San Francisco Chronicle - April 20, 2006
Patricia Yollin, pyollin@sfchronicle.com.

The soiree in a South of Market design store earlier this month was part of Sumo's new life: She is the poster dog for Petchitecture, Friday night's annual fund-raiser for PAWS.

PAWS stands for Pets Are Wonderful Support. Through mere chance, in the form of a winning raffle ticket, 6-year-old Sumo was accorded "pet idol" status. But as luck -- or ill fate -- would have it, she is probably the best possible choice.

In mid-August, six days before her wedding, Sumo's human, Alyson Lee-Suzuki of South San Francisco, was badly injured in a car crash. It meant that she had to get married in the chapel of San Francisco General. A few weeks later, an increasingly listless and moping Sumo faced her own medical crisis: a diagnosis of lymphoma.

Lee-Suzuki was in rehab when she got the bad news.

"They've been taking care of each other ever since," said her husband, Tetsu Suzuki, a project manager at Genentech.

"When I was feeling down, she'd bring the ball to me," Lee-Suzuki said. "Now when she's feeling down, I bring the ball to her."

John Lipp, executive director of PAWS, said the bond between Sumo and Lee-Suzuki exemplifies the mission of the San Francisco nonprofit.

"It tells what PAWS is all about," he said.

The organization offers help in many forms, including food and litter, transportation, dog walking and subsidized veterinary care -- whatever is needed to keep people who are sick and poor from losing their pets.

PAWS took shape in 1986 when volunteers at the San Francisco Food Bank decided to help clients with AIDS and HIV who were giving their own meal rations to their pets. The following year, it became an official project of the San Francisco AIDS Foundation.

The nonprofit -- first of its kind in the country -- has now gone beyond low-income San Franciscans with AIDS to others in the city who are poor and disabled. In May, a pilot project serving senior citizens will begin.

Lipp said PAWS, with a $1 million annual budget covered entirely by grants and private donations, has spawned 16 models elsewhere in the United States. It currently has 505 clients and 340 volunteers, and provides 700 cans and 900 pounds of dry pet food each week.

Last year, Petchitecture, which features a live auction of fancy animal habitats, raised $115,000.

"There were 700 people and 200 dogs," Lipp said. "And a couple of brave cats."

A 9-pound orange tabby named Jasper is PAWS' other "pet idol" raffle winner this year, but he has no plans to drop by Fort Mason for the 11th annual Petchitecture bash. He was also a no-show at the South of Market preview party, which drew 150 humans.

"He hates being around a bunch of people he doesn't know," said Cameron Weston, who acquired Jasper at a New Jersey animal shelter.

"I got him because I was living alone and got really tired of coming home from work to an empty apartment where the only thing growing were the plants -- and they didn't care if I came home," Weston said. "I wanted something to be happy to see me."

Weston, who is involved in sales promotion and acting, eventually acquired a partner as well. The three moved from the East Coast to San Francisco in 1990 and live together in the city's Corona Heights neighborhood.

"Jasper's a talker, so you always know when he wants something. He's also a hisser," Weston said. "I've had cats my whole life, and they hiss when they're really upset or frightened. Not Jasper -- he hisses whenever. Just for the heck of it."

It took several visits to the shelter before Weston found the cat he wanted.

"When it's right, it's right," he said. "It's almost like meeting a person."

He and Jasper have co-habited for 14 years. Weston is not sure how old his cat is or what his early life was like. Lee-Suzuki and her vizsla, by contrast, have lived together since the very beginning -- Sumo's, that is.

"I watched her birth," Lee-Suzuki said.

Six years ago, her brother and his partner were breeding dogs. When a litter of seven was produced in January 2000, Lee-Suzuki picked the first puppy to emerge. Although her previous dogs answered to Lucky and Bubbles, she decided on a different approach with the vizsla. Why Sumo?

"She used to jump on the couch and squash her siblings," Lee-Suzuki said.

Since her diagnosis, Sumo has undergone several rounds of chemotherapy and has lost 10 pounds. Now her cancer is in remission. Lee-Suzuki, meanwhile, recently returned to her job at Wu Yee Children's Services in San Francisco, where she works with kids who are disabled or have special needs.

At the preview party for Petchitecture in a sleek furniture store, the 50-pound Sumo jumped on beds and couches, bounded to the stage to receive a proclamation sent by Assemblyman Mark Leno and eyed two Yorkshire terriers as if they were dinner. She was lively and playful, giving no hint of how sick she had been.

"She loves people," Tetsu Suzuki said. "Except the mailman." If you go

Petchitecture, a fund-raiser and live auction for PAWS, will be held Friday from 7 to 10 p.m. in Fort Mason's Herbst Pavilion on the San Francisco waterfront. Tickets start at $75 and can be purchased at the door or ordered by phone at (415) 979-9550. For more information, see www.pawssf.org.

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