ANIMAL HOUSE
The saga of Vivi continues ...
Denise Flaim
Animal House
June 5, 2006
Whatever happened to that whippet from JFK?
I get that query via e-mail at least several times a week, not to mention the computer-less lady in Galveston, Texas, who calls every month or so.
Most everybody knows who the JFK whippet is, thanks to the media splash her disappearance made in mid-February: Vivi, a California show dog fresh from competing at Westminster, sped off into the airport marshlands after breaking free from her crate.
What many don't know is that Vivi is very much around - in cyberspace, at least.
Soon after Vivi's great escape, I began chronicling search efforts on my blog (www.newsday.com/animal house). Among other things, it explains why recovering Vivi would be such a challenge: Sighthounds, bred to chase fast game, are notoriously independent and quickly turn feral when lost. It's like trying to catch a cat on rollerskates.
The blog has become an electronic tapestry that documents the twists and turns of the Vivi search: The fruitless first days at the airport, from pawprints on the restricted shoreline to quilt-wrapped traps that stayed empty but for the occasional irate tomcat.
Then, in mid-March, a breakthrough: two pet-detection dogs picked up a trail that led to 110-acre Baisley Pond Park, just north of the airport.
Days later, Vivi surfaced in Flushing: She scarfed down bread tossed by a resident and touched noses with a Doberman out on a late-night walk. Again, tracking dogs confirmed her presence. Kissena Park, downtown Flushing, the Queens Botanical Garden, Flushing Meadows-Corona Park - Vivi toured them all. Volunteers widened the circle with their "lost dog" fliers, which sanitation workers then removed with great efficiency.
In April, Vivi headed north, with sightings in College Point - where camera-monitored feeding stations are still watched - and later Whitestone. By May, the "I-saw-a- little-white-dog" calls shifted south, to Alley Pond Park.
And then, barely two weeks ago, the wandering whippet's latest curve ball: Unconfirmed sightings back near Kennedy Airport - Brookville Boulevard and South Conduit Avenue in Rosedale; and 105th Avenue and Sutphin Boulevard, and 144th Street and 119th Avenue, both in Jamaica.
Late last week, a sighting put Vivi in Valley Stream, near its eponymous state park and Franklin General Hospital.
What to make of this travelogue? On the one hand, it may be a stunning testament to the connectedness of the borough's greenways. (Unlike Van Wyck-obsessed Elaine Benes on "Seinfeld," it looks like Vivi takes the Cross Island and the Southern State.) On the other hand, callers are inclined to call any little white dog Vivi.
And what of recent reports of a whippet stopping traffic on the Hutchinson Parkway in the Bronx? Does Vivi do bridges? Is she still even alive?
Meanwhile, Vivi-mania rages on my blog, to the tune of 5,000 hits a day. Volunteers who call themselves "foot soldiers" report on where fliers are needed. Others obsess that Vivi is in heat and birthing illegitimate "whip-pits." Despite repeated assertions from experts that sighthounds are usually caught by luck or accident, frustrated "doers" float dangerous notions such as dart guns and drop nets. A lady named Sharon from Michigan posts a daily prayer - or two, or three.
And Vivi's owners and breeders - who have returned to their daily lives on the other coast - look on, grateful for the support, but keenly aware of its disproportion.
"There are thousands of other dogs out there who deserve every bit as much attention," writes Vivi's breeder, Bo Bengtson, who has repeatedly said that chasing or approaching Vivi is only more likely to make her run.
But like Barbaro the injured racehorse, Vivi is a reverse Cinderella. Her showdog status satisfies our fascination with the elite and beautiful, while her misfortune elicits emotions - pity and concern - that democratize her.
The blog's comments percolate with compassion, as well as snarkiness ("I can search better than you") and obsession (with rival splinter groups of searchers). They say far more about human nature than they do about Vivi. For better or worse, the blog is a community - or maybe a cult - centered around a little snip of a lost dog. And no matter what the pushpins on the map say, it's the one place on Earth where you can always find her.
Copyright 2006 Newsday Inc.
Comments (36)
Brava Denise!
Wonderfully written, and extra-ordinarily succinct. Hugs to those way too cute puppies from the Catskills.
Susan
Thank you Denise for the wonderful column.
Denise,
I am keeping my fingers crossed that you get contacted by Newsday readers that realize they have seen Vivi lately!
Regards,
Tara from LI
Thank you Denise. Great column. I still pray EVERY day for our little Vivi.
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