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Committing to adopting a pet is a serious decision for a family. It's always best to do it when the time feels right, but every once in awhile, things don't go exactly as planned...
Our Furry Friend
Adopting a dog can be one of the best things you can do for your family. Introducing a dog to your house can make you a more patient, more loving, and healthier person pretty much immediately. Bringing a dog into your life when you have kids is even better because they will always have a friend to be around, and they will always have something to do.
A Fluffy Mystery
For one particular family, adopting a puppy was extremely necessary. However, when this particular puppy started to act strangely, the family had to question whether they made the right decision in adopting this particular dog. In fact, they started to question whether this creature was even a dog at all…
Considering Adoption
Sun Yun was a super hardworking mother. Between raising her two kids, spending time with her husband, and working as a freelance graphic designer, Sun Yun barely had any time for herself. So, when her children proposed that they get a dog, her initial response was a resounding “no.” But, as she thought about it, adopting a dog would provide her with important breaks throughout the day that would keep her active and smiling, so she considered the request over the course of the next week.
Putting it in the Back of Her Mind
The more she thought about getting a dog, the more she found herself researching potential breeds that would work best with their limited space and her family’s allergies. She concluded that getting a puppy wouldn’t be the best idea at the moment, and she planned an impromptu family vacation instead. However, nothing could have prepared them for the bizarre circumstances that were awaiting them once they left their comfortable home…
Out and About
Sun Yun and her family hopped in their station wagon and drove towards the beach closest to their house. It was the beginning of the summer, so the sky was still a little overcast. The beach was windy and cold, so the family opted for a relaxing day walking on the promenade next to the shore. Most of the stores were open for the season, but the usual bustling crowd was nowhere to be found.
Oh? What's That?
Somehow, even the buskers were missing. Sun Yun and her family trodded along the lonely boardwalk path to the end of the shops and paused to take in the scenery. Suddenly, something caught Sun Yun’s eye. There was a man who had parked his hatchback by the staircase down to the street and there were three dark figures moving around in the trunk, all of which were shadowed by a pasted sign that read “puppies for sale.”
The Puppy Doctor
Sun Yun was intrigued, so she started walking towards the car with her family in tow. She knocked on the driver’s side window of the car and the man rolled it down with a smile on his face. “Hi, I’m Dr. Morrison, did you want to see the puppies?” Sun Yun smiled and nodded, she took a step back to let the man out of his car and watched him walk towards the back of his car.
Puppies in the Trunk
The man popped open the hatch and the three puppies went absolutely ballistic. Sun Yun’s children sprinted to the back of the car and reached over the mesh gate that was trapping the puppies in the trunk to pet their little heads. Each hand was greeted by three fluffy faces and little pink tongues, licking and squirming wildly, yapping away without a care in the world. Sun Yun looked at the man, pointed at the littlest puppy in the car and asked: “how much for that one?”...
Baby Giants
Dr. Morrison smiled and said “These are Tibetan Mastiff puppies, they’re going to be huge when they grow up. I’m a veterinarian and a client of mine couldn’t take care of them, so she gave them to me to help find them a home. None of my colleagues could take them, and I was hoping to meet a nice family like yours. These puppies can be sold anywhere between $1,500 and $5,000, but for you, I’ll make a special deal...”
Incredible News
“You can have him, I named him Little Black because he’s the smallest and darkest of the three.” Sun Yun felt bewildered, “Seriously?” she replied, to which the man responded “Yes, seriously. As long as you promise that you and your family will take good care of him.” Sun Yun looked back at her children who were furiously nodding yes, her husband looked stunned, aghast that they would be making such a serious decision at this particular moment in time. Sun Yun took a second to think before she responded to the man, after all, Mastiffs can grow to be enormous creatures, and they lived in a pretty small apartment…
Fleeing Quickly
"We'll take him," Sun Yun said. The man responded with "Great!" He slid around the car, handed Sun Yun the puppy, and hopped into the driver's seat of his car. The man sped away without another word, leaving Sun Yun and her family awestruck. Sun Yun looked down at the puppy and noticed that its face was a little strange looking, he had large teeth, sunken eyes, and a snout that didn't quite look like it belonged to a dog.
This Mysterious Creature
The family wordlessly drove home with the squirming puppy. Sun Yun's kids struggled to hold onto the creature because its nails were so long and sharp for a puppy. Little Black had huge paws, a long skinny torso, and a flat, wide face. Sun Yun had no idea what the man who claimed to be a veterinarian left them, but she was almost sure that it wasn't a dog...
Well, We Have Him Now
When the family got home, the first thing they did was feed their new "dog." Sun Yun ran out and grabbed some bagged dog food, but when she poured it out for Little Black, he turned his nose up to it. Whatever was in the food, Little Black didn't seem to be particularly into it. Sun Yun chose to wait and see what happened, and hours later, Little Black reluctantly took a few bites and fell asleep on the carpet in the living room. The kids laid around him and stroked his strange, wiry fur. Sun Yun sat down at her computer and started researching what "black Tibetan Mastiffs" were really supposed to look like.
A Special Puppy
To her horror, Sun Yun discovered that Little Black didn't really look like a Tibetan Mastiff. However, he looked similar enough to the puppies in the picture that Sun Yun decided to give him the benefit of the doubt and let him stick around for a while. After all, her kids had already forged a connection to him, and he was kind of cute anyway. Sun Yun glanced over at the "puppy," sighed, and closed her computer. Little did she know, Little Black was about to turn their lives upside down...
Suspicious Eating
The next morning, Sun Yun woke up to find Little Black in the same position on the carpet where he was the night before. However, when she walked into the kitchen, she found that the fruit bowl on the counter had been ransacked, and terrible sharp teeth marks plagued all of the apples that she bought to feed her children. She glanced at Little Black's food bowl, only to find that it was just as full as it was the night before.
Taking Him Out
Furious, Sun Yun attached the leash the man gave her to Little Black's collar to walk him outside. When the got on the pavement, Little Black started acting erratically. He would gallop from one part of the sidewalk to the other, turn back to Sun Yun and growl, and fight against the leash. He wasn't very big, but he was super strong for his size. He would also intermittently stand up on his hind legs and lean back, almost like how a person would walk. This shocked Sun Yun, and she immediately brought him home and locked him in his cage, got on her computer, and out of curiosity, she googled "bear cub..."
Wait, Really??
Sun Yun felt a rush of panic flow over her, as she looked at more pictures of black bear cubs, she could see the similarities between Little Black and the pictures on the screen. Sun Yun researched the characteristics of bear cubs, and she assumed that Little Black was actually a 3-month-old black bear. She thought she was going crazy, there was no way that a random man was selling bear cubs as puppies, but the more she researched, the more she convinced herself that was the case.
She's Got to Do Something
Sun Yun's kids had already gone to school for the day, she was at home alone with the bear cub, Little Black was standing up in his cage and gnawing at the thin metal bars and pushing against the cage almost like she had trapped a child in there. Sun Yun anxiously dialed the number for the closest vet clinic, she explained her story and rushed Little Black to the office as fast as she could. Sun Yun was relieved that she discovered this when she did because she was afraid that her family was in danger by just having the creature around the house...
A Means to an End
Sun Yun pulled up to the veterinarian clinic with Little Black in tow. He was squealing under the sheet she had covered his cage with and running around within it. Sun Yun felt bad for the creature, who was purely misunderstood, even though he wasn't exactly who she thought he was from the beginning. As she walked up to the front door of the office with the cage in town, the vet and his assistant came running out and instructed her to drop the cage and let them take over.
Divine Intervention
The vet swept the cage up and pulled it into the clinic, rushing past the waiting room and into the back of the office. Sun Yun walked in, without even signing any documents, as the vet pulled placed the cage past an armored door and shut it. He seemed exasperated, and he stated: "You were right, this is not a dog, this is a bear cub. This creature is extremely dangerous, and it's amazing that it lasted the whole night in your house without destroying something or harming your family..."
Making Some Decisions
Sun Yun and the vet stood together in shock. Now, the vet had a baby black bear cub in his office, which probably wasn't something he wanted to have in the first place. Sun Yun had to explain to her family that the dog they adopted yesterday was actually a bear cub and he couldn't be in the house anymore. Either way, both of them were trapped between a rock and a hard place.
An Extremely Dangerous Creature
The vet took a second to calm down, he pushed past Sun Yun to walk out into the lobby and address the waiting patients. He stated that there was a dangerous animal in the clinic, and he had to put all of his efforts into making sure that this animal gets relocated so it doesn't pose a threat to the other animals and employees in the office. The vet instructed Sun Yun to sit down and explain exactly how she came in contact with the creature in great detail...
Even She Couldn't Believe It...
Sun Yun explained everything that happened, her meeting the man by the beach, him giving her Little Black and speeding away. The vet had to take a second to process everything. He put his head in his hands and took some deep breaths, he then asked about what happened when she brought him to her apartment...
The Unknown Danger
Sun Yun told him about feeding him the dog food, him falling asleep on the floor, and then waking up in the middle of the night and eating all of the apples. The vet asked if they had kept all of their doors shut at night, and Sun Yun carefully answered "Yes." The vet explained the danger of their situation, stating that if they had left their doors open, Little Black could have harmed one of her children, just out of self-defense...
Oh, Really?
The vet explained that black bears are omnivores, but they prefer to eat herbivore diets. When they're babies, the bears need to eat strictly herbivore diets. When Sun Yun fed Little Black meat-based dog food, this upset his stomach and caused him to be docile for the rest of the night. If she hadn't fed him a meat-based meal, he could have destroyed their house or harmed one of her children...
Their Saving Grace
Sun Yun was awestruck about her luck in this situation, and as she took a second to take all this information in, the vet stopped her to explain what he had to do next. He had a friend that was visiting from out of town who ran an ethical traveling circus, the vet was going to give him a call to see if he could take the bear. If he couldn't, there was virtually nothing that the two could do...
An Ethical Circus
As it turns out, the man that ran the ethical traveling circus hosted displaced wild animals with nowhere to go, and as they travel the country, they try to find qualified zoos who are willing to take them in. This man just so happened to be bringing in his girlfriend’s cat by later that day because it had a cough. Sun Yun was relieved to find out that he was willing to take Little Black off of her hands, and out of her life...
Letting Him Go
The business that the man ran was called the South Melson Traveling Circus. Sun Yun had been following the Instagram for this circus for years, and she was elated to donate Little Black to be part of the traveling act. The man was delighted, he was particularly fond of bears and had recently given up his favorite bear to a Zoo outside of Chicago…
Sending Him Away
Later on that day, Sun Yun met the man outside of the vet clinic. He brought an armored horse trailer that he had previously used to hold the aforementioned bear that he loved so dearly. Little Black was just as big as a medium-large sized dog, so he had plenty of space to stretch out and relax in the sodded trailer. There was plenty of ventilation in there, and there was even water and food waiting to coax him into the metal container…
Off to the Races
The man explained that he was actually planning on leaving that night to head to a town nearby. He wasn’t going to showcase Little Black because he had already had such a stressful day. Just like that, he was gone. Sun Yun was exhausted, and she couldn’t wait to get back to her family and detail her exciting day to her kids that were mourning the disappearance of their beloved “dog”...
What a Heroic Tale
When Sun Yun got home, she told an animated story about her day at the dinner table. She stood and mimicked the vet’s actions in an exaggerated way, and she even showed the kids the most recent Instagram post from the South Melson Traveling Circus. The post was a picture of the vet and Sun Yun standing arm in arm next to the trailer that Little Black was placed in just before he left…
The Moral of the Story
Half a year passed and Sun Yun and her family watched as Little Black grew to become Big Black via Instagram posts, and some personalized photos from the man who adopted him. A year went by before the family decided to adopt another dog, this time, from a shelter instead of the back of some stranger’s car. Sun Yun for sure learned her lesson for making such a wild and uneducated decision, one she would never make again.