Mars Bars in Bolliewood: Miss Marley Mack, Mack, Mack...

All dressed in black, black, black
With silver buttons, buttons, buttons
All down her back, back, back

I'd be lying if I said I didn't sing this (slightly modified) clapping game to Marley...It's suiting - talks about jumping fences, which is totally Marley's thing.

(beautiful photos by Lorelei Hoffarth for the Windy City Canine Rescue/Lethbridge Fire Department calendar fundraiser)

Marley steamrolled my life almost exactly 1 year ago. She was just another foster dog through Windy City Canine Rescue...she wasn't supposed to stay. She welcomed herself into my house and in the first night she (literally) bounced off the walls, flipped out in her crate and bent all the wires, and ripped a huge mouthful of beautiful white hair out of Ollie's tail. She was an absolute, complete and total spaz.

Marley was surrendered to the rescue - something along the lines of boyfriend and old girlfriend had the dog, new girlfriend didn't like the old girlfriend's dog. When our volunteer went to pick her up, Marley (then Harley) was wearing a studded collar, had never left her back yard, never ridden in a car, never walked on a leash. Oh yay. She was shedding like mad, covered in dandruff and her coat was dull. So, we changed her name, put a smiley face collar on her, started her on good food and vacuumed her daily :)

Her spazziness escalated in the car - she would snap, snarl and scream at every car, bus, bicycle, pedestrian, skateboard we passed. I ran her for hours everyday, slowly working off the steam and the seemingly years of pent up energy. Slowly but surely she started to mellow out. Slowly but surely, she wormed her way into my heart. Don't know why an easier dog couldn't worm it's way in instead...

I fostered Marley for 7 months. For 7 months we searched for a home for her. We had only one inquiry and it wasn't a good fit. Nobody called, nobody emailed, nobody even wanted to ask a question about Marley - and we hadn't even told anyone how crazy she was! I cried the day I was hanging up rescue posters and this is what I saw:

That's the poster for Marley right there in the middle. Not one single phone number taken.

So, we continued on. Got her into the fundraising calendar. Did extra blog posts about her. Showed her off at Meet and Greet park days. Took her thru manners training classes. Still nothing. Maybe because of her pitbull looks? Maybe because she is big and black? Maybe because I secretly loved her a lot and she already knew she was home?

Late last summer I signed the adoption papers. It was shortly after she had whupped the pants off my other foster dog and we were all worried about what to do with her and where she could go. A normal person would have sent her away. A sane person wouldn't have touched her with a 10 foot pole. Not me. Noooo...I decided to keep her psycho savage badass-ness in my life for good. But I don't regret it :)

Wait, nope I regretted it on Tuesday night when I came out of Tim Hortons and my car looked like this:

It's been a learning experience to say the least. She is the complete opposite of Oliver in every single way. I've had to learn to be patient and calm, to speak her language and anticipate her triggers. To only put her in situations where she is bound to succeed (ok, so I didn't do such a great job of that on Tuesday) She has separation anxiety, leash aggression and is highly reactive. She is smart as a whip, has a strong bond to me, and tries so, so hard to keep me happy. She is beautiful, striking and athletic. She is tender and gentle with kids. She's my couch potato at home. In public, well that's just a different story altogether. She chases vacuum cleaners, fishing lines, and the automatic car wash sprayer thing. She throws herself around with reckless abandon, over 6 foot fences, single leaps down a full flight of stairs, shreds her way out of a soft crate at agility class in 13 seconds flat. That was also my bad. Our first teambuilding agility class we spent at the far end of the field away from all the other dogs, so she could collect a semblance of focus. Now we can make it through a rally-obedience class working beside all the other dogs, with maybe only one or two spaz-attacks per hour. We're working on it...little by little...we'll get there.