Called by Breed
The sign says, “If you didn’t call, you don’t belong here. Turn around and leave.” It makes me wonder if we should.
The road had turned us upside down, from the exit off a rural highway, up a steep and hilly incline of a small mountain, around a wide corkscrew towards the top of a place where the breeder lives. Hers is the last house on the left. It is already dusk, so we can’t read the number. We take a chance and get out. It is chilly.
The woman who opens the door is stalky, short, with a brief shock of dirty blond hair. She doesn’t smile, but opens the door and tells us to come in to the lighted living room hall. There are shot guns hanging on the wall.
The dog we want to see is in the kennel out back. “Let me get my flashlight,” she says.
We have no right to be looking at dogs. I am pregnant. We live in a cheap, one bedroom apartment, and that, only at the mercy of a kindly landlord. My husband is unemployed. The car is not ours. It is a used Toyota Tercel leased for $100 a week from a place called Rent a Wreck. Our car burned up in a fire on the side of the road. It made the front page.
The ad said, “Free Shiba Inu.” I didn’t know what that was, but on the phone, the lady had said the dogs look like little foxes. Here’s the address if we wanted to come and look. So we are looking.
She returns with the flashlight and leads us outside. We walk on a gravel path towards a barn. To the left, a group of five or six German shepherds strain against a chain link fence, their bark, I am sure, not worse than their bite. I would move closer to the right, but there, behind another fence, is a five or sixsome of Rottweilers. I don’t know much about Rottweilers, but the lady says they make excellent guards.
The barn has a padlock. Inside smells like straw and dog. There are no lights. The lady points her flashlight up where a large kennel has been mounted.
The dogs look strange—short, with thick manes of red-gold fur, curly tails and sturdy feet. They do this prancing thing, back and forth. They aren’t particularly interested in us. “These are the males. They need to be socialized,” the lady says. “Here’s the one in the paper.” She points.
The dog walks funny, trying to prance but can’t quite do it. “What’s wrong with him?” I ask.
“He has hip dysplasia. He’s okay, though.”
“Oh.”
I wander a little, looking at the other dogs. I see a wooden box on the left. There is a light over the box, and when I look in, I see a small female, indeed, the size and semblance of a fox.
She is beautiful. Her hair is the same color as the others, but there is less scruff at the neck. Her eyes are black as the inside of the barn but as wide open as the moon.
“Why is she in there?” I ask.
“She’s the runt. She needs the heat lamp. I’ll step outside and let you and your husband talk.”
We do. I am serious. We can’t take an injured dog. It will need medical care and we can’t afford it. It’s irresponsible for us even to be looking at dogs right now, never mind one with a birth defect. My husband wants one, though. Okay. Then what about the little one? She seems healthy.
We call the lady and ask about the runt.
“These are purebreds. They all have their shots. They are $700.” She hadn’t planned on selling the little one yet.
We don’t have $700.
I tell her why we don’t want the boy. I tell her I am going to have a baby in a couple of months and we want a dog for the baby. We are in a small apartment and we read that Shiba Inus don’t bark much and are good with kids. The baby Shiba is adorable.
The lady says she can give us the runt for $150.
We go inside to sign papers. I am afraid. We might not be able to pay the rent on time. We shouldn’t be doing this. Our friends know we are broke. They lent us money. We will have to lie, tell them we got the dog for free.
My husband says we should do it. We’ll never again get an opportunity to buy a purebred at this price.
“We’re not going to get rid of her once we get her,” I tell him. “She’ll be part of the family. We’ll need to take care of her.”
He writes the check and the lady goes back to the barn. We wait outside.
The lady carries the dog and hands her to me. My body is shaking, and so is the dog’s.
We are in the car. The dog lies on my belly. She is warm and extremely shy. “She just needs to be socialized,” says my husband.
We call her Shiba because that’s what she is. I like it because, growing up, I had a dog by that name. I know it’s silly to call a dog by its breed, but I don’t care.
That was more than fifteen years ago.
As I write this, Shiba is curled up on the couch, her paws tucked in like a fawn’s. She is grayed and she is blind. She hesitates when walking downstairs, testing each step before she moves. When we call her, she doesn’t know where the voice is coming from and wanders around until she figures it out. She jumps when we pass by her because she can no longer see or sense when we are coming. I’ve taken to warning her, but she is a little deaf.
She comes to my desk chair and gives a communicative whine when she wants to go out. She likes the small backyard where she has spent most her life. It is familiar to her and she can make her way around, even in the dark.
Sometimes I am on the couch and she goes to my chair. She stares at it and whines. “I am over here, Shiba,” I say. She doesn’t hear, so I get up.
Shiba has lived through two moves cross country, two children, now teens, a divorce and remarriage, several cats and, for the last four years, one other dog. She has always been the Alpha. She loves cheese and short walks in daylight. She still prances. And I recall how she came to live with us, within our hearts, those many years ago, when our family was young and poor and struggling as an injured dog. How we all have grown healthy since then.
Katherine Mercurio Gotthardt
August 19, 2011
