 Toby's Story
June 3, 2002: A routine search on
Petfinder.com revealed that a stray Wheaten had been taken to a
Burlington County, NJ shelter, not far from my home. I was already
fostering another dog for WIN and was not able to take on another,
but I notified Gwen and the others at WIN. I agreed to go to the
shelter the next day on my lunch hour to gather some more
information about the dog.
The next day I went to the shelter and met Dog # 02-05-518, who
was without a doubt, a Wheaten. He was approximately 3 to 4 years
old, somewhat underweight, but seemed to be otherwise healthy.
Someone had recently given him an unflattering haircut, which was
definitely not the preferred Wheaten trim. He seemed very friendly
and quite anxious to get out of the shelter. I promised him that I
would do all I could to get him out of there, filled out an adoption
application and waited to see what would happen. The following day,
another WIN volunteer sent an e-mail to the shelter inquiring about
the dog. She received a reply that the dog’s owner had reclaimed
him. It seemed as though this dog’s story had a happy ending, and we
all put him out of our minds.
In the meantime, my foster Daisy was adopted on Sunday, June 9th and
things were just beginning to get back to normal in my house, when I
received a phone call at work from the shelter on the morning of
Friday, June 14th. Dog # 02-05-518 was back and they wanted to know
if I still wanted to adopt him. After notifying Gwen of this latest
development, I made arrangements to take the rest of the day off and
headed to the shelter. It turned out that the story about his owners
reclaiming him was not true. He had been adopted by an elderly
gentleman who quickly realized that he did not have the patience
deal with an energetic young Wheaten, so he returned him to the
shelter after only one week.
I adopted the dog and named him Toby. On the way home, I took him
to the vet for a quick exam and a rabies vaccine. He was very thin,
but the exam revealed that he was quite healthy. He was already
neutered. His teeth were in desperate need of a cleaning, but that
would have to wait for another day. I made an appointment to have
him bathed and groomed and then took him home.
Toby got along well with my dogs, but it quickly became apparent
that he had been terribly neglected in the past and he demanded
constant attention. He proved to be a champion jumper and
counter-top surfer. I realized that the best kind of permanent home
for him would be one where he did not have to compete with children
or other dogs for his owner’s attention. He needed an experienced
owner who could afford to spend a lot of time with him. In the
meantime, he needed to learn some better house manners, so I started
training him to respond to a clicker and enrolled him in a basic
obedience course at WonderDogs in nearby Berlin, New Jersey.
 St. Francis of Assisi, the patron saint of animals, must have
been watching out for us, because I could not believe my luck when I
came across an adoption application from a couple who lived in the
next township over from me. They were empty-nesters whose previous
Wheaten had been euthanized at age 14. After a period of time
without a dog, they were ready take another into their home. I
wasted no time in contacting them and arranging a visit for them to
come and meet Toby.
Judith and Stephen Dragos liked Toby immediately, but the
adoption would have to wait until he had had more obedience training
and until after Judith and Stephen returned from a brief out-of-town
trip. But finally, the time was right. On July 28, 2002, six weeks
after I had brought Toby home from the shelter, I packed his crate,
food, and other belongings into my car and drove him to Judith and
Stephen’s house.
Perhaps the most difficult part of fostering is saying good-bye
when a dog has been placed. Toby realized that I was leaving him,
and his big brown eyes pleaded with me to take him with me. I felt
terrible, but I knew that he had found a wonderful new home and that
this was the best possible outcome to his story. This was confirmed
when I visited the Dragos' home again recently. Toby, now named
Fergus, is happy and thriving. He has put on some more weight and
his coat is starting to grow out. He has even reached a truce with
the family cat, who wasted no time in making it perfectly clear that
she was in charge. Fergus has settled in; he was extremely fortunate
to find such a wonderful new home. He got off to a rocky start in
life, but there is no doubt in my mind that he will be happy and
loved for the rest of his life.
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