My husband, Eldad, was on his way to a crowded animal shelter to see a dog that he claimed “had a horrible picture.” Labeled as a terrier mix, and it’s been over a week now. We are full time dog rescuers, so we are used to the inevitable.

Got a call, “You won’t believe how cute this dog is and he’s already spayed so he’s coming home with me today.” Later that afternoon, I walked into our home to be greeted by our two white rescue terriers and this fluffy ball of fluff who licked me like I was his best friend. “Oh, you look like a pumpkin,” I said. And just like that, Pumpkin instantly became part of the family. Eventually we would have to find her a foster home, but she was so squishy and potty trained and so perfect/

Two days later, Eldad and I had to go talk to a class of children at an author’s festival about the dogs and other creatures we had raised in our home. We had no idea what we were going to say, so we brought our book and brought up Pumpkin as an example of how a rescue dog is a friendly and lovable dog. He just hoped Pumpkin wasn’t too skittish. He had her tied up and planned to have her on my lap at all times.

The children were in second grade and very polite and caring and I realized that they were too young to really be exposed to the term “euthanasia” and that it would be inappropriate to tell horror stories of abused animals. Eldad presented a power point presentation of photos of many of the cats and dogs and other creatures we had had in the house. The kids oohed and aahed and then suddenly Pumpkin jumped out of my lap. As if she were possessed, Pumpkin dove into the crowd of children as if she were a rock star throwing herself into the crowd.

The mood immediately changed, and suddenly everyone went crazy for Pumpkin. She had been abandoned her entire life and she had never received so much love and affection from so many people at once. It was like she instinctively knew “I’ve got to get the message across, the mutts at the pound are the coolest dogs in the world.” The cuddle and cuddle festival was amazing and instead of a rigid presentation we now had a really relaxed and exciting dialogue with the students.

Now we learned to let Pumpkin work his magic. She diplomatically walked around the class and let each second grader have equal time to pet her.

These little ones were filled with questions and kept raising their hands with comments and at the end they asked for our autographs.

When Eldad, Pumpkin, and I finished for the day and left campus, most of the students were outside at the tables eating lunch. The moment they saw us, they started yelling, “Pumpkin!”

I had an army of kids chasing me trying to get to superstar Pumpkin. Her teacher informed me that most of these children were first generation born in the United States and culturally not exposed to animals as “part of the family.”

It’s amazing to think that this dog that had had such an impact in a few hours on so many people, just two days before, sitting in a cage, was deemed unworthy of life.

There are many Pumpkins facing the same fate and hopefully one day these youngsters will remember that they chose to save an animal over supporting puppy mills and pet stores. Maybe other Pumpkins will have loving homes instead of being torn apart by pounds. I can only wait.