Author Archives: JackiSkole

Curveball

Posted on by JackiSkole

My husband said, “Sometimes life throws you curve balls.”  But sometimes life doesn’t do the throwing; you do.

I went to the Flemington Pet Valu Saturday to speak with Linda, one of the co-founders of the rescue group that saved Galen, about my pup’s early days in North Carolina and her transport north.  Linda is so busy with her day job and the rescue that I’ve found the only way to communicate with her is to corner her at the pet store—she’s there most weekends trying to adopt out her dogs and cats.  This time Kevin and the girls came with me.

When we arrived, volunteers were lowering six of the cutest, cuddliest, beige pups you’ve ever seen into a pen on the sidewalk outside the store. The pups were eight weeks old and looked like some type of golden retriever mix; their mom – a jack russell – was also rescued, so at least part of their heritage is known. I heard one young guy, probably in his late twenties, say to his friend, “They are genetically designed to make you go goo-goo ga-ga.”

Puppies from a North Carolina kill shelter

Mom

I had never met Buff, who, with Linda, co-founded Catnip Friends Cats Rescue, but Buff was also at PetValu Saturday.  I’d hit the reporter’s jackpot:  two sources poised to answer my myriad questions.  I grabbed pen and paper and left my family to go ga-ga over the pups.

But Kevin and the girls did more than ogle puppies; they volunteered to walk a five-month-old dog named Loki, who had been passed over for adoption three weeks straight.  Figuring out Loki’s breed is a challenge.  Gaston County Animal Control in North Carolina deemed him a husky, but there is no way that Loki has even an ounce of husky in him.  He looks more mutt than either Galen or Gryffin.  During the following two hours, my family bonded with little Loki.

After my first visit to the pet store some weeks ago, I started toying with the idea of our becoming a foster family to one of Catnip’s dogs.  I mentioned the possibility to Kevin.  We agreed this summer, when I had time off from my job as a college professor, we would seriously consider it.

Somehow summer became Saturday, fostering became possibly adopting, and Loki came home with us.

I say Kevin threw the curve ball; perhaps I did by allowing Loki to come home with us.  Either way, ball thrown.

Loki: Shepherd, Dog; Flemington, NJ

Loki, as seen on Petfinder.com

Ready or not…

Posted on by JackiSkole

The first time I saw Galen she was going by the name Julia.  And I didn’t see her so much as I saw the picture of a grey-speckled month-old Australian shepherd/black lab pup, head cocked left, sporting a seemingly perplexed look.  I was surfing Petfinder looking for dogs that were one- or two-years-old, house broken, and in Central New Jersey.  It was November 2010, and my family was absolutely not ready for a new dog.

We were still grieving; at least Kevin and I were.  Our two daughters, then ages 8 and 6, seemed to be dealing with Gryffin’s sudden death two months earlier better than we were.  Of course, he was our first child, and when a child – even a canine one – is ripped from your life without warning, the heartbreak feels irreparable.

Yet there I was, and there I had been for the past several weeks, staring into the sometimes funny, sometimes quizzical faces of shelter dogs.  Kevin wanted to wait until spring at the earliest, before bringing a young dog, especially a puppy, into our home. He said he didn’t want to deal with a puppy during the height of winter.  (You would have thought he could foresee the snow-filled season awaiting us.) But the real reason was more complicated:  His emotions were a painful mix of sadness over Gryffin’s death and guilt over replacing him.

The fact that I was considering a new dog was perhaps the most surprising turn of events.  For the first time since we’d moved to our New Jersey home, with its unusually dark hardwoods that showcased every golden hair Gryffin shed, I wasn’t vacuuming daily (or twice daily). I was adding that most essential resource – time! – back into my life.  And we had freedom!  The freedom we hadn’t had for ten years, to leave home for a day or a weekend without worrying about who was going to take care of the dog. We could be spontaneous!

But when I came right down to it – the time, the freedom, the spontaneity – none of it made up for that empty feeling that overcame me every time I turned into the driveway and didn’t see Gryffin saunter toward the car, tail wagging, face smiling.

Then one day, I came upon pictures of Galen’s litter and fell for… Trevor. Trevor was a handsome little guy who, unlike his sister with her unique grey coloring, resembled the iconic black lab pup.  He and his siblings were going to be offered for adoption that weekend at a garden center just ten minutes from our home.  It was time to let Kevin and the girls know what I’d been up to.