Graduation Day

Memo to self: the next time one of our CCI puppies graduates, wear waterproof mascara.

I actually considered doing that yesterday morning, as I was putting on my make-up in preparation for the special day ahead of us. I don’t like the waterproof stuff; at the end of the day it’s so hard to remove. And I reflected, “I usually don’t cry that much,” thinking of all the days on which we’ve turned in puppies. “Usually only at the very end when we’re saying goodbye.” Foolishly, I applied regular mascara, that kind that runs and smears when tears fill your eyes.

I’d forgotten how different graduations are from turn-ins — not surprising, considering that the last time one of our dogs actually graduated was 8 and a half years ago (Brando in August of 2011). The whole structure of the day is different. Puppy-raisers turning in dogs don’t arrive until mid- to late morning, and the main event comes at noon, when the ceremony begins. Shortly after it starts, everyone watches the slide show of adorably cute photos of the puppies who are matriculating. Then all the puppy-raisers parade onstage with their charges to receive ceremonial rosettes and be applauded. It’s heartwarming, but it never makes me cry.

If you’ve raised a puppy that is graduating, in contrast, the day begins at 9 a.m., when you assemble in a big work room in which long tables have been set up. You get your first sight of your dog’s new family (see the framed photo, above.) The head of the training program gives a little prep talk (e.g. be positive when you reminisce about your experiences in raising the dog; don’t be too nosy about the recipient’s disability). Then shortly after 9:30, the recipients file in.

Steve and I greeted the family for whom Adagio will serve as a Skilled Companion, then we all sat down. Dina, the mom, blinked rapidly then apologized for feeling emotional. But I was blinking too, startled by the wave of strong feeling that swept over me. Suddenly I recalled that I had felt exactly the same way when Brando graduated. It takes so many steps, big and small, to bring you together with the family across the table. And here you are, sharing this canine that you love. Turning in your puppy to begin its Advanced Training is like sending your kid off to college, but to me graduation feels like going to his or her wedding.

In the hour and a quarter that followed, we learned much that made me feel good about Adagio’s destiny. He is the second CCI dog chosen to serve this family. (Amazingly, Dina and Tony participated in that training session 8 and a half years ago with Brando. They instantly remembered Aimee and Yuriy, the couple to whom Brando was awarded.) Their first dog, Emilio, is still alive and well, but aging enough that it seemed time for him to stop working (though he will live out his life with them).

They live in Orange County and seemed happy at the prospect of staying in touch with us in the coming months and years. Julianna, who’s now 14, is non-verbal and she’s inclined to rock a lot, often forcefully, but Dina reported that Adagio seemed undisturbed by her movements. In the training dorm, he fell asleep next to her and soon was snoring loudly, while Julianna seemed comforted by his presence.

After a while, one recipient after another stood and took a microphone to talk about what their dog was going to mean in their lives. Several were men in wheelchairs who’d lost their ability to walk. Three were able-bodied women who would be taking their dogs to work (one to comfort crime victims, for example; another to cheer psychiatric patients). The rest were families with children struggling with terrible challenges, like Julianna’s. Generically, their stories are familiar; they’re the folks to whom CCI has always given its dogs. But hearing the actual voices of real individuals, seeing their obvious fortitude and gratitude and optimism packs a emotional punch. The details make a difference, like Dina’s description of how the canine companion transforms her family’s routine outings to a mall. People stare at Julianna’s unusual appearance; her convulsive movements. But when a proud, handsome dog accompanies them, it deflects and transforms that cruel attention.

After the brunch, all the puppy raisers moved to another large room to reunite with the dogs we had raised. When the trainers let Adagio out of his kennel, I almost wondered if they’d made a mistake; directed us to the wrong animal. He looked so much bigger than I remembered. But his frantic tail-wagging made it clear that he at least recognized Steve and me.

We spent some sweet time petting him and taking photos…

Adagio’s beautiful litter mate, Apple, also graduated. She will work with crime victims in Colorado.

Eventually we loaded him into the van to drive to the Vista complex where the ceremonies unfold. Several more things happened that startled me and touched my heart.  The little box of beautiful cookies made by Janice Flynn (who with her husband Dan are the most epic dog folks I know, having raised more than 20 CCI puppies, most of whom have graduated.)

The beautiful engraved frame which we will fill with a photo of the handsome Mr. A — a completely unexpected gift from a whole crew of regular puppy raisers I have come to cherish.

Adagio got to sit with Steve and me throughout the program. A dark moment came well into the ceremonies, when I realized we were on the brink of handing over the leash to his new family, this time for good. I whispered for him to come to me, then I bent over and petted and petted him. He wagged his tail and looked into my eyes.

Then it seemed it was over in a flash. Except it’s not. This morning I received some photos from Dina. They all make me happy:

Emilio and Adagio — best buds already?

 

 

 

Hallelujah!

It’s been such a long time coming, but this morning Steve and I got the call every puppy-raiser dreams of: informing us that our handsome boy, Adagio, has been “pre-matched” for service as a Skilled Companion.

Becky Hein, the puppy program manager for CCI’s Southwest regional office, told me Adagio has been paired with a 14-year-old girl from Orange County. If the next week goes well, we should meet her and her family at a special brunch up in Oceanside on Valentine’s Day morning. No dogs will attend the brunch, but once it’s over, we’ll be reunited with Adagio for a magical hour. Steve and I haven’t seen him since August 9, the day we turned him over to the crew up in Oceanside to begin his Advanced Training.

It’s always such a sad day for us. But Adagio seemed happy enough.

We’ve received several reports since then and were thrilled each time he passed another milestone. Now that he’s on the verge of graduating, it doesn’t seem real. Adagio was the 8th puppy we’ve raised for CCI, and only one of his predecessors (Brando) went on to a working career. (Adagio’s wonderful half-sister Beverly, whom we also raised, was released from the training program due to a medical problem.)

Other exciting news this morning was that Adagio’s littermate, Apple, also has been pre-matched and is tentatively slated to work with crime victims in Colorado.

Our first sight of Adagio and Apple when they arrived at Lindbergh Field back in January of 2018.

It’s been a long road. The next 9 days promises to be eventful (and a little nerve-racking).

Thrilling dog news!

We’ve gotten some news we haven’t had in a long, long time: one of our dogs will be continuing on to Team Training!

That’s Adagio, of course, who began his Advanced Training on that hot day back in August.

Happy to meet you, Mr. Trainer, sir!

Team Training is the session during which people who have been selected to receive CCI dogs move into the dormitories on the Oceanside campus. During the first two days, these folks work with a variety of dogs. CCI always has a few more candidate dogs than clients, to try and assure that every match will be a perfect one. On Wednesday, February 5, the preliminary matches will be announced. All of us puppy-raisers have been told we’ll get a call that day informing us of our dogs’ status.

If Adagio is not matched with anyone, he will likely continue for an additional three months, then go through the entire Team Training process again with the next class of humans. We’re told that dogs in this situation get a higher priority for placement.

Much can still go wrong. On occasion, a dog can still be released just before or during Team Training, or during their third  “semester” of Advanced Training. Still, it’s been more than eight years since any of our pups has gotten this far (that was Brando). So we’re delighted Adagio has reached this milestone. And as an extra bonus, Adagio’s sister, Apple, will be starting Team Training with him. How cool it would be to have two litter mates graduating together!

 

Adagio’s first report card!

I miss Adagio. Steve misses him. We miss having any dog in the house. Maybe if we’d gotten another CCI puppy immediately after turning in Adagio, or if Tucker were still with us, we wouldn’t miss Adagio as much. But living the dogless life for the past 7 weeks has kept him pretty high up in my consciousness and made me look forward to his first report card with particular eagerness. Now we’ve finally received it, and it feels pleasurable to have even this distant contact with him.

It wasn’t perfect. It was lovely to see all the good behaviors checked (“allows/accepts physical handling/grooming,” “attentive to handler,” “calm,” “interacts appropriately with dogs,” etc.) But he got also check marks next to four bad behaviors (anxiety, barking, prey drive, resistance). The note from his instructor, Grace, explained a bit more. “Adagio has adapted nicely to the professional training environment. Initially, he would show some hesitancy going over grates or jumping on surfaces, even refusing to do so at times. We have made some progress in this area, and are still working on building his confidence on new surfaces. Adagio will bark at his handler when he wants attention. On leash, he is very responsive and generally very willing. He is progressing with all new and known commands. He has shown to be distracted by the cat occasionally, but we are working through this. Thanks for all your hard working in raising this sweet boy!”

In the final section of the report, evaluating overall performance, he got all “Moderates.” Overall, it feels like a solid B to me.

Reaching this particular milestone finally prompted me to do something I’ve been meaning to do for ages: look up how long each of our previous pups lasted in Advanced Training before being released. Here’s what I calculated:

Tucker — 65 days, released after receiving one report card

Yuli — 69 days, also after one report card

Brando — never released. He GRADUATED!

Darby — 40 days. She didn’t even make it to her first report card.

Dionne — 89 days. Our most challenging and difficult pup, we look back and can hardly believe she made it through TWO report cards before her ejection.

Kyndall — 46 days. In contrast, this sweet thing also got the boot before even reaching her first report.

Beverly — 28 days. They must have been doing report cards super fast during her stay. She got one report, but then was released for health reasons.

Today marks Adagio’s 49th day in Advanced Training. Will he get to his next report, scheduled for about a month from now? Stay tuned

Bad news

I’ve enjoyed Adagio ever since we got him (a little over a year ago), but in recent weeks my affection for him has been building. Maybe part of it is losing Tucker. But Adagio also has reached a stage where he’s almost pure pleasure to live with. He wakes up in the morning bursting with happiness; happy to go for a walk or (if he’s very lucky) run around the nearby field for a short spell. Then he settles down, mostly snoozing throughout the day but ready to venture out if an opportunity arises. He does almost nothing wrong. We have a few things to work on to prepare him for a life of service — getting him to better ignore other dogs on the street; extending the time when he reliably stays down on command. But we’ve been relishing the thought of having until November 1 to work on these things.

That’s the date we were told he would have to be turned in for advanced training. (CCI includes this information in the paperwork, when they deliver each baby dog to its puppy-raiser.) By November 1, Adagio will be less than two weeks from his second birthday — a little older than most of the other CCI pups we’ve raised. I was aware that sometimes this “turn-in” date gets pushed forward, but I shoved that possibility from my mind. Then last week I received an email from the puppy program administrators at our local CCI training center. Adagio’s new turn-in date would be August 9, it announced. “Thank you so much for your flexibility! Rest assured that in the past dogs have turned in at a younger age. If your turn in was moved sooner, this change of a few months is not significant in relation to their potential success!”

At a couple of gatherings with other puppy-raisers, I soon learned that Adagio was not the only puppy who’s been moved up. His sister, Apple, has too, along with two other dogs close to Adagio’s age. Most of their puppy-raisers seemed more blasé about the news than us; they’d been half-expecting it. But Steve and I felt crushed to have three months less of life with Adagio. We love him!

As if to remind me that he hasn’t yet reached absolute perfection, Steve found this on Adagio’s bed yesterday afternoon:

Those are the mangled fragments of a set of earphones. Happily, Adagio found them in Steve’s garbage can. They’d stopped working, and Steve had discarded them. So no real harm was done. Still, the difference between stealing earphones from the trash or stealing something like that from a desk is close enough to remind us we’re not done with the task of civilizing him. We just have three months less to do it.

 

Report card day!

As promised, CCI sent out the first report today on the puppies who were turned in earlier in the month. We felt so relieved to get one regarding Beverly. Two of our previous six puppies (Darby and Kyndall) were released from Advanced Training before they even made it to this first landmark!

What the trainer had to say about our girl made us feel even better. All the “good” behaviors were checked (“allows/accepts physical handling/grooming,” “allows/accepts cradling,” “attentive to handler,” “calm,” “interacts appropriately with dogs,” “interacts appropriately with people,” “seeks direction,””walks nicely on leash,” “willing”) and only one of the “bad” behaviors was (“surface sensitivity”).  A note stated that “Beverly has settled in to the kennel environment since turning in for Professional Training. She interacts appropriately with other dogs in the play yard and checks in with her handler frequently. Beverly is calm and accepting of all aspects of the grooming process.” She “has some some surface sensitive to the stairs in the grooming room and grates around campus” — something Steve and I were keenly aware of and worried about. But the note continues, “We are working on this and have already seen some improvement. In training, Beverly is a willing worker and responds well to motivation and correction.”

All in all, it’s the best first report we’ve ever gotten for one of our puppies, including Brando (the only one who so far has gone on to graduate.) So we’ve feeling hopeful.

Not long after getting the email with Beverly’s report, we heard from the puppy raisers of Keegan (Beverly’s CCI doggy friend who lives not far from us and was in all the same classes with her) that Keegan also got an excellent report. Furthermore, the two of them have the same instructor. So that means at least they see each other regularly.

This is Beverly’s actual report. The ones above are Jeannette’s from the days of yore.