LETTERS From CAMP Rehoboth |
CAMP Talk: Rehoboth Vote Goes to the Dogs |
by Bill Sievert |
Sometimes it seems like the pooches of Rehoboth Beach are more popular than their people are. When Nassau Gallery was damaged by a late-night fire in June, the very first thing almost everyone wanted to know the next morning was whether Buster, Starr and Rocky had been in the building. A sign had to be hastily posted on the boarded up window to let everyone know that the three miniature schnauzers were all fine. A few folks also inquired as to whether their human companion, the gallery's owner, might have been hurt in the blaze. Lots of regular visitors to Rehoboth know that the guy who runs the Critter Beach shop has a Portuguese waterdog called Tucker, though many have no idea by what name to address the proprietor himself. Scores of pedestrians stop and say hello to another renowned canine Rocky as he makes his rounds with one of his owners from Rock Creek. You know, what's his name? In John's and my store, many people who have no clue as to our names frequently drop by to ask, "Where's Nikki?" If our two-and-a-half year old Shih Tzu happens not to be present, I'll say, "Oh, she worked the morning shift today. She prefers to have her evenings off for dinner parties." Usually, the person inquiring mutters a disappointed, "Oh," and quickly moves on. There are so many popular pups sharing the streets and shops of Rehoboth Beach that I know I will be hounded for failing to include them all. Among them are Sophie at the Cotton Club, Chester at Caf Papillon and Nike at Java Beach Coffee, which is also the site of the twice a year "Gay Wienie Dog Convention" of dachshunds and their people. Sam Hill, a mixed with a bit of Rhodesian ridgeback, is frequently spotted dragging CAMP Rehoboth President Murray Archibald through the CAMP courtyard. CAMP Rehoboth Secretary Amy Gehlert is led around by the multi-chinned Shar-Pei T.J. Our Nikki's best buddies are Beau, a tiny tea-cup Yorkie who rules the roost of Amy Stein, and Willie, a big mixed-breed poodle who owns the owners of the animal-theme gift shop Noah's Lark. As a rule, those of us who share our lives with a dog look kindly upon all breeds, irrespective of size, color, gender or sexual orientation. But for the past two summers there has been a new source of divisiveness in our usually tolerant town, a friction that pits pet against pet, owner vs. owner. The competition is far fiercer than our local mayoral elections, in which the same man is returned to office term after term, running on his usual platform of: "You know what you're getting here." The cause of the competition in our canine community is the annual "Best Pet on the Beach" contest sponsored by Atlantic Color Lab and Critter Beach. Since its inception, all of us animal owners have found cause to lift our personal pet to a higher pedestal, praising it as prettier, smarter and totally superior to those curs and bitches of our neighbors. Last year, John and I ignored the pet contest. It's sillier than the Miss America pageant and the Peoples Choice Awards combined, we decided. How can you pick one dog as the "best on the beach?" And, to make matters worse, the contest includes cats in the same category! If that's not a classic example of comparing apples to oranges, one guaranteed to make neither feline nor canine owners content. Unfortunately, after watching so many other pet parents enter their precious charges last summer, we decided we'd have to participate this yearfor the sake of our Shih Tzu's honor. (And, speaking of honor, the name is pronounced Sheet-Zu, no soft "i" on the first syllable, please.) Entering Nikki in the contest has been most stressful for us, and for the tolerant staff at Atlantic Color Lab. We have scrapbook upon scrapbook of photographs of Nikki, from her earliest bunny-like hops around the front yard as a seven-week-old pup through her ever-changing hairdos and hues of fur. (No, she doesn't color her fur; she simply becomes naturally blonder at certain times of the year.) Which single pictorial image could we pick to represent the essence of such a beautiful, multi-faceted young lady? John and I particularly like a shot of her (in one of her blondest stages) seated nobly on a matching white Victorian chair. She looks rather regal, sort of like Cate Blanchett in "Elizabeth." So we entered the photo. Almost as soon as it was posted, a friend objected. "That doesn't capture the real Nikki, with her long luxuriant tail or her pretty eyes and that cute way she cocks her little head." So we set out to shoot another roll of film, being advised that it is permissible to change the picture we had entered. Twenty-six shots later we still could not persuade Nikki to cock her little head on command, but the folks at Atlantic Color Lab selected a shot of her sprawled on her tummy with her bushy tail wagging contentedly. Good enough, we decided. Until we saw the entry posted for a Lhasa Apso, one that looked remarkably like our Nikki, but with a spiffy red bow around its neck. "Oh my God!" I cried. "That dog looks cuter than our dog." It was back to the drawing boards, hours of digging through our files of negatives in search of yet another photo. "We've got to go with a gimmick," John urged. "All the best entries show the dogs doing something." "Well, we've always loved the photo of her riding that raft," I said. John concurred that the image of Nikki floating on a zebra-shaped float in a swimming pool is indeed "priceless." "So, would you take the negative in and ask them to change the entry again?" I asked timidly. He shot me a look that cried "Wimp!" but agreed that this latest picture had "winner" written all over it. That is, until the next morning as we glanced through the pages of a local publication. There, in an advertisement for the pet contest, was a photo of a dog riding a raft in a swimming pool. "We are NOT changing the picture again," John ordered. "By the way, what is the prize for the winner?" "Prize? I'm not sure they've promised a prize, except that they'll run the animal's picture in an ad or something." "You mean, we've gone to all this trouble and there's no prize?" "It's not a matter of the size of the prize," I reminded him. "It's about well, it's about..." John cut me off. "It's a good thing Nikki is our only kid," he said, and he is right. We are doting parents. We allow our child to strew scores of chew toys all over the house so that we cannot even walk in bare feet without cutting ourselves on some sharp, half-eaten chunk of rawhide. When Nikki coughs (or swallows her diaphragm, as some smaller breeds tend to do occasionally), we drop everything and hold our breath, ready to race to the vet if she doesn't calm down within 20 seconds. We sometimes decline social invitations unless Nikki is invited to come with us. (She truly does love going to dinner parties, and we sometimes think that the only reason we are invited is so that our friends can romp with our dog.) I have no idea how we will take the news if some other dog (or, heaven forbid, cat) is the victor when the contest results are posted in a few days. Actually, I do have an idea how we'll react. Exactly like parents whose human kid loses her or his quest for student-body president or homecoming queen. We will whine that the ballot box was stuffed and that the winner is homely and goofy looking. We will comfort each other with the knowledge that beauty contests are trivial and that we will re-direct our energies towards more important prioritiessuch as working on the special trick that (we know) will win Nikki a trip to Broadway and her television debut on David Letterman's show. Then, Tucker and Nike and Willie and the Rockys will sidle up to her on Baltimore Avenue, sniff her backside admiringly and snort, "You, go girl!" Bill Sievert is co-owner of Splash, a clothing and accessories store on Baltimore Avenue, and the Program Director of CAMPsafe, CAMP Rehoboths AIDS education and prevention program. |
LETTERS From CAMP Rehoboth, Vol. 9, No. 10, July 30, 1999 |