It didn’t work. Early this afternoon, we took Rocko back to the family that adopted him a week ago. (Coincidentally, they live about 500 yards from us right here in West Richland.) So we’re a one-dog family again.
It wasn’t so much a problem with Rocko, or with the two dogs together. They were doing pretty well — although I was surprised to see Sparky get mean and aggressive towards Rocko at feeding time; we had to feed them separately.
The problem was with mainly with me.
After we got home with Rocko yesterday, I had all kinds of feelings of guilt for the rest of the night — guilt about taking someone else’s dog. The other family adopted him last Saturday. The first couple days were rough, with Rocko being too aggressive and the kids not doing too well with him. That’s when we contacted the shelter and learned he was with another family. Then a day or two later, the shelter called and said the family was struggling a bit with Rocko and they knew about our interest, so they wanted us to see if he’d be a good fit at our house. When we went to pick him up at the shelter on Friday, the mom explained how rough it was the first couple days, but also mentioned that every day had gotten better, and how her daughter was excited that there were no problems at all for two days in a row.
Rocko was settling in with them when we came to take him. And I couldn’t shake that feeling all night while he was hanging out with me and Sparky on Friday night. Felt horrible about taking someone else’s dog, even though they were willing to let us.
Secondary to that was learning that I’m a one-dog guy. I’m more attached and loyal to Sparky than I think I realized, and even while Rocko was laying down at my feet for most of last night, I wanted Sparky to be there. I realized that I’d never love Rocko the same way I love Sparky … and that wouldn’t be fair to Rocko.
There was talk of waiting a day or two to see if the guilty feeling would go away, but I think the best thing was to get him back to the family that he’d been with for the past week. Get him back to what he was getting used to. So, the two-dog era is over. We won’t be doing that again. Sparky is all the dog we want.
Bye Rocko … thanks for visiting. (On the bright side, he lives right near the park where we sometimes walk Sparky, so I suspect we’ll see him again.)
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