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The government building in downtown Tampa, the one where you go to vote or see a County Commission meeting or get your new license plate, seems an odd spot for a love connection.
But it happened.
It's also a strange place to find a bunch of government types cradling and cooing over a stray dog, but, yep, that happened, too.
On that November day, the muckety-mucks were gathered to bid a formal farewell to three departing county commissioners, one of whom was actually leaving without a scandal, and that was nice.
Someone thought it would also be nice on this bittersweet occasion to have a dog around. Commissioner Rose Ferlita — the scandal-free one, leaving to run for mayor — is in particular widely known for being pro-dog.
Across town, Hillsborough County Animal Services spokeswoman Marti Ryan was elbow-deep washing dogs when she got the message: Could she bring a pet or two?
She scrambled. One was too smelly, another too hyper. Then there was the small tan and white one marked NKO, no known owner, a stray found near the interstate. Basenji mix. Wagged her tail in circles. Social. Sweet-faced.
Sold.
Never one to miss a chance to show off the kind of good dogs that fill shelters, Ryan dressed the dog in a T-shirt that said Bad To The Bone, named her Della after one of Ferlita's trusted aides, and headed out.
It's funny how a dog can reduce a group of serious people to loving them up. (Or maybe "elevate" is a better word.) Della the dog was so mellow she allowed herself to be passed around like a baby. Someone joked the dog was like Mike, as in county administrator Mike Merrill.
Merrill is the man who took the helm after the tumultuous and controversial reign of Pat Bean. Commissioners seem to like him, his steadiness and his ideas. Maybe they like the way he talks, too, the calm and soothing voice of a former seminarian.
"Honestly," Ryan says, "I kinda thought Mike was a cat guy."
He saw the dog from the dais, came over to play with her and, he says, pretty much fell in love right there. She is not a panter nor a jumper, not an I-can't-do-enough-to-please-you sort of dog.
Ryan looked from dog to county administrator, county administrator to dog.
"He's a very smart man, but he's very, very amiable," she says. "The dog is that way."
"I imagine she thinks deep thoughts, just like Mike does."
Merrill stayed with Della a long time. He didn't want to let her go. But he had taken in strays over the years, and he knew this was not a decision you make on impulse.
That Saturday he went to the shelter. There she was, same sweet dog. He made up his mind. Actually, he made up his mind before he got there.
She has leash and harness, bed and raincoat. He re-named her Suni, what he says they call antelopes in the part of Africa that basenjis come from, and also a word for goodness in Korean.
People think basenjis do not bark, but in truth, they sort of yodel in what's called a "barroo." Or maybe they just wait till they have something worth saying.
In Merrill's apartment, Suni stands on her hind legs to yodel at his parrot, who screeches back. As for Merrill, he looks forward to coming home at night.
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