The kids’s e book “Lucy Goes to the Gentle Barn,” written by Tenny Minassian with illustrations by Agavny Vardanyan, relies on the writer’s go to to the Santa Clarita animal sanctuary The Gentle Barn with Lucy, her poodle combine rescue canine. (Images courtesy of Tenny Minassian)
Inside Burbank’s Republik Coffee, Lucy jumps on her hind legs as if she’s about to greet me with a hug. We’ve by no means met earlier than, however the eight-year-old poodle combine is extremely pleasant.
Lucy’s human, Tenny Minassian, tells me later exterior, “She just loves going out and meeting people and seeing other dogs.” Sure sufficient, Lucy has spent a lot of this interview greeting passersby, each human and canine.
In 2015, this rescued puppy charmed Minassian and her household. Since then, Minassian and Lucy have been on loads of adventures collectively, assembly new individuals and animals within the course of. One of these adventures impressed Minassian to put in writing her first kids’s e book, “Lucy Goes to the Gentle Barn.”
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“I just started thinking about how much she has in common with kids and their experiences, especially young kids,” Minassian says. For instance, she notes, Lucy will not be a fan of visits to the veterinarian, a state of affairs that is likely to be just like how kids really feel about physician’s appointments. “So, I started thinking of all these ideas that I could write about her.”
At The Gentle Barn in Santa Claritapeople and animals join by actions like cow hug remedy and horse grooming. Minassian visited the animal sanctuary along with her father and Lucy again in 2017.
In “Lucy Goes to the Gentle Barn,” with illustrations by Agavny Vardanyan, the small canine learns to be courageous when encountering a lot bigger animals. She befriends a cow who shares her identify and smooches a horse – and Minassian exhibits me a photograph of the second when the canine and horse did so in actual life. “She had a good time; I wanted to start there,” says Minassian. “I reached out to the Gentle Barn and they were OK with it.”
Ellie Laks, founding father of The Gentle Barn, is a fan of the e book – and Lucy.
“At The Gentle Barn, we have guests from all over the world, young and old. Some cry, some connect to animals, some feel part of a greater animal-loving community, and some are brought to tears,” says Laks by way of e mail. “I love that Lucy gets to come to The Gentle Barn and meet new friends from tiny chickens, goats with golden eyes, pigs rolling over for belly rubs, giant cows, and even large horses. … It’s a wonderful way for people to experience The Gentle Barn through the eyes of an adorable puppy named Lucy. I recommend the book to everyone.”
Two years earlier than the journey to The Gentle Barn, Minassian had simply returned to Southern California from graduate college at San Francisco State. “I told my parents, When I move back we’re getting a dog,” remembers Minassian, who’d by no means had a canine earlier than Lucy. Her household is from Iran — Minassian was born there as nicely — the place having a canine as a pet isn’t as frequent as it’s within the U.S.
“My mom was really scared of dogs,” she says.
But it was Minassian’s mom who picked out Lucy from the Southern California Pomeranian Rescue. Minassian remembers her mother’s response when the oldsters on the rescue first introduced Lucy to stick with the household for a trial interval.
“She just scooped Lucy up and was in love with her,” says Minassian. “It was adorable. She had never touched a dog in her life.”
Now Lucy is a part of the household. She responds to instructions in English and Armenian, the language Minassian’s mother and father use along with her. She’s traveled with them to Las Vegas and even on a visit to Armenia in 2019, which is likely to be the topic of future books that Minassian plans to put in writing. “I have a whole series that I want to do on that,” she says.
Minassian laughs when she thinks again on the Armenian journey. “We took Aeroflot. Not a good idea,” she says of the Russian airline. “They were not really on board with emotional support animals.”
At the time of the journey with Lucy, Minassian says the locations she visited in Armenia weren’t significantly dog-friendly both. She remembers eating places with out of doors seating weren’t happy with the little pooch hanging round. Finding an Air B&B was a problem they usually needed to commonly affirm with ride-share drivers that bringing a canine on board was okay, she says.
“It was a whole culture shock for us,” says Minassian. Still, it was an thrilling journey, even when Lucy couldn’t go contained in the church buildings and needed to watch from under as Minassian rode the three.5-mile aerial tramway, Wings of Tatev.
Back home, Minassian and Lucy discover bookstores, vegan eating places and occasional retailers collectively, scenes from which generally pop up on the Instagram account @lucy2therescue. They’ll go to poetry readings, take part within the Best Friends Animal Society Walk and gown up for Halloween.
“She hates that,” Minassian says of the Halloween costumes, “but she does it and we’re matching.”
Lucy has even reunited with one among her canine siblings, due to the canine DNA platform Embark. “As soon as her sister did it, they came up as a match,” says Minassian. “They had the same exact walk. It’s adorable.”
The little canine has been a giant life-changer. As Minassian handled melancholy just a few years again, Lucy grew to become her emotional help canine. And because of their bond, Minassian adopted a vegan life-style.
“I started questioning why I eat some animals and not others,” says Minassian, who made a profession change, too.
