A Dream Comes True by Shane Armstrong
Truth time. I have longed for a beagle since I was a little girl back in Kentucky. My older cousins had a tri-color beagle named Molly whom I loved. I desperately wanted one for my very own. I could fudge a little and say that it was my secret dream to have my own beagle but that would be untrue. I longed for a beagle and everyone knew it. There was not a birthday that I did not wish for one when I blew out the candles on my cake, or a Christmas when I didn’t hope Santa would make my dream come true. Through a series of misfortunes, it would actually take me almost four decades to bring home my very own beagle, but the happy ending was everything I had dreamed of since childhood.
In 2012 I saw the sign. LiteralIy. I was driving down the main street in our SoCal town and saw a sign that I thought read Beagles Galore. I flipped the turn signal, changed lanes and was about to pull into the shopping center when I realized that the sign actually read Bagels Galore. I drove home. “What is wrong with me? I thought as I sat in my garage after the automatic door had closed behind me. “I am an adult. I am a totally rationale, sometimes irritatingly logical person. Why am I so hung up on having a beagle in my life?”
I feel like I need to take this opportunity to thank the internet for making it so easy to find a beagle when someone like me finally surrenders to this life-long dream. For some reason, on that day, I was just ready and no amount of logic was going to stop me. I went into the house, logged onto www. Petsfinder.com and specified that I was looking for a female beagle, senior aged, within 50 miles of where I live. How likely was I going to find that? I’m in SoCal, land of the Chihuahuas, not somewhere where beagles are plentiful like in southern states. And then, there she was on my monitor: A tri-color female beagle, 11 years old, staring out of a blue, concrete cage with a chain-link door. Her name was Layla (cue up the Eric Clapton song) and her online description read that she was “a sweet older lady with impeccable manners.” I was sold. I emailed the shelter and ironically, the staff member who answered my inquiry was also named Shane (“It’s a sign!,” I told myself). We emailed back and forth several times and each time he positively addressed a concern, I felt a little bit more of my childhood hope returning.
A check with my landlord, an amendment to my lease, and a long talk with my eleven-year-old son came next. I carefully explained to him that beagles live 12-15 years on average and that this dog might live for years but also might only live six months. He was pensive at first, then smiled at me saying, “But it would be a good six months.”
Sound the trumpets: I emailed Sir Shane back at the SPCA Shelter in Long Beach that Lady Shane would be coming to pick up the beagle. He was thrilled. I guess I didn’t fully realize how little chance an elderly dog has of being adopted. I will never know how my girl came to be homeless and then in a shelter, but our vet confirmed that she had been well taken care of. I tried to focus on that and not think about her time on the streets.
When we arrived at the shelter, Sir Shane had a lengthy list of questions about our family, living environment, financial resources, and planned feeding/shelter/exercise/medical care plans. He was tentative with each question, as if he thought I would change my mind and not adopt her. I finally told him that “Unless this dog hates us, we will be taking her home.” He was clearly relieved and called for a volunteer to hasten our introduction. I would like to say that the first meeting was euphoric and that Layla recognized us as her forever family right away but that just wasn’t the case. As a dog living in a 6×6 pen for three months, she just wanted to go outside. It wasn’t that she didn’t like us, it just seemed like she wasn’t too interested. She did let us pet her, showed no violent tendencies and seemed friendly enough. We went back inside to complete the paperwork.
Unbeknownst to us, any adoptable dog age seven or older is called an Underdog at the Long Beach SPCA shelter. To honor that, the adoption fee is reduced by $10. Not only did we save money by adopting an older dog, the office staff came out to honor us with a round of applause.
As we left the shelter, our new friend seemed friskier with a little spring in her step. As we approached our car, she started jumping around and yipping. Just before I put her in the car, she must have realized that we were her forever family.
That evening, I texted out this photo to friends and family with a caption reading “A Dream Comes True.”
This month, I am celebrating two years with my wonderful, re-named, Rosalie Beagles. She has brought so much love and joy into my life, and I know that she was meant to be mine. Some things in life are worth waiting for, and this beagle-dancing, geriatric, sleeps-under-the-covers-with-me-every-night dog was definitely worth the wait.