Pet Stories

I wanted a poodle; I got a pit bull instead. Standing in the scant dog run at an NYC pound, a volunteer came out with a fawn colored 65lb, adult female Pit Bull mix that was far too regal to be homeless let alone on death row.

On a warm sunny afternoon in June 1999, my new family inched their way westward on the Long Island Expressway toward LaGuardia airport in Queens NY. Little did they know that we would soon meet their new relative that would forever change their lives. My plane from Tennessee taxied to the gate and I vividly remember how the little nine year old boy’s face lit up the moment he saw me and I felt the same about him. We were instantly best friends. They named me Munchkin. I was a tiny four-week-old black, white and yellow Havanese puppy (they soon discovered the yellow was ‘number 1’, from my trip, and they washed it off).

Today, glorious Friday. I only had a few pesos on me so Julieta (a girl I work with) and I decided to go get a sandwich. As we turn the corner something organish-brown catches my eye. To my horror, a dog is lying on the street - on his side with all four legs outstretched - next to the curb.

"Oh my God Julieta look at that dog!?!

I was about five when I first saw it. My mother, my sisters and I were driving in my mother's mini van to Idaho Falls. It was either December or January, snow was on the ground but the roads had been plowed and sanded. Somewhere between Boise and Twin Falls, I saw a big white wolf standing next to the road. The wolf stared right at me, it's eyes were golden. It looked at me like it just knew. My mother never saw the black ice and the minivan lost control, crossed the median and hit a pickup truck head on. None of us were harmed and other than some small pieces of glass in my sister and my mother's hair, there wasn't a scratch on us.