The Rip Van Wrinkler, XVII, Issue 2, May 2013

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Ruth Kamen, 1973

The “How my dog entered my life. . ." Contest

generated a whole lot of fabulous stories,

so each gets it's own page.

Dennis Allen

Karen Christensen

Uschi Grewe

Lisa Marshall

Susan Marsicano

Yvonne 't Mannetje

Tamara Allen

Donna Hess

see tease for each below.

Dennis Allen

HOW I LEARNED ABOUT BASENJI'S.

I was working for a guy painting and plastering and fixing his rentals.  He had three house's all next to each other. While I was scraping paint on the middle house. I heard some scuffling behind me, and on the other side of the fence, that ran around the first house, a group of smallish dogs had appeared. They were all Red and White little dogs with wrinkled brows, pointy ears.  They made me think they were wondering, "what  is that weird guy doing?"

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Karen Christensen

Not  long after I bought my first house I started to seriously consider getting a dog. My brother thought I needed one, too -- though he thought I, as a single woman in an urban environment, needed a Rottweiler! My mother alternately questioned how I could live without a dog, and how I could even consider getting one what with my work and travel schedule. We'd had dachshunds and a mini poodle growing up, and I thought both were fine but not necessarily what I wanted. And I was busy, so. . .

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Uschi Grewe

HOW WE CAME TO GET LADY…..

We always had a dog in our family! Before the Basenjis we had a longhaired Dachshound. He had a lot of health troubles with his back and that was the reason why we decided “we must have a dog with longer legs”! To get him on his couch, we build him stairs, to make life for him easier.

To be honest, we tried to keep him off the sofa because of his back. But he was clever. Whenever we came home we could feel the warm spot where he had been on the sofa.  As soon as he heard the key in the door, he quickly got down.

Because of all this, Friedhelm told me “…when Tommy dies, we will not have another dog soon!”

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Dagmar Herhoffer


Lisa Marshall

OUR FIRST BASENJI

By the time our daughter was a toddler, Jim and I could see we had a dog lover on our hands.  I would spend many hours with her at any and all neighbors who had dogs she could pet and play with.  One day I said to Jim, “we should just get a dog of our own”.

We started attending local dog shows and reading books about dog breeds.  The AKC Complete Dog Book was one book we brought home from the library over and over.  We wanted a small to medium size dog.  At first we liked the Border Terrier and Jim had grown up on stories about his dad’s Scottish Terrier, Angus.  But when we saw the photo of the Basenji in the AKC book we were fascinated and had to find out more.

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Susan Marsicano

THE STORY OF APU

My mother was young & trying to keep my asthmatic sibling alive, when I was growing up, but I brought every stray dog home. She, without fail, had them all carted off. She was doing her best.

I left home at the age of 17 to go to art school in NYC. I left Long Island, NY, in 1958, got out of the subway, at Astor Place, in Manhattan, stepped over a sleeping derelict and so my life began, for real, at Cooper Union Art School. Cooper is a scholarship school. I was so proud to be admitted, and am still proud to be a CUAS alumna.

In l959, the day after I left home, I walked to the 92nd St. ASPCA in a blizzard (the subways weren't running). That day I got my first dog that I could keep. She was a wee prick-eared cinnamon colored short-coated mix, with one ear a little floppy, about 3 to 4 months old, and she had distemper. I named her Apu.

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Yvonne 't Mannetje

Ch’ami came into our lives to safe Chica’s life (our beloved cat). Her brother Jordi suddenly died 3 weeks shy of his 8th birthday. The two of them were very, very close. Jordi protected his sister against “enemies” in the neighborhood while the little coward was hiding under the couch. He also spoiled her rotten by washing her thoroughly every night, holding her tight in his arms. There was this special “brand” of mice Chica loved a lot, so being the gentlemen he was Jordi regularly went out and brought her home one, making a special sound to alert her. When she was outside herself, he just left the mouse –dead or alive- on the kitchen rug, thinking she would find it later. ….

We gave Chica the opportunity to say her last goodbye to her beloved brother, but she was in total denial. The following days, weeks she wouldn’t eat. We brought all her favorite food in little portions to her, without success. She lost a lot of weight. Chica developed a nervous tic. She licked her belly as if she wanted to lick the grief away. This resulted in her having a bald belly.

We fought very hard to get her out of her depression, but she seemed to have lost interest in life. Kees and I understood she needed a companion, but she was hostile against other cats. We thought of a dog, but had no clue as yet about a breed that would fit us all. Then we came across this poster in a magazine with drawings of some special breeds and we immediately noticed the Basenji, wanting to get to know more. . .

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Tamara Allen

I do remember driving to visit Fawn and Batsy - I remember most the drive home, but not the drive there, and I remember meeting Fawn and Batsy for the first time.

Dennis actually called Karen Jones, and talked goofy - she called him back and they chatted - she had played cello I think and did movie scores in her "Free time" when she wasn't rescuing basenjis.  Josh, Dennis and I drove up to Hollywood - through Los Angeles, near Burbank, and found Karen's houses.

At that time she had two small houses, next to one another, filled with basenjis in crates, in the living room, bedrooms, garage.  When Dennis had talked to her on Wednesday she had said there was a pair coming in that she felt would be right for us. And older pair of dogs, mother and son.  It was October 1995 that we got Bastion and Fawn.  Seems longer that they were with us. It struck me that Karen said solemnly, that these two did not belong at the rescue - they needed to be rehomed quickly. 

When we got to her house, she greeted us and I was surprised. . .

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Donna Hess

I can’t believe it, but it has been a little more than a year since we adopted Nora. It has been a long journey, but ultimately the ending has been happy.

We’ve had several retired racing greyhounds over the past fifteen years. When our last little girl left us, my heart just needed a change. I had always wanted a Basenji, I like the breed’s intelligence and looks, and the dog would fit in with my Aussies activity-wise. I contacted BRAT, who I must say is the most organized rescue group I have ever encountered. The website is wonderful and I fell in love with Nora’s beautiful face. Many phone calls and emails ensued. BRAT sent me her profile and told me about the behavior issues she had.

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