W. Bruce Cameron - Here Comes Tucker

October is National Sarcastic Awareness Month. Right, I’ll be sure to celebrate that. It’s also National Caffeine-Addiction-Recovery Month, but I don’t know what events the organizers are planning because I’ve slept through the meetings.

Some people celebrate October as Bat-Appreciation Month, which I can, well, appreciate, but I am not sure what to make of the declaration that it’s also National Window-Covering-Safety Month: I guess one should cover one’s windows with drapes and not with something less safe, like maybe explosives.

Most significant for me is that October is National Adopt-a-Shelter-Dog Month, which I celebrated by adopting a shelter dog named Tucker. As of this writing, he’s been alive 11 weeks, but he’s been chewing my shoes only one of them. Before he came to live with us, he was sheltered by Nikeno’s Second Chances, a Denver-based animal-rescue group of which my daughter is a co-founder. Dumped into a box within scant hours of his birth, Tucker and his siblings found their way to Nikeno’s by a kind person who realized that without immediate intervention, the newborns would die.

As to the person who so heartlessly abandoned the newborns, could I just say that I hope that he winds up on the receiving end of Bat-Appreciation Month? (If it is “bat” as in flying mammal as opposed to “bat” as in baseball, I just hope they are flying mammals who bite.)

Of course, I’m a forgiving person who can find it in my heart to truly wish no actual harm comes to the callous, pitiless dog-dumper. There, I’m celebrating National Sarcastic Awareness Month after all.

Tucker and his brothers and sisters were taken to a German shepherd rescue dog named Belinda, who had just hours before weaned her litter of pups. Belinda looked at the shelter workers with a “you’ve got to be kidding me!” expression, but ultimately took the pups in and nursed them as her own. Perhaps Belinda believed she had had a wild night a couple months back that she couldn’t remember. The puppies were tiny — probably born of an unspayed spaniel, by the look of Tucker’s features, though there is really no way to know.

I’ve got a book out right now called “A Dog’s Purpose,” so the question I’m asked most often is “what kind of dog do you own?” I’m proud to be able to honestly say, “I don’t know.” But by rescuing Tucker, I actually saved two dogs who might otherwise have been euthanized — Tucker, of course, plus the death-row dog who was rescued and took his place at Nikeno’s.

Tucker may be of dubious heritage, but he is a genius, I promise you. He has a demonstrated ability to reach up onto a coffee table, dig into a pile of mail, and locate and shred a check. All the credit-card bills and solicitations that he could have destroyed to my complete indifference, and he finds the only item that I care about. That’s what he shreds. A bookshelf full of paperbacks I’ve forgotten I even own, and Tucker can locate the signed first edition of “The Caine Mutiny” and eat out the signature page while I’m taking a shower.

After a stern lecture on why I need my sleep, Tucker woke me up at three in the morning to further discuss the issue. He also needed to go outside, though once there it took 15 minutes for him to find the exact right spot for him to do his business. He seemed pretty disgusted that I immediately bagged and removed his work of art without taking any time at all to admire it.

He is, of course, adorable. I’ve abandoned all attempts at work and pretty much spend my days on the floor wrestling with him. He weighs only about 7 pounds, so I pin him a lot more than he pins me. It’s tiring, though — his energy seems limitless, while I’m both sleep-deprived and exhausted by all the unaccustomed crawling and dog-fighting. In fact, by evening I can barely keep my eyes open, and put more work into preparing his dinner than I do my own.

I guess you could say I’m all Tuckered out.

To write Bruce Cameron, visit his website at http://www.wbrucecameron.com. To find out more about Bruce Cameron and read features by other Creators Syndicate writers and cartoonists, visit the Creators Syndicate webpage at http://www.creators.com.

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