Sean and Lisa are friends of mine that live in Sierra Vista, Arizona. I don’t get a chance to see them too often these days, so when their text said that they were going to be in Santa Cruz at the end of the summer, I looked forward to it with great anticipation. And no, not just because I was finally going to be given a chance to show off Dingo. But yes, they had heard tidbits about Quinn, and of course had seen a picture or three. I knew they were both going to fall hard for Wonder Woman. Lisa more than Sean. Sean too though.
Sean was probably the very first person I met when I landed in Santa Cruz back in January, 1998. He was twenty years my senior, and still is. I would definitely consider him a mentor, despite our political differences. We worked together as salespeople, shlepping cable TV advertising to local businesses. He had all the good accounts.
At the time, I was 30. I was arriving to Santa Cruz with a broken down Honda Civic and two Australian Shepherds that I kept in the divorce. Sean and his wife Lisa watched my animals on those rare occasions when I needed to leave town. Murray and Madison were my Australian Shepherds. Very fine animals by anyone’s standards. At the time, Sean and Lisa had Joe and Shasta, domesticated working dogs in their own right. Anyway, it was an ideal match, and they became the “go to” surrogates.
Fast forward almost 20 years.
I put a modified tether around a rope before taking Quinn through the beautiful hotel lobby, then through the bar and restaurant itself, and then outside to the patio where dogs are more than welcome to be dogs. In fact, there is even a dog menu.
Lately I had been catching a little heat from upper management with respect to putting our stamp on this dog friendly hotel property with a wee bit too much defiance. I totally understood. I had become a dog snob. Again. But the good kind of dog snob. The dog snob that has the dog to back it up. It went like this:
“Hey Aaron we all know that Quinn isn’t going to cause any lawsuits, but a rule is a rule. It just takes one of the guests to see your dog off leash, and then they decide to also have their dog off leash. Their dog happens to be a vicious Corgi or Chihuahua and bites someone on premises, and next thing you know, we have a lawsuit on our hands.”
I get it. And the GM who broke the news to me gets it also. He made sure I knew that he knew that I had myself quite the Red Heeler, but that a rule was a rule. We shook hands and that was that.
Quinn and I parked ourselves under an umbrella on the outdoor patio. Sean and Lisa were soon to arrive with Reggie the Deerhound. We were then joined by our mutual friend Russ who came with his rescue lap dog. 200 feet above sea level, overlooking the entire Monterey Bay, it was happy hour at Linwoods and life was grand.
When it became time for goodbyes, that’s when Lisa looked me dead in the eye and very quietly said, “If you ever need her looked after, please don’t hesitate to ask us. She is such a sweetheart and we’d love to have her.”
I think my reply was something dumb like “Aw thanks Lisa, but you’ll have to get in line.“ Snobbery 101. I really wish I had that line back actually. Perhaps it was the beer spewing, I don’t know. It’s just something that came out. It was a dry(gone awry) way of saying that everybody loves Quinn, and I will always have plenty of takers. Plus in the back of my mind of course I am also thinking about the 1000 mile distance between where they live and where I live.
From Day 1, I have known that Quinn has all the premiere canine qualities that maybe even a non dog lover would find too scrumptious to pass up if ever given the opportunity to watch her in my absence. That is surely where the “Get In Line” comment stemmed from. So Lisa…if your listening…rather reading this…I didn’t mean anything by it, it was clearly my ego speaking.
My canine snobbery didn’t phase her at all because I remember after what I thought was our Final Goodbye, and just before what turned out to be the final, Final Goodbye, she whispered it again, “Hey, I’m serious. If you ever need a place to leave Quinn, call us.”
Foreshadowing at its very finest.