Pumpkin or Little Indian depending on how I was acting.

Daddy (my birth father)

And Dad’s (Dutch’s) smile that could light up a room. Such a gentle nature for a man who had endured so much, surviving the Bataan Death March and the Japanese prison camps.

Dad (Dutch) & I

Daddy taking me to get my ears pierced – twice – before I was 10 years old and buying me red nail polish for Christmas. And Dad sending me to a Mary Kay party when I was 17 with a blank check – “’cause you need to know how to do these things if you’re going to be a successful lawyer” (yea, back then I thought I wanted to be a lawyer).

Knowing that there was no hope of getting what you wanted if Dad said “no.”

Dad (my adoptive father)

Hanging with Daddy in the tire shops and shoe repair shops.

Daddy

And Snips’ barking – 0 to 200 decibels without warning. Watching Charlie jump out of his skin. Getting Snips going with three little words: “Is Daddy Home?”

Snips

For most of his life Spice became a recluse whenever strangers came to our house, but in his last year he came out from under the bed to be with our friends, old and new; to sit on the porch with our pet sitter and enjoy a last spring day.

Let your Cat Loaf rise on a warm window sill for 20 min.

Sometimes a Little Change is Good

So this last week at the shelter has been a little different for me. With no more worries about bringing home cat diseases I took the opportunity to cuddle some cats. I also got to bottle feed my first kitten. She was "the crazy one" as she constantly scrabbled at the bottle with her front paws all the while meowing up a storm about how hungry she was. At one point it was a true human experience as I tried to push the nipple in her mouth, she clamped her lips shut and meowed through her closed mouth as if to say "you can't make me eat it."

On Thursday when I went in to photograph dogs there were even more itty-bitty kitties in the office area. The shelter must have received a couple (or several) litters of kittens who still need to be bottle fed; it seemed like half of the staff was fostering two to four of these little babies. One kennel had four little ones in it that were howling to beat the band … they were HUNGRY! Their foster mom was busy running around the shelter so I offered to feed them. Then she said I also needed to "express them" … uh, what? She showed me how to take a towel and act as a momma cat massaging their private areas to get them to pee. I learn something new every day!

I expressed and fed all four of them before I headed out to the dog kennels. The next day I started thinking about the rabies clinic their foster mom had to run on Saturday and perhaps she could use a "kitten sitter." I got the okay from Charlie and soon arrangements were made for me to pick them up early Saturday morning at the shelter and bring them back that afternoon.

Of course, about the time I got them home and decided I wanted to sneak in a nap they were ready to be fed again. I decided I had to give them little names so I could keep track of who had been fed and who hadn't; so I named them after their looks … Brindle, Boots, White Belly, and Calico Fade. Tippi was quite distressed by all the meowing. I let her really sniff a couple of them and the little brindle colored one actually started purring when she did that … I think they have some big brother and sister dogs in their foster home. Tippi was actually whining loud enough that it made a great big chorus to wake up Charlie.

I posted on Facebook that anyone in the neighborhood should stop by and help me socialize these little darlings. My neighbors Sarah and Jamie stopped by first. We had great fun. Check out Charlie's little video. Our friends, Paul and Valerie, also stopped by with their daughter, Elizabeth. She was very good with the kittens and it was so cute to watch her go from person to person to interact with all the different kittens. At this point the kittens decided that they were hungry again so we had a little feeding party and then they snuggled down in our laps and went to sleep.

Early on Jamie commented that he'd have lots of kittens, puppies, and kids as long as they were this kind of tiny and cute. Then he watched me "express them" and he retracted his statement. LOL!

And then kittens and I had a very nice nap. I woke them up and took them out on the front porch for some good light to get some photographs before I returned them to their foster mom. They were hungry again and so I fed them one more time. All in all it was a great morning.

I did have some good puppy time this week too. After feeding the four kittens on Thursday, I didn't have as much time as I might like to photograph pups. I started with Thelma as the photo on the website only showed her snout; in fact, her biography described her as her litter mate since he was more prominent in the picture. She was very sweet and looked like she'd be the kind of dog that would be great running around with kids in a back yard.

Thelma (ID: 51118)

Next I decided to photograph Charlie. He was a smaller puppy in a kennel by himself even though his intake photo showed that he came in with a whole passel of pups. Once I got in the kennel I found out why he was on his own. He was skinny and a little weak. Poor little guy. As I sat down with him I saw that he had a little nose drip as well, not a good sign after my recent experience with Sienna. I decided I couldn't take the chance and go to other kennels after this and potentially spread something and then I remember some advice Tracy got when she was trained in Fido Fitness at the shelter.

Charlie (ID: 51687)

"Think about it this way: If it is their last day on earth, at least you made it a good one."

So that's what I did. I sat there with Charlie; cuddled him; fed him all the treats in my pockets and basically tried to make him feel all kinds of love and affection. I am ecstatic to say that he is being adopted … woo hoo!

Some of them you won't be able to save as they get taken up in the process … and some of them you will feel like you had a hand in making the rest of their life better.

Fluffy or Not I Love Them All

It's always good when I can get back into the shelter after life's chaos has kept me away. I was finally able to get there last Thursday for one of my regular sessions, and then Saturday I met up with "Jenny" and we did dress-up photo shoots.

Sienna

Of course, it's always a good day for me when I get to love on a Chow Chow. This is Sienna, who is a petite sweetie that just wants to cuddle. And even though she jumps on you to get your attention she doesn't pounce on you like a lot of dogs. She sort of hovers in mid-air and then gently falls into your arms.

[I am very sad, disappointed, - no, angry to have to say that Sienna was euthanized on Tuesday, April 19 for a (suspect) upper respiratory infection. It took over a year, but volunteering at the shelter finally brought me to tears. I need to figure out how to make sure that this doesn't happen to such a sweet Chow again.]

 

Suzanna (ID: 50698)

Suzanna was one of those dogs who surprised me – not because of her personality but because of her stature. I figured she was some sort of a Bulldog mix puppy; instead she's full grown at three years old and only 34 pounds. They say she's a Beagle/Bull Terrier mix. She's a little skittish of quick movement and a raised hand but warmed up quickly with a wagging tail.

Alice

We had a blast on Saturday putting pups in costume and trying to get their photo before they took it off. We started with Alice. Her name is really Jasmine but I changed it to Alice 'cause she looks like she's wearing Alice Cooper style eye make-up. After meeting her I think her name needs to be changed – she is not an Alice, not even of the Cooper type; maybe Daisy to go along with her hippie headband. A friend at work said we should change her name to Cleopatra to go with her eye make-up. Even some of the other photos I took showed a different side of her. She was sweet and well behaved during our photo shoot. She's a little hard to adopt out because her previous owners say that she is not good with dogs, cats, or small children. She doesn't seem to pay much attention to other dogs walking by her kennel … maybe it's time for a re-test.

Raza

Raza is a wonderful boy. Doesn't he just look adorable in his business attire? I also love this photo that seems to be saying, "And why haven't you come by and adopted me yet?"

Jack Sparrow (ID: 50944)

And we had to do this costume shoot – I mean after all he has an eye patch and is named Jack Sparrow.

Pepper

Princess Pepper is one of those sweet elder dogs – I love the look on her face as we put her little hat on – so sweet. She was adopted shortly after our photo shoot – Yea!

And then there is Riley and her Hello Kitty ensemble. Patrick had bought the Hello Kitty sweatshirt but it was too small for his dog so he donated it to the shelter for photo ops just like this. I had been looking all morning for a pup that it would fit. As "Jenny" and I came to do Riley's lady bug photos she saw the Hello Kitty blanket in her kennel and we knew there would have to be a costume substitution. Those ears kept popping up and out of the little hood. Too cute!

Riley (ID: 49505)

I will be back on Thursday to take more photos. I won't give up on these guys. I won't.