Arches National Park, UT.
My Heart Melted
On July 15th I’ll have had Rosie for exactly ten years.
For those unfamiliar with our story, I initially met Rosie while I was volunteering at the Petaluma Animal Shelter. The shelter had just managed to adopt-out, or foster, every single one of their dogs, leaving the kennels completely empty. An impressive achievement. So we reached out to other shelters that had more dogs than they could handle and took some off their hands. Rosie was one of those dogs.
To this day I have no idea why she ended up in a shelter, but I’m sure glad she did.
The other volunteers knew I had been searching for a dog of my own, and before long I started hearing whispers that they thought Rosie might be the one. I hadn’t admitted it to them yet, but I had been thinking the same thing.
The problem was, Rosie arrived at the shelter a few days before I was leaving for a three week vacation in Europe, and I had a strong feeling she would be adopted by the time I returned from my trip. So I had to move fast.
Many shelters offer a “Foster-to-Adopt” program, meaning you can foster a dog for a period of time before committing to an official adoption. So I organized it with the shelter, loaded her into the car and brought her home for a night.
Right off the bat it was clear this was a good dog—she did great in the car ride home, was good on the leash, affectionate, didn’t bark, friendly with everyone and sweet as can be. Everything was going great.
But at one point, while I was distracted in the kitchen, I realized I hadn’t seen or heard her for a while. Parents of small children can attest to how suspicious that silence is. She had been so well behaved, but I thought this might be the time I’d finally catch her doing something naughty.
So I began sneaking around the house, hoping to catch her in the act.
But she wasn’t on the first floor.
So I started tiptoeing up to the second floor, peeking around corners, certain to find her chewing on something she wasn't supposed to be chewing on.
And sure enough, what do I find?!
Her asleep in my room.
I expected to find her misbehaving, while the whole time she was just taking a nap.
My heart melted.
That’s when I knew, for certain, that I wanted her to be my dog.
But because I was leaving the country the following day, things became a little more complicated. Thankfully, the director of the shelter offered to break protocol and “reserve” Rosie for me until I returned home. In fact, while I was away, instead of holding her at the loud, scary shelter in the city, Rosie was transferred to a partner shelter out in the country, where she had a larger, quieter, more peaceful place to stay until I got back.
Even though I had an incredible time in Europe, from the moment the trip began I was counting down the days until I could return home to pick up my sweet dog.
I landed back in California on the evening of July 14th and picked her up the morning of the 15th.
And the rest is history.
“How is it possible that out of all the dogs in the world, the best ones are rescues?” – Anonymous
