With stoic determination I decided that, when my dog Izzy passed away, it would be months, nay years, before I opened up my heart and our home up to another four-legged friend. The thought of also having any dog other than my sweet, no-toothed, doe eyed, fur-ball, peeing machine was unfathomable. I had adopted Izzy from a shelter when she was 8 years old, someone who had her from a pup dumped her there, they no longer wanted her. When she arrived home, she was reserved but seemed full of hopeful optimism, in a little package that came up to my mid shin, bright sweet eyes and a completely shaven coat, that would prove to soon grow into an apparently never-ending fawn coloured mane, we were in love from day one.
Anybody that had the opportunity to meet her, would know first hand that we were mutually obsessed with each other. She taught me that some dogs simply love you so much they want to climb in your mouth, and she did try with varying degrees of success at any given chance. Age and time, as it does, finally caught up with her and at age 14, after 6 magical years together her kidneys failed. On one winter Saturday afternoon at approximately 12:45pm she lay still and peaceful for the very last time on my lap. It would make the human condition infinitely easier if we could actually stop loving with the immediacy that death can cease life. But love and memory are one in the same and are forever intertwined, which leaves us both perfect and flawed. We humans are, I suppose, perfectly flawed.
Having had Izzy for almost the entire time I have lived in Canada, it was not only the most painful heartbreak of losing such an adored and loved friend but also a complete lifestyle and identity adjustment. Suddenly I didn’t have to get out of bed extra early on a winter morning, bundle up and trek outside. Suddenly there was no clicking noise of little dog toes, scratching on the hardwood floors.
Suddenly there was no fur to have to lint roll off my clothes or off our couch, which incidentally is covered in a fabric – that I can only imagine was designed for the specific purpose of acting like Velcro to pet fur. Suddenly I was no longer a dog owner. Most shockingly I realized, I wished for it all over again.
Shizzle, our cat, who is best described, as having been born with a face that only a mother could love on payday, seemed also lost in her absence. He is jet black and has an oddly rotund head. He was born with the medical anomaly of not having fully formed eyelids, specifically the small area where the eyelashes grow out of; as if that were not a sufficient dose of oddness, he is also completely and utterly crossed eyed. Medically and for the most part functionally he is in perfect health expect for the fact that he seems to be able to fully view both 5 o’clock and 10 o’clock simultaneously with each eye. He is dopey and not terribly surprisingly a particularly un-athletic cat, his inability to even bother to attempt to jump onto anything higher than a foot off the floor is both amusing and yet quite a relief, the kitchen counter could be made of tuna and cat nip and he would still remain firmly planted on the floor. I did try to teach him over the years, that he too could be an adventurous, marauding and agile cat, but he prefers best to act for the most part like a dog, a lazy dog at that.
Shizz was only a wee large-headed gangly legged kitten when he first met Izzy and was also confused by her now sudden absence from his life; “I think he’s depressed” I kept saying, but really its hard to tell exactly what a crossed eyed cat is really feeling, should a balance challenged, cranium hefty cat have the ability to sufficiently express himself I think he would have. He was also sad. So we would just hug it out him and I. Hug-it-out!
Time moved like honey in the weeks after Izzy passed away. Thinning only very slightly each day, it got easier with the healing tonic of Time, that only Time itself can ever administer. Silent wood floors, fur free couch, clothes and cross-eyed cat hugs trickled by with it. I originally found and adopted Izzy off the site petfinder.org, a site that aggregates all the national shelters and rescue groups and lists them by size breed temperament usually alongside a little thumbnail of dog-face-heart-string-pulling-ness.
I had successfully maintained the, now dissipated conclusion that WE WILL WAIT for our new family member. But somehow the slow, silent, sad times seemed to pass so very much faster while scrolling through the endless lists of dogs that wanted to be loved. It’s hard, if not impossible, to scan the pages of Petfinder and not have your heart stolen with each click. We will wait we thought. we. will. wait.
Enter Cash, page 3 of my Thursday morning casual website perusal, listed on the petfinder.com Ugly Mutts Ontario Dog Rescue in Hamilton, ON.
He was new to the site, peering out of his profile photo with beady eyes and a face that could sink the hardest of hearts. He was smaller than any dog I had ever owned and had a write up that made me wonder how anyone could give him up, it seemed that even his foster mum was at odds with even giving him up herself. He was perfect, I was smitten. The idea of waiting now seemed like a complete farce. It was no longer me that was waiting, our dog was waiting for us; he was simply taking up a spot in a shelter when really that place should be freed up for another unfortunate soul. He should be at home with us where he belonged. I sent in my application, something I had only ever done once before when I applied for Izzy nearly 6 years prior. I again tried to put in words in the little assigned boxes how awesome we would be for him. Self-praise has never been my forte and I second-guessed every word, hoping I could somehow get it right. I basically ended up sending in an application that was a succinct version of how I felt about owning Izzy. How much I loved her and how much I hoped I could have the opportunity to love him.
I hit send and got an auto reply, stating that applicants are usually contacted in 3-10 business days. His foster mom called 24hrs later on Friday night; no reference calls were needed, despite the lengthy list supplied. We were invited to come meet him on Saturday to see if it was a good match. The shelter was out in Hamilton so we woke up early and set out in -10 degrees, slushy snow, the sun struggling to compete with, but eventually failing to win its battle against the heavy grey clouds. I had never before been to Hamilton and I expect mid February is likely not the best time to judge it as the most resplendent of locals. We drove through slushy streets and through run down neighborhoods in the less up kept parts of town, spare leash and new collar in hand and more mounting excitement than a combined month of Christmas mornings.
Meeting him, smiles, discussions, papers to sign and more papers to sign it was a blur of process and before I knew it we soon had an extra tiny, very well-mannered gentleman in the car sitting between us on the sludgy drive home. The sun peeked out from behind the clouds.
Turns out, it was a good match. He has been cuddled up next to, on top of, following keenly, spooning behind or beside and in the closest possible physical proximity ever since we got home with him. He is 6.3lbs of pure beady-eyed love. He too tries, as Izzy did, with varying degrees of success to plant himself face first into my mouth out of sheer doggie love, though he could well prove to pose a risk of being a choking hazard on account of his diminutive size. He is slowly teaching Shizzle the fine art of playing chase and jumping over chairs higher than one foot tall, playing in extended games of catch and general dog/cat frivolity, which goes to prove that you can teach a lazy cat-dog new tricks.
Nothing ever really changes the feeling of losing a pet, but knowing that one very cuddly ‘ugly mutt’ who was dumped in a box outside of a high-kill pound one cold December now has his own family to adore for the rest of his life certainly fills a gap that was left.
Welcome home to our little boy, Cash Gewürztraminer Craig. Welcome home.
guh-VOORTS-truh-MEE-nur
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