On Dogs

Tell us a little about your current dog—or you most recent dog relationship. How did you come to get him/her? What’s the backstory?

 So I currently have two dogs one of them is named Okemo and I've had her the longest out of the two. She is a white husky and I got her when I was in middle school—so probably 6th grade. We got her because we thought that might be a good idea to give my old dog, who has since passed away had gotten older,  a better life and another companion—maybe it would put a little pep in her step—to have a little puppy running around the house. This definitely proved to be true, it definitely made the end of my older dog’s life (Aspen) more enjoyable. 

 

So that is how Okemo came into our family. We actually bought Okemo while my Dad was in Florida and he had no idea we did it. In fact he told us we could absolutely not have another dog while we had one of the house—we had never been a two-dog family before so we kind of went behind his back on that (They're best friends now so it's all water under the bridge!).

 

For Aspen I'm not sure what the backstory is exactly. My parents got her right after I was born. It was really another addition to the family—she rounded us out, if you will. I grew up with Aspen, when someone asks me about my childhood dog, I talk about her. We really did grow up together . . . we were the same age all the same time, she was with me through every awkward phase of my life. She was my best friend, and when she died I never cried more. It sounds horrible, but when my grandparents died I didn't cry as much as when Aspen died. I cried for days and the last night that she was with us I slept in her crate with her. I truly had such an emotional attachment to her. 

 

Then currently we also have another dog—so we’re still a two-dog house. His name is Dax, and he's the first boy dog we've ever had. Dax is an English cream retriever, and we got him because Okemo grew up with another dog in the house and when Aspen passed away we could tell that she was not in a great place. That seems like a dramatic statement to say about a dog, but we feel like it's pretty true. So Dax was kind of a way to bring that light back into her life, like we did for Aspen. And Dax is really the most lovable dog ever. We joke all the time together that they have the quintessential brotherly sisterly relationship—they fight like a like no other, but they’re  the closest the two dogs could be. It’s just amazing. So we got him when I was a freshman in college, so I always joke that my parents were just replacing me with him. But, I remember I was in a club meeting and all of a sudden I got a FaceTime call from my parents who were in Pennsylvania, picking out a dog. I left my club meeting, camped out in the hallway, and was like “what is going on?”Anyway, that's really how they all showed up in my life.

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Had your family always been “a dog family”—or dog friendly? What was the impetus for getting a dog in the first place?

Getting Aspen just seemed to be the right thing. We just moved into a new house, we had a new baby (me!), it seemed like it was a great way to round up the family. My parents bought the dogs growing up, so even before we were a dog family, we were dog family. My dad definitely had a closer bond with his dog which was a beagle. Our first dog, Aspen, was also a beagle, so I think that's kind of how we brought her into our lives. So yeah, we had this amazing family in this new house and I suppose it still seemed like something missing. I think from my parent's perspective it was because they had both grown up with dogs, and appreciated that a family wasn't a family without a dog.

 

And as for their names: all of them are named after mountains. We're big skiing and outdoorsy family—our entire summers are spent outdoors. Even now during the quarantine when most people are binging Netflix and everything, we have a rule in our family where we're not allowed to turn on the TV until 5 p.m. because our parents want us to be outdoors doing things. So all of the names stem from our love for the outdoors. Aspen is in Colorado, and that was one of our first family trips out West. Okemo is a mountain in Vermont. Most of my life has been spent in Northern New York and Vermont—that's where my parents got married right near there, so that has a special significance to us. And then Dax is short for the Adirondacks, which is in Northern New York. It's where I really grew up . . . we have a summer home on Lake George, and it's just our family happy place.

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What’s your favorite memory with all of your dogs?

 

Merging Aspen and Okemo together, I think my favorite memory is when I first felt like Okemo was actually becoming a part of our family and Aspen and her were getting along well together. At first it felt like she was terrorizing him—she was just a little puppy and Aspen was so old and I had such a special connection with Aspen that I didn't take to Okemo as quickly because I always thought that she was like a bully. 

 

But one year we took our Christmas photos of my sister and me in front of our Christmas tree with Aspen in Okemo. And usually they'll play fight with each other all day long if they’re anywhere near each other and for whatever reason this day they were the picture-perfect dogs. I just don't know how it happened, but you took the camera out and we were one big happy family it was so funny. So I guess it's my favorite memory of Okemo. 

 

And then backtracking to Aspen—she was honestly the most hysterical dog that I've ever had in my entire life. Hysterical not in the sense of crying and whining, but more in the sense of she was so funny and she was so smart. So to preface this memory, we had to redo our kitchen at one point—remodel, reconfigure it and everything—because Aspen was so driven by food and so smart. We always think of the TV show MacGyver to describe her, which is about a man who fixes things that seem impossible to fix, and he does it with something like a paper clip. So we always used to call Aspen to MacGyver because no matter what obstacles you put in her way, if there was food on the other side of the gate he was she with some way figure out how to jerry-rig the gate to open up. Basically that being said this is after we had remodeled our kitchen, and we were like “This is great, we haven't had any bad accidents yet.” She used to get into a fridge a lot so that hasn't been happening; she used to be able to climb on the countertop and end up at the garbage can and push it over, and that hadn't been happening anymore. So we were happy about that until one day when we were all sitting on the couch after a day of school for me and after a day of work for my parents. We had a leather couch, and the sides of it would always get filled up with dog hair and what not.  This day my mom was cleaning up the dog hair from the side of the couch, and then all of a sudden she felt something squishy. She was confused, but not yet alarmed. She moves a cushion over a little bit and we find an entire package of stuffed shells, stuffed shells stuffed into the side of the couch. Aspen was not only smart enough to somehow figure out how to get herself into the freezer of the brand new remodeled kitchen that we thought we had Aspen-proofed, but she was also smart enough to know that the stuffed shells could only be eaten if they were defrosted . . . so she put them into feet in between cushions to defrost them.  So that was just so quintessentially Aspen and it has to be my favorite memory. 

 

And then I'm not sure with Dax he's probably the most lovable dog I've ever had and that's me saying that from just having him throughout college. I think he is more lovable than my childhood dog and everything. But he it's just so perfect that I don't know if there's a memory that stands out more than others. I guess I'll talk about when we first got him . . . so he's an English Cream Retriever and they are really well known for being water dogs, which is one of the reasons we got him. Okemo, our Husky, didn’t necessarily love the water the way we thought she might—I don't know why we expected that she would because Huskies just don't like the water—but when we brought her up to Lake George for the first time, and we were out on our boat, she was not just not having it. She would take maybe one lap throughout the lake and then  sit right back on the back of the boat to sunbathe for the rest of the time while we were out there. But when we first got Dax, my Dad was determined to make him a water dog—regardless of whether or not he wanted to be one. Basically when we got him it was October and every year we opened our pool in May. I would say by the first full week of us having the pool open,  my Dad decided that it was time for Dax to figure it all out. So he took my dog, opened up the screen door, had my dog in his hand—who was still a baby at this point, maybe 25 pounds— and without any warning, throws Dax into the pool. This was the first time that the pool had been open while Dax was alive, so he was confused as to why there was this body of water in the backyard. 

 

So yeah, he just throws him in—no warning, no dipping his paws in first—and Dax just swims around and around and around the pool. And he can't find the stairs. We were thought “Oh wow! He loves the pool so much!”, but then quickly realized that he didn’t know how to get out. He was swimming over to us, trying to put his paws on the edge of the pool where we were standing. That was so funny and just marks his love for the water; everything we have bonded over has been like swimming and kayaking, etc. But that was when I knew that he was just going to be such a great addition to our family.

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What’s one thing that you know today that you wouldn’t have known without your dogs?

I don't know if I wouldn't have known it otherwise, but I think I'm a lot more responsible solely because of my dogs. I joke with my parents now that I'm home in quarantine that I'm a single dog parent because I completely take over in the motherly department with my two dogs. I'm the one who feeds them every morning and every night. I take them on a walk every day regardless of whether it’s pouring rain. We had a tornado the other day, and after everything settled I was like “okay time to go on a walk!” So I feel like knowing how to take care of another animal just prepares you so much for going off to college and having to take care for yourself and going out to the real world, and being on your own. I just think it’s such an invaluable experience, and I don’t know if I would be the person I am today without them—especially growing up with one since I was a baby.

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What has your relationship with dogs taught you? What has your dog given you?

I think dogs, above all, teach people about unconditional love. And I don’t think there is anyone else but my parents who have showed me that—besides my dogs, of course. I think it is something really unique to not having a pet . . . I also had a cat growing up and I just never had that same bond and that same experience with him (Benny). I used to joke that Benny lived to terrorize me; I still have scars on my body from him scratching me. But my dogs are different. I remember when I went through my first big breakup, I remember crying in my bedroom and all of sudden I hear Okemo scratching at my door because she knew something was wrong. And I let her in and she just sat with me for hours. No one gives you that type of love, other than the people you’re closest to and dogs. And I think that if you don’t have that experience growing up, you don’t truly know what unconditional love is, and how to give it to other people.

 

Going off of that, when I was in high school, my grandmother moved into my house because she had Alzheimer’s. Her best friend—and her rock through it all—was Okemo. Regardless of whether or not she remembered my name, she would remember Okemo. That is in large part because Okemo would always sit at her legs. She had her own chair in our living room—a tan recliner that was solely grandma’s chair—and you would only find Okemo near the tan recliner. Dogs just know when something is wrong. They know how to give all the love in the world, without asking for anything in return. And I think that’s just so special.

 

 

What would you say to someone that was contemplating getting a dog—or someone who was dog-skeptical? What would your pitch be?

I think you get so much from dogs—even more than you put in. Dogs take a lot of responsibility, and a lot of money, and time, and care. But the memories that you have from them, and what you get out of it is just so much greater than everything that you have to put in. I think they teach you so much about life, and love, and responsibility. They are just the best parts of my life. Every day when I wake up, I come stumbling down the stairs, half asleep, and I get kisses from my dogs, and I know the day is going to be a good one because they’re here in my life. I’m stuck in quarantine, but every day I have structure at least because I know have to feed my dogs and take them on walks. I feel like people become better when they have something like a dog to take care of, and for them to get something out of.

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