Brittany Lee wanted to make a difference.

In 2017, she was pursuing her degree in sociology and anthropology while working in the bankruptcy department of a law firm.

That’s where she learned about Central Arkansas Rescue Effort (CARE) for Animals. “One of the lawyers was involved with CARE as a caseworker,” Brittany explained. “She said, ‘Hey, CARE needs more volunteers for a Saturday showing this weekend.’ They used to have incentive points for participating in things. You can get these points if you come out.”

She thought it sounded fun and decided to go, bringing her fiancé, Cameron Still, with her.

The pair had met at the University of Arkansas at Little Rock (UALR). They were both in the honors program and took a different set of core classes together. “We talked a bit, but it wasn’t anything serious,” Brittany shared. “Two years later, we had anthropological theory and archaeology together. We’d ended up in a group project together and hit it off.”

But he had a girlfriend. Then, right before Thanksgiving, he asked Brittany out on a date. “I hadn’t even realized he was single again,” Brittany said. “We started dating and it was kind of perfect. We stayed up all night talking.”

When they went to volunteer, Brittany enjoyed the experience. At the time, she was still in school, pursuing a career in policy analysis. “While I was out there, Cameron asked, ‘Have you ever considered a career working with animals?’” she shared. “‘You seem really stressed when talking about policy, but this is the most relaxed I’ve seen you.’ I was like, okay, maybe he’s right.”

But she didn’t know all of the opportunities in the animal industry, and she decided to explore becoming a veterinarian. “I shadowed a vet tech and was like, this isn’t really for me,” Brittany said. “For me, it’s a lot more of spending time with people and building relationships and seeing progress happen. So I tried that and I was like, okay, I guess I won’t work with animals, but I least I know it’s not the right fit.”

She enjoyed her time at the showing so much she decided to volunteer for CARE as a caseworker. Caseworkers are responsible for interviews, home visits, and meet and greets to ensure that each adoptable pet is matched with the perfect family. “And then CARE’s volunteer coordinator at the time told me at the very last minute that she wanted to adopt one of the dogs I was caseworking,” Brittany explained. “I said, ‘I’m very sorry but at this point, it’s too late in the process. Three other people want to, and it would be unfair to turn them down.’”

The next day, the volunteer coordinator left her keys and credit card at CARE and left. The executive director at the time, Ashley Younger, sent out an email to the caseworkers asking for a volunteer to fill the position until a permanent replacement was found.

At the time, Brittany was going to school, caseworking for CARE, and working at the law firm. “I’m really excited about caseworking and I’m telling people about it,” Brittany shared. “My boss calls me into her office and tells me I need to quit volunteering at CARE, because all of my time needs to be spent at Wilson.”

She’d already reduced her hours at the firm from full-time to part-time as she looked for another job. “I’d gone down to part-time because I needed more time to work on my project and I was miserable at Wilson,” Brittany said. “It was the worst job I ever had. I thought maybe if I go to part-time maybe I can survive until I find something different.”

But her boss confronted her about the hours Brittany was spending at CARE, since her excuse for reducing her time at the firm was that she didn’t have the time. “I said, ‘You’re not entitled to my free time,’” Brittany explained. “She was asking for my free time, outside of 9-5. CARE was on weekends and during my free time, which Wilson didn’t have a claim to. I put my two weeks in and I was unemployed for awhile looking for the right job.”

Then CARE had an open position. “It was two, three months before Runway, and it was a really bad time to lose an employee,” Brittany shared.

Every year, Paws on the Runway is one of the biggest fundraisers that CARE offers. “I went up there every day and volunteered and learned the ropes,” Brittany said. “I told Ashley I was interested, and I interviewed and I got it. It was a weird set of events that happened but worked out perfectly.”

She’d found a way to work with animals while building relationships and making a difference. “It was something that was absolutely perfect,” Brittany explained. “There are only three positions and they were full at the time. I remember telling the previous volunteer coordinator, ‘I’d like to get this job when you move on,’ but it was never within the realm of possibility at the time. It never occurred to me to work at a shelter or rescue and CARE is the only one in central Arkansas that pays. It was something perfect falling into my lap.”

And she was able to take her dog to work with her sometimes.

She’d gotten Darwin, her Corgi, when she was 19 years old. “I got him from a breeder because I didn’t know better,” she shared. “And probably not a reputable breeder.”

But he was perfect for what she needed. “I wasn’t working a whole lot,” she explained. “I was straight out of high school. I was depressed. I don’t think I left the house for the first two weeks I had him to get food or anything.”

Darwin was a happy dog with plenty of personality. “I got really lucky with him,” Brittany said. “He had issues with other dogs, and that was because of me. Besides that, he was just the easiest dog. He was really good. He was perfectly potty trained.”

He struggled on the leash. “He’d sit down, plant himself and refuse to move,” Brittany shared.

And while he might not have been the smartest in everyday life, he loved to work. “During training, it clicked and he was perfect at it,” Brittany said. “He was my best friend for six years.”

Brittany had started thinking about his senior years as Darwin had just turned six. “I started trying to think how I would want the last few years of his life to go so he was happy and as comfortable as possible,” Brittany explained. “I was putting him through classes. I wanted him to enjoy himself. He would come to CARE with me when I knew which dogs were going to be around. He was fine. I didn’t want to put him in a stressful situation where I was forcing him around a ton of other dogs. He was middle-aged. I just started thinking that way, like, ‘Oh my god, I can’t believe this dog has been with me for six years and at some point he’s going to pass away.’”

One day, Brittany had let him hang outside for several hours. “He loved being outside, to the point he’d refuse to come in and if you got near him he’d run away,” Brittany shared. “One day the weather was really, really nice. We’d left him outside for three hours, which I wouldn’t do for most dogs but he really loved it. He’d been fine that morning and the day before, and when I let him in, he couldn’t get up the little two steps. I picked him up and carried him in. I was thinking, maybe he slept weird. Maybe he got bit by a snake. He wasn’t really able to walk very much. I touched his back legs and he could still feel them, which was a good sign. I took him to the emergency vet that night.”

He had a disc rupture. “It was just a really unexpected thing,” Brittany said. “It hit his spinal cord. It’s not super unusual to happen in low rider dogs.”

The survival rate was high, and with physical therapy, Darwin would be fine. But Brittany was still concerned. “Darwin doesn’t like people touching his paws,” she said. “I knew he’d be able to walk again, but I wasn’t sure he’d be able to run. He loves to play fetch. He’s gotta be chasing something to be happy. I was a bit worried, but figured we’d figure it out.”

Even if he had to be less active, that was better than nothing. They put down the deposit, extending and then maxing out the credit card for his care. “It was a possibility that we’d have to go to a surgeon in Memphis,” Brittany said. “We left him there overnight. He was okay. He was still happy. I’ve never seen him not happy.”

The next morning, on March 12, 2019, they called with an update. Darwin could lose feeling in his back legs and become paralyzed. The surgeon would call when he arrived.

He called to tell them that Darwin was paralyzed. He could do the surgery, but it was possible that ultimately, Darwin wouldn’t be able to walk or breathe. “I wasn’t at all happy about that, but I was glad I didn’t have to put him through the surgery and physical surgery,” Brittany said. “It wouldn’t have been a good quality of life. That one was hard. That was really, really unexpected. I knew he was prone to injury. He’s broken a toe. He had a partial ASL tear. I didn’t know this was just a spontaneous thing that could happen. He was really young and really healthy. I took really good care of him. A lot of corgies end up fat and I took good care of his joints. It was just really hard and really bizarre at first. I don’t think it’s really hit me that he’s gone. Sometimes I feel like I’m going to come home and he’ll be there.”

And then there was Zinger. “Zinger was really special,” Brittany shared. “They’re all special in their different ways, but I don’t know if I’ve ever had that instant connection with a dog before Zinger. He drove me crazy. I was only supposed to have him for two weeks. He was really needy and anxious. He’d sit and get in front of my face while I was driving. I almost wrecked. I told his caseworker, ‘I love him but he’s gotta go.’ That day, everything fit together better. He was still needy, definitely. I don’t know if he got less anxious, or I got used to it, but he probably realized he was somewhere he was going to stay for a little bit.”

Darwin and Zinger coexisted. “They just kind of ignored each other,” Brittany explained. “Zinger came from a hoarding situation. He’d be fine around other dogs but he didn’t really like it. Other dogs made him anxious. They were okay together because Darwin just pretended he didn’t exist and Zinger really preferred that. He just fit in really, really well really quickly. We got into a routine. He didn’t have to be on a leash. He just kind of knew, ‘Okay now we’re going to CARE. Now we’re going home.’ I could take him to stores with me because he was well-behaved.”

But he was also rather odd. “He was just a really weird dog,” Brittany said. “He was a little bit of a grumpy old man. Weird is the best way to describe it. I don’t think if he showed it as much at CARE. At home, he was totally a different dog. He’d run all over the entire house. He was so happy he didn’t know what to do about it. That was my favorite thing every day. He has a personality. That’s what I love about dogs. I love dogs with big personalities.”

Zinger was with Brittany for just a few months. When Zinger passed on September 14, 2018, 70 people showed up at the clinic to be there for him and Brittany. “Zinger had a brain infection, we think,” she explained. “It never got better and it got less and less manageable.”

But four months after Zinger passed and three months before Darwin, a puppy came along.

Cameron and Brittany had decided the previous year they wouldn’t foster another dog until 2019.

Then on January 2, Brittany’s coworker, Jeana Williams, texted her, “I need a foster. I did something stupid.”

The puppy was wiry and a bit feathery. Jeana thought at first he would be an Australian Shepherd, but then he stopped growing. They labeled him a terrier mix and Brittany and Cameron brought him home as a foster. “He doesn’t look like any dog I’ve ever seen before,” Brittany said. “Cameron talks about how he’s like a dog somebody put together in a lab.”

They called him Louka. His wiry hairs increased, taking over his body. His ears stood up and took on a side flop. His legs got longer. “We just wanted to foster him because he was a puppy and he was cute,” Brittany said. “The last one we fostered long term was another puppy, a beagle puppy. Cameron wanted to keep him but I did not want to. He missed having a puppy around because he was the one who didn’t have to take care of the puppy.”

And while the experience wasn’t all that fun to start, Brittany started to see the potential in Louka. “It was just as miserable as the first puppy was for a while,” she shared. “What really made me want to keep him was how smart he was. Darwin was really, really good at obedience work but just as dumb as a brick. I never had a dog who was smart. It was really impressive. Every new thing we would teach him he would pick up in about 10 minutes.”

He would grumble if he was getting frustrated during training. And he had a lot of energy. “He just does really funny things when he’s excited and looking to play,” Brittany said. “He’ll do zoomies all through our house. He’ll grab random stuff and steal it from us. He hates when we blow in his face. He’ll jump on us and play bite. It’s not as much personality but funny little habits that he has. He’s a funny little dog. He’s not affectionate at all. He doesn’t want anything to do with us. He will give us kisses, but he will not receive them. He hates it. He doesn’t want to snuggle. He has to sleep in bed but doesn’t want to be near us.”

And he’s polite with other dogs but he can be pushy when he wants to play. “It’s not in a way that he won’t respect if a dog tells him no,” Brittany explained. “It’s funny seeing his personality come out more.”

She wanted to adopt Louka. “I really wanted to see where this goes,” Brittany said. “I wanted to see what sort of dog this turns into. That’s what made me really want to keep him. I begged Cameron, but I beg Cameron every time. But Cameron is very partial to puppies, and I thought, ‘Maybe I have a chance here.’ He kept saying, ‘I don’t think this is a good fit for us. Wait for a bigger dog.’”

They’d made their list of everything they wanted in a dog, and Louka was none of them.

Then they had until Friday to decide if they wanted to keep him. “And he told me, ‘I just don’t think it’s a good idea,’” Brittany said. “That whole night, I was crying, because I was really going to miss him. The next day, Jeana put an adoption form in front of me. It was a surprise from Cameron. It’s just a funny feeling. For one, it felt really good to adopt a dog from CARE that wasn’t going to put down the next week.”

Louka was also their first dog together. “Zinger was very much my dog, even five months in, Zinger would tolerate Cameron but barely,” Brittany said. “This is our first dog really together and it’s been cool. Cameron was very much not a dog person when we met and just had to learn to become one for me. He would encourage me to go into the dog field. He knew this was the best-case scenario for me. We originally started fostering to get a leg up on trying to get the job.”

Now, taking care of Louka is something they do together. “He really did throw himself into getting to know Louka and learning how to care for him,” Brittany explained. “He enjoys spending time with him every day. It’s nice having a dog that isn’t just mine and having a project together.”

Cameron and Brittany have been together for three years and are engaged. They moved to New York City in 2019.

Follow Brittany on Instagram at Briiiiiiiiiitt or Rescue Dogs of NYC. Follow CARE on Instagram or visit their website.

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