Owner in Love with Rescue Dog's Bark That Sounds Like Cross Between Seal & Pig
With all the dogs begging for adoption at shelters and rescues, it can be hard for one to stand out. When you go and see row after row of begging faces, it can be difficult to choose just one.
So sometimes you look for some kind of distinguishing characteristic or look for one that just clicks with you.
For Drew, that came in an unexpected fashion. He went to a rescue intending to adopt one dog, but when he got there all his plans were turned on their head.
The dog he wanted had already been adopted. So, determined not to go home empty-handed, Drew began to peruse the other adoptables.
A black pit bull mix caught his eye — or rather, his ear. “He was jumping up and down and kind of grunting without a voice,” he said.
The strange sound was captivating. Not exactly musical, perhaps — but arresting in its own fashion.
He was interested in taking this new dog home, but the dog had already been spoken for. Even in the short time he’d spent with the pup, though, Drew knew something was special about this one and tried to find some way to get the dog into his care.
He spoke to a rescue worker to see if he could just foster the dog. “She warned me. She was like, ‘You’re gonna get attached.’ I said, ‘Listen, it’s not about me, it’s about him. I can’t put him back in that cage. Let me give him two weeks of freedom and then I’ll give him back to his owners,'” Drew said.
A noble goal, to give the pup some love and room to roam in the meantime, but, as he later admitted, “Wasn’t a good idea. That was a terrible idea.”
Obviously Drew and the dog, who was named Dennis, bonded. They became close friends, and when the end of the two week time period came to a close, Drew was hoping for a miracle.
“I got this phone call saying, ‘You have to drop him back tomorrow.’ I was devastated,” he said. “I couldn’t even function. I felt like I literally lost something. I was mourning, almost. It was a weird feeling.”
“I was like, ‘I will give him if I have to. Is there any way you can convince them to let me have him? Because we are just — we’ve bonded.”
When the other people who had planned on adopting Dennis saw video and photographic evidence of the bond between Dennis and Drew, they couldn’t separate the two.
And they’ve been best pals ever since.
“I don’t know how to say this, but I used to be, obviously a lot more selfish,” Drew admitted. “Everything was about me. I used to care about things that just, in hindsight, weren’t important — at all. The things that are important are really like — bonding, spending quality time. He’s changed the way I view the world, really.”
Dennis has only become more articulate as they spend time together. At first, Drew was concerned about the pig/seal squeals, but soon came to understand them as Dennis’ language.
“I didn’t understand what was happening. It was kind of scary. It was like he was possessed. But then, if you look at him and look into his eyes, you can see he’s trying to communicate, so then it became just normal.”
Obviously these two were meant for each other, and they have plenty of chatty adventures ahead!
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