PetProject

When it comes to dedication the one thing
you can count on is your Pet. A Pet means
many things -- joy, love, responsibilities,
companionship, fun, and great wonder. A
Pet will make you smile when you are sad.
A Pet always gives something back. And a
pet can be your best friend. Pet Project is
an endeavor that takes on the task of giving
back. People from all walks of life including
celebrity personalities took time from their
busy schedules to contribute to this project.

We want to tell you about it. When people
think of a pet most of the time they think of
dogs and cats. For some people their loves
can be more exotic, like a parrot or a spider
or even a turtle. What comes to mind is a
Sunday morning brunch where some 15 or
20 people were talking about if they could
have any kind of Pet in the world what
would each of them want. The last person
asked decided what he wanted as a pet was
something obsolete. He wanted a Dragon.
The guests at the Sunday brunch thought
that was (t-o-t-a-l-l-y) CoOL. The boys went
out. When they returned 4 hours later they
had returned to the house with a Lizard
more than 3 feet long. It was the closest
thing to a real dragon in Modern times.
Believe it or not, they actually use to walk
the lizard around the neighborhood on a
leash. They used to sun in the yard with the
lizard, watch TV, and eat grapes together.

See pets do come in all sizes and shapes.
A pet also in some strange uncanny way
reflects the personality of their owner(s).
Now the point of the NYC Pet Project is to
help and contribute to pets that need extra
attention. Those who do not have it so good.
The sick, the homeless, the hungry. To do
that people created a book and the profits
from the book are given to organizations
that reach out to those in need. Pet Project
is a hard cover coffee table book capturing
some of the special moments of people with
their pets. Each person contributes a little
message along side the photos. Some
people tell tales. The book itself is a warm
adventure of human emotion and pet love.

The NYC Pet Project has always been a labor of love.
We wanted to offer readers around the country an
extraordinary glimpse into the lives of New Yorkers
from all walks of life and their pets and to raise
money for New York City animal charities. Little did
we know that our book was also destined to become
a record of everyday life in New York during an
extraordinary time. On 9/1 1, New York City was
shaken to the core. But in the year that followed,
the New York City pets in this book - and hundreds
of thousands just like them all over the city - helped
people cope and move on with their lives. For the
most part, they did this, not through feats of heroism,
but simply by being there - as anchors of normalcy in
a time of crisis. We had just started production when
9/11 (New York Trade Trade Center event) happened.
For weeks after the attacks we couldn't get ourselves
to pick up the reins and continue. A pet book seemed
trivial compared to what was happening downtown
and in the rest of the World. But the more perspective
we gained, the more we realized this project was not
trivial at all. By coincidence rather than design, this
was no longer a pet book, but a first-hand account of
the bond between New Yorkers and their pets during
an historically significant period. The people of this
supposedly abrasive city were more willing than ever
to pose with their pets and write to them about their
feelings. That was when we realized that this is a
book about love, and what could be more important
than love ?