Stella's patellas

For those just joining us, which is pretty much everyone, it's important to note that several months have passed since I began this page and Stella is a teenager now nine and a half months old. She has become a muscular, 54 lb. fireball of lovable, boundless energy. I have every intention of finishing her story from the last post forward but I want to interrupt along the way to basically keep track of some of the more current events in her life. Bear with me.

About a month ago, she was diagnosed with a right medial luxating patella. That's a trick knee to you and me. For a kneecap, it's a little like when your kitchen drawer jumps the track. It can simply slip off an be replaced manually or it can splinter the wood, damage the drawer and the track, and never work again. It occurs most often in little tiny dogs. If you've ever seen a little dog running full blast on three legs, there's a good chance it's because of a luxated patella.



Sometimes I'm told, these things right themselves with time but Stella's sadly, did not. Our walks went from four miles a day to zero over a period of four weeks and it became clear that she would have to have surgery or face chronic pain and (eventual) lameness at such a tender age. A couple of people I discussed this with naturally assumed I'd have her put down. Before anyone gets enraged over this sort of thinking, I should say in their defense, that they were people who generally don't have too many options. I don't have a vast supply of them myself, but putting her down was never an option. To make a long story short, she had the surgery on Wednesday and was released from the hospital this morning. I asked the vet staff if their itemized surgical estimate included any Xanax for owners, but was told that it didn't. I spent two days carrying the phone around and thankfully, working.

Not surprisingly, she was happy to see me this morning and I her. I was stunned when her doctor offered to walk her to the car. So far, the prognosis is good. The next four weeks however, are critical to her future quality of life, the idea being the nine and a half month old puppy isn't allowed to play or have any fun at all. I hope for her sake, that it all becomes a distant memory wherein I get to tease her occasionally about that day she came home dressed as a satellite dish.

Baby Giraffe

I brought Stella home from the fair on tear down day. Often, it's a Monday, the day after the midway closes when all the rides are being packed away. It follows tear down night. Any other year, I would've stayed all day taking pictures, but I had very suddenly become the owner of a puppy. I say very suddenly - that's misleading- I asked Billy Winn, nine days earlier if I could have her, betting he'd say no, which he did. Then, in a combined moment of clarity and good will, Billy and his girl had a meeting and decided to adopt her out. So late Sunday afternoon, I became the new proud owner of the bouncing baby dog. Three months old. Pit Bull. Never been on a walk. Or in a house. Did however, spend the last three months riding around the country, hanging behind a midway, listening to Nickleback and Emanem.

In preparation for this adoption I went home at 4 in the morning and picked up everything in the house that I thought would interest a puppy, magazines, camera gear, power cords, the new cowboy boots, all put away some place out of reach. During that time I went from trying to talk myself out of taking the puppy to being totally overjoyed about actually having a puppy. It was a combination of fear and sleep deprivation but at no time did I stop picking things up and putting them away. Two hours later, I was back at the fairgrounds in time to shoot the sunrise. At eleven-thirty that afternoon, I got the nod from Billy to take the dog. He was getting ready to move the truck she'd been tied to for the last twelve days and we agreed that at that point, she'd be mine.

She (all twelve pounds of her) drug me across the midway and I steered her in the direction of the car. There's a whole story about the first time I walked this dog, nine and a half hours earlier. I'll just say here, that she has a passion for funnel cake and leave it at that. On this, our last goodbye to the Tennessee State Fair, I was headed to the car and she was headed to the funnel cake. It's safe to say, there's more than a little bit of it, on the ground after ten days of the Tennessee State Fair. It was kind of like being tied to the back of a train.

Once we made it to the car, her demeanor changed. This would be the only time she would be allowed to sit in my lap in the car and for part of the ride, she did exactly that. The last half of our journey would see her sitting quietly in the passenger's seat watching me intently for any sign of what was coming next.

Don't worry, I blindly assured her. Everything's going to be fine.

We went straight to the pet supermarket, just to drive the point home.

Without hesitating, she walked through the automatic doors. I immediately picked her up and set her in the basket of the nearest cart. She studied me, uncertain as we rolled down the first aisle and let loose a heavy sigh. Her world had changed dramatically in the last forty minutes. Neither of us had slept for two days and it was hard to say which would be the first to collapse.

Then I picked up Baby Giraffe, gave him a squeak and tossed him into the cart with her.

Joyous revelation is the only way I can describe it now. The happy dance. I'm surprised she didn't pee herself. It was the moment she understood that I wasn't just some dangerous kidnapper. By the time we left there, she was sitting in the cart in a new dog bed, schmoozing extra milk bones off the cashiers.

Baby Giraffe became the icon of happiness for Stella. This photo was taken the day we retired him and today, this many months later, if I want her full attention, literally all I have to do is say the words: Baby Giraffe and for a minute anyway - she's mine.

What you make 'em

The first couple of girls I'd passed on the midway that night also suggested she was a pit bull but denial blinded me to the possibility of it that first time. They had to be wrong. I decided this in a most friendly way and kept moving.

This woman though, she knew what she was talking about. I could hear it in her voice. Those few moments slowed way down in my head, like when you realize that you're about to skid off the road and there's nothing you can do about it except hold on. I asked if she minded if I sat down at the table and she motioned to the chair.

"Jesus," I said, "are you sure she's a pit bull?"

"Positive"

"So tell me what do I need to know about raising a pit bull," My own words echoed in my ears but hers didn't.

"They're what you make 'em," she said. She took a long drink from the beer and I found myself wishing for one too. "What else?" I asked. "I'm sorry I'm interrupting your dinner, but I have to know by tomorrow afternoon." She didn't seem to mind.

"Females are more easy-going than males are," she said, "and well, you might have to beat that dog once or twice" (I think I momentarily repressed a full-on head-bouncing-off-asphalt faint here), "just with a newspaper though," she added - "but once you've got her attention, she can be the best dog in the world so long as you don't tie her up in the backyard and walk away."

No problemo.

I thanked her and she wished me luck. The dog and I continued on, down the backside of the midway toward her truck which had been parked mostly behind the Starship 3000 for this last twelve days. I think Stephanie tied her back up when we returned as my head was still swimming in the fog of reality and my newly discovered prejudice.

Just the moment I start feeling all proud of myself in the ethics and morality department, a new prejudice, that I am completely ignorant of in myself, comes home to roost. Despite the fact that I felt completely ready to be a dog owner, never in a million years would I have gone off in search of a pet pit bull. Never.

N.E.V.E.R. And now I had one. The first dog of my adult life. Pit bull.

I've chosen to believe, looking back on it, that God was playing a little trick on me, not to mention my cat Gigi.


Stephanie and the puppy; Sunday afternoon

Our First Walk

Normally, I shoot pictures on teardown night and into the next day. We agreed that I'd pick up the dog on Monday, when it was time to move the truck.

After the show closed that Sunday night, I took pictures for a couple of hours, then asked Stephanie if I could walk our dog. "Sure" she said, "I'll untie her for you."

What she handed me at the end of the leash, was a dog that hadn't as far as I could tell, ever been on a walk before. This was an animal that within the first fifty yards of our walk, ate gum, snow cone wrappers, chicken-on-a-stick, the chicken-on-a-stick stick and Gravitron vomit right off the pavement, in front of my eyes.

We made it as far as Sammy Forbes' burger joint and a woman, thirty six ounces into a forty ounce beer, sitting at a table there said: "'Aint nobody breakin' into your house." She took another bite of her sandwich and I said, "What?"

"I said 'aint nobody breakin' into your house with that pit bull in there."

"Beautiful dog too, if you didn't want him I'd take him right now. I used to raise pit bulls and that one is gorgeous."

The Aquisition

I was sort of kidding when I told Billy he ought to give her to me. More than once over the years, ride jocks had tried to get me to take their road dogs home. Often they were ill-behaved or sickly. Her being a three month old puppy, I never dreamed he'd say yes and at first, he didn't. He'd gotten her from Juan for his girlfriend's birthday. She wasn't exactly his dog to give away.

I sat in the shade under the truck for a few minutes every day with her anyway. Her favorite toy appeared to be a smashed plastic water bottle. It slid beautifully on the asphalt, often out of her reach. Others who knew her and I would walk by and kick it back under the truck for her. Occasionally some jointee would walk by and toss her a stuffed toy.

Ten days went by and on the last day of the fair, Billy and Stephanie came to me and announced that they had talked it over and decided to adopt her out. It was like she won the dog lottery. I had no idea at that time that I had won it too.

Stella

"Looks like a dog out of a Mark Twain story."

She went on the road a carny dog the first three months of her life, made it through four state fairs and a variety of other spots throughout Wisconsin and Illinois. Carnival life can be really hard on a dog. Those that survive it often turn out to be some of the greatest dogs in the world though (Trish and Chi Chi come to mind).

Stella got off the road early, in Nashville and thanks to her previous owners, came to live at my house. This is her story from that point forward.

White puppy

Cute white puppy... so beautiful