One Dog. Three ‘Co-Parents.’ What Could Go Wrong?
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Version 0 of 1. When RJ King, Tripp Swanhaus and Carole Radziwill decided to share a miniature goldendoodle last year, friends discouraged it and scratched their heads. They worried that a puppy would become neurotic or confused about which of the three apartments on different floors in the SoHo building where they live would be her real home. And who would be the real boss? Mr. King, a model? Mr. Swanhaus, a marketer? Or Ms. Radziwill, a Real Housewife on TV and real author? “But it has turned out that she knows her place in the world,” Ms. Radziwill said. “And she isn’t needy, because what would she need?” Mr. King said. “She gets to live in three one-bedroom apartments instead of one,” Mr. Swanhaus added. Ms. Radziwill now has a boyfriend, Adam Kenworthy, a vegan chef who is fond of the dog too. “I like her soft and fluffy, so I give her baths,” he said. The other night, the “co-parents,” as they call themselves (never owners or masters), were lounging in Ms. Radziwill’s well-appointed living room, which included one very important and now shredded French couch. It was previously owned by Lee Radziwill, Carole’s mother-in-law from her marriage to Anthony, who died in 1999. They were passing Baby, smallish and with a taupe-colored coat, around like a bong in a dorm room. Mr. King, who has 110,000 Instagram followers and is often invited to places where the boldfaced roam, held Baby (20,700 Instagram followers) like a baby. She gazed up into his expensive eyes, represented, like the rest of him, by the Wilhelmina modeling agency. But she gave herself to the arms of the others too, with the open-mindedness of an equal-opportunity pet that loves unstintingly and regardless of looks, age or number of followers. “I always wanted a dog, but I didn’t want one on my own,” Mr. Swanhaus said. He isn’t alone. These days in a sharing economy for rides and homes, it’s no surprise that internet services such as Bark ’N’ Borrow are matching dog owners with carefully vetted members who take dogs for limited amounts of time. Fairmont Hotels has “canine ambassadors” to lend out to guests. The Aspen Animal Shelter in Colorado makes dogs available for the day for tourists in its popular Rent-a-Pet program. Not everyone approves. Alexandra Horowitz, an associate professor of cognitive science who runs the canine research lab at Barnard College and is the author of “Being a Dog,” worries about lending to strangers. On the other hand, she finds permanent sharing intriguing. “Dogs don’t like to be alone,” she said. “But they are eminently flexible in dealing with new situations, and they can get bored with the same routine every day.” What’s good for dogs may also be good for humans, and not just by easing their responsibility. Brad Faulkner, a young New Yorker who works in finance, is one of four friends who once shared a dog in a Manhattan apartment and now have shared custody. Sugar, a Border collie and Labrador mix, spends summers in New York and the rest of the year in Los Angeles, where two of the four roommates have relocated. “It’s actually a great way to keep a friendship going with people who have moved across the country,” Mr. Faulkner said. Sometimes sharing custody of a dog can even rekindle romance. Andrea Arden, a dog trainer, was dating a man and sharing his Doberman. When they broke up, he offered visitation rights, leading to getting back together and then getting married. “He told me it was because we were soul mates,” she said. “But I think it had more to do with the dog.” They’re now divorced and the dog is deceased, giving them a definitive ending. But custody can sometimes become a tricky issue. Jane Friedman, the chairman of Open Road Integrated Media, has taken in her son’s dog, a Havanese, while he and his wife are dealing with a baby and toddler. The other day she joked that she wouldn’t be giving the dog back. “My son got very sensitive,” she said. “Now I know not to bring the topic up again.” Well, nothing’s perfect. When it comes to sharing a dog, even in the most ideal circumstances, issues arise, including unstable rules and schedules from modular living. “If one person thinks it’s O.K. to jump on the furniture and the other doesn’t, then the dog will be confused by mixed messages,” Ms. Arden said. In fact, one might meet Baby, the dog shared by Mr. King, Ms. Radziwill and Mr. Swanhaus, and find her slightly ill mannered at times. But then, who isn’t these days? “Housebreaking her was in my kitchen, and it was a nightmare,” Mr. Swanhaus said. The responsibility had fallen to him because his kitchen was larger than Mr. King’s, and it didn’t have a newly refinished floor like Ms. Radziwill’s. The dog managed to climb the gate and destroy an expensive carpet. After that, Ms. Radziwill wanted to send Baby for rigorous boarding-school training. The others rejected her plan. When they brought in a house-call-making trainer, not everyone attended or stayed through the sessions — naughty. And Mr. King didn’t like the trainer’s attitude. “She was a disaster, and she was also arrogant,” he said. “She came highly recommended,” Ms. Radziwill said with only a trace of irony from her living room chair. “But we stopped using her because Baby’s such a well-adjusted dog.” Of course just as there is room for improvement in any dog, there is room for human improvement too. Mr. King and Ms. Radziwill (she contends that she shoulders the brunt of dog care, including vet visits and bills) keep a strict feeding schedule. Mr. Swanhaus, who the others are quick to point out has never bathed the dog (although he did once buy shampoo), leaves food out all day and doesn’t stick with a rigid dog diet. “He’s the one who doesn’t always enforce the rules,” Mr. King said. Rule No. 1 for the humans? Never drop the dog off at another apartment (always arranged by texting) without walking her first. Ms. Radziwill recently broke that one. “It was the only time I did that,” she said. “But I was so depressed after the election, I couldn’t function.” Evening was becoming night, and the team of co-parents seemed reluctant to leave their Baby and pull themselves together for a Saturday night. Mr. King went to set up an ironing board in Ms. Radziwill’s kitchen to press a shirt to wear to a black-tie dinner at the home of Valentino Garavani. Ms. Radziwill had plans to join the radio journalist John Hockenberry. Mr. Swanhaus was to attend the opening of a new club, Paul’s Casablanca, named for Paul Sevigny. Baby, who had once been the bridesmaid of Toast, the popular dog of Josh Ostrovsky, the Instagram celebrity known as the Fat Jew, had no plans. She played with abandon with the two kittens of Ms. Radziwill that had just finished climbing up her silk curtains. Ms. Radziwill, who like her fellow co-parents doesn’t have children, smiled at the menagerie of animals and men. “So far none of us have plans to move,” she said. “If that ever happens, we may end up in a custody trial. But we don’t like to think about that.” |