Name: Gidget - 4.75-ish y/o
Family Members: April (Mom), Thomas - 15 y/o, Oscar (Cairn Terrier - 8 y/o)
How long has Gidget been in the family? 4 years, 5 months
Profession: Account Manager for a promotional products provider to Fortune 500 clients
Location: Sandy Springs, GA
Nicknames: Gidgie-puddin', Gidgiepotamus, Gidgie
5 words/phrases that best describe Gidget:
- Clownish
- Cuddly
- eager to please
- routine driven
- kitty-cat (because she loves to rub her body against things like a cat)
What makes Gidget unique? Gidget is very talkative. She tells me if I am not doing the thing she thinks I should be doing at any given time with a long, growly/howly speech about why I should be petting/cuddling/feeding/walking her. It is almost impossible to resist. Her relationship with Oscar is something special too. She is dog selective, and pretty alpha - except, it seems with small male dogs. So I sought out one of those for her when she and I became empty nesters and she seemed lonely. She and Oscar fell in love at first sight, even though I took several days to let them meet without a gate between them because of the size difference. (she is 72lbs and he is 22lbs!). She had to learn to play more gently with him then her previous playmate, who was more her size. Oscar really rules the roost around here now! He tells her when they are going to play and when it's time to stop. While she sometimes complains or acts a clown to try and lure him back in, she knows he is really the boss. They have been so good for each other.
A girl and her favorite stick!
Rescue Story: Gidget was between 4-5 months old when one of my coworkers' husbands found her on a roadside in a semi-rural area of north Forsyth County in mid-November. He is a serial softie (dog rescuer). so he picked her up and brought her home out of the cold. However, they already had a full pack, with two older dogs and another recent rescue from a deadbeat neighbor. So they couldn't think of keeping this skinny , stray puppy. After a week of simultaneously looking for her owners and trying to find a home for her in case none were found, they were at a loss of what to do. My co-worker was networking her , but worried they would ultimately have to take her to a shelter. I had seen pictures and listened to my co-worker talk about this sweet little white puppy during that time. It had been less then a month since I had to have my brothers 2 y/o white dog who I was caring for, put to sleep due to aggressive bone cancer. (he had moved to Alaska and left his dog with me. I was supposed to have him for 2 years while he was away but he showed symptoms of cancer within a month of their move and had to be put to sleep 6 weeks later). I'd never been without a dog of my own before, but the two dogs I had at the time really belonged to my daughter and my mother. So I felt like I had a hole in my heart, and couldn't help thinking this poor puppy probably had a hole in hers too. I loved my mother's pit mix and thought the two girls would make a beautiful pair of sisters (not so much, as it turned out : ( ) Finally, I just blurted out one day "okay, I'll take her!" - and I agreed to take in this puppy I had never even met. The next day (the day before Thanksgiving), my coworker's husband met me at the office and handed me a leash and a bed. She was terrified of being handed off, but she was one of the prettiest little things I'd ever seen, and I was instantly in love. The name Gidget came to me as we drove home, because her face was so sweet, like the chipper teenage girl from those old movies.
Gidget on the way and in her new home!
What is your favorite pastime as a family? Gidget loves to "fetch" sticks and balls....and then play keep-away with them. She finds one and prances around the dog park , showing it off. I love tricking her out of them, while telling her "that's Mommy's stick," or "that's Mommy's ball!" When I finally win the game, she does the fastest, prettiest sit you've ever seen , begging me to throw it again for another round.
What is life like since you rescued Gidget? Gidget proved to be a MESS of a puppy, and she still is a force of nature - too smart and too strong for her own good sometimes. She has mastered the breakout from 3 different types of crates, was able to jump my fence no matter what I did to stop her, and I am currently working through a new Houdini behavior she developed with the room where she stays when I am out. We spent our first New Year's night together at the emergency vet when she escaped and came back home with a lacerated foot. But we bonded very quickly over that first Thanksgiving weekend, and she is a total mommy's girl - nothing comes between Gidget and her mommy.
My family thought I was insane for taking her on, because I was already a single mom taking care of two dogs, and the last thing I needed was a big puppy. When my daughter and her dog moved out, and my mother took her pit mix back; it became just the two of us and Gidget made all the difference in my empty nest. I don't know what I would have done without her....and she shows me every day that she never wants to be without me either. She has a lot of quirks, but I have always gravitated toward the quirky, so she has been just perfect for me--- my companion, my confidant, my alarm system and protector now that I live alone and mostly just a perennial reminder of what love looks like. She has trust issues that date back to whatever her life was before she was found on the side of that road, but she trusts me above all things. She looks to me for what to think of every new person and situation we encounter. It's not a thing I take lightly and it has taught me a lot about how to approach a new life (mostly) on my own. Sometimes you just have to say " I'll take her!" and decide to embrace whatever it is that comes from it.
Photographers note: On this day I had happened to book two photo shoots back to back - who would have guessed both would have a dog sibling that were Cairn Terriers. That was the first thing I noticed when I met this family...another cute little nugget side kick. After that, April had mentioned that Gidget was slow to warm up to strangers...so I basically just ignored her and spoke with April and her son, got some logistics down and by the time we got to our first spot and I was sitting on the ground...it seemed she was ok with me. She came up and gave me some love, and was really relaxed from that point on. Who knows, maybe she thought if this crazy lady is willing to get down to my level, she must not be all bad. I also want to point out that April wasn't kidding about the sticks. They brought her favorite stick from the dog park and she was definitely all about that stick! She was also all about keeping that stick (per April's comments about "keep away" above).