Mark Cushing - Pet Nation: The Love Affair That Changed America

Two strangers meet in a park, each walking with a dog on a leash. They dont ask each other where they work, or live, or went to college; or about the kind of car they drive, or their favorite football team. They say one, perhaps, two things: What kind of dog is that? Whats her name? Twenty minutes later, they know everything about each others pet and then part ways as friends. Not have-each-other-over-to-dinner friends but friends who look forward to seeing each other, and their dogs, again.

When you consider the condition of pets in America before Pet Nation, it seems as if everything was photographed in black-and-white or sepia, all stills and no video. Pets were scattered here and there, nearly invisible, as if they didnt matter. Then they began to appear everywhere. Before long, pets were transformed from a diversion to the center of our culture and so many lives. This wasnt a purely personal experience; pets became social glue, the common bond between people with little else in common, who would never otherwise have spoken to each other. Thats the essence of Pet Nation, and why I wrote this book.

I majored in medieval and renaissance history at Stanford (hows that for spotting a trend?), went to law school, and became a business trial lawyer. I figured Id spend my life in a courtroom, raise a family, and see the world. If you had asked me for a thousand scenarios that might unfold in my life, building the Animal Policy Group and becoming a leading advocate and adviser in the pet world would not have made the list. Not even close. Fortunately, that is what happened. In 2005, I received a phone call from Banfield Pet Hospitals founder, asking me to lead a pet lobbying effort with our federal government in Washington, DC. This was possible then because everything was changing with pets in America.

Dogs and cats went from the backyard to the bedroom, and then dogs headed out the front door of the house to every corner of the United States, every town, suburb, and city. Pets stepped into political and legal arenas, stirring up issues and passions wed never thought about before. My daily world became the dramas at the intersection of pets and American society. My career as a trial lawyer and DC-based lobbyist morphed into a full-time, national practice, fighting battles and advancing causes related to pets. No one else had the job I created or, rather, shaped for myself. This job had never existed, and Ive battled, cajoled, lobbied, and persuaded ever since.

Pet Nation reveals that something about usnot about dogs and catshas changed without our realizing what happened. Pets arent a fad. They are more like the medicine America needs now for individuals and communities to feel better, and to do better. This is the story of what happened, how it happened, where it happened, and why. We explore issues challenging Pet Nation today and a culture that wasnt prepared for dogs and cats to move center stage. We study the human-animal bond, legal restrictions, political conflicts, colorful history, cutting-edge research, and a pet health-care system thats turned upside down. What I have discovered is often entertaining, occasionally surprising, and sometimes shocking. Its an insiders account of what no one saw coming twenty years ago, or could stop if they tried.

Now, lets begin with a few stories about dogs and cats.

March 14, 2019

The flight to Orlando, my third red-eye of the year, was delayed but not without diversion. Besides the usual suspects tapping away on their iPhones and laptopsbusiness travelers, Palm Beach dowagers, and families bound for Disney Worldthere was a new and decidedly more exotic passenger in the American Airlines Admirals Club that night. Well groomed, with a jeweled necklace, a Louis Vuitton case, chestnut-brown coat, and long eyelashes, Suzette made a stir. From time to time, she sampled a few candies proffered by her traveling companion, a woman in her thirties with a similarly understated fashion flair, took a sip of Tasmanian Rain bottled water, then sat back and closed her eyes, waiting for the flight to board. Three years old, this long-haired Chihuahua was accustomed to the comforts of business class. Seated across the aisle from her owner / pet parent / friend on the flight from Phoenix, I learned that Suzette had a busy social calendar, a passport of her own, more Instagram followers than I will ever have, and a full, pampered week ahead of her in Boca Raton.

November 16, 2018

A Huffington Post article by Elyse Wanshel tells a different story, in which two beautiful cats became the fulcrum for a modern Seattle wedding of two women that would make any ailurophile purr. In the article, Wanshel describes the efforts of two newlywedsColleen, 27, and Iz, 26to entertain their guests at their wedding. Since the ceremony was performed at a Quaker meetinghouse, they were not allowed to serve alcohol while a photographer took their post-wedding portraits. Inspired by their two older, disabled rescue cats Ladybird and Pangur, Colleen and Iz devised a plan. As Colleen told Wanshel, When we were brainstorming something alcohol-free for our guests to do while we took family pictures, kittens came up and things flowed from there. Instead of a cocktail hour, they invented a kitten hour, starring six kittens from the Seattle Animal Shelter that were made available.