Karat - Part 2

I got a phone call at work. It was Andrea and she said, “There is a dog in our garage.”

I said “Is he mean? If not run him out!”

She said, “I put him there.”

That was the first I knew about Karat. I thought we would find his owner and get back to our one dog existence.

Karat was a mellow dog. He never got too excited about anything. One of the reasons we got a dog was so I could run with it. As soon as Bella grew up enough I started running with her. The problem though is that she is so hyperactive that she would pull me down the street when I wasn’t fast enough. Then she would wrap me in the leash as she ran in big circles around my intended path. When it was safe I would just drop the leash and let Bella run free and she loved it.

After we got Karat I would take Bella out of the pen in the morning to run and he would just whine. I thought maybe he wanted to go running too so when he was old enough to run I put the leash on him instead of Bella. It turns out that he wasn’t interested in running at all. He just didn’t want Bella to leave.

As we ran I had to practically drag Karat along with me. Where Bella was spastic, Karat was lethargic. We ran on the sidewalk that goes behind the houses on Azalea. When we made the turn away from the road I dropped the leash so Karat could run free. Instead of taking off like a rocket as Bella normally did Karat stopped.

I stopped too and turned around and looked at him. He looked at me like “If you want me to run some more you’re going to have to make me.”

In the mornings when I fed the dogs I would let them out and they would run and play. Karat was the dog who would come fall on my feet as I filled up the water bowl because he wanted me to pet him. Only after I scratched his ears or rubbed his belly would he go off to see what Bella was up to.