Dog Love - One of a Series

I love dogs. I don't believe that I have ever encountered a dog with which I could not have bonded, given the appropriate circumstances. I have a particular fondness for abandoned dogs, rejected dogs, abused dogs, dogs that have no place to call home, and dogs that just show up unannounced on my doorstep. I have a long history with dogs, and I cherish all of it, even the sad spaces.

Katy the pit bull simply showed up on our doorstep one day. It was the weekend, and my wife and I were returning from errands. Katy was big and black and curled up under a chair on the front porch. We approached her with caution, first to assess the threat to us and second to determine her physical condition.

She was lethargic and largely non-responsive. When we realized that she was probably harmless, we began to pet her head and speak softly to her. We brought her a little food and a little water and continued this exchange for perhaps an hour. Then my wife posed the obvious question:"What are we going to do with her?"

I responded: "Honey, I think we have basically two alternatives. One, we can beat her off the property with a heavy stick, or, two, we can take her to the veterinary clinic and see what it's going to take to make her feel better." My wife opted for the latter alternative, and I concurred.

Two hours and hundreds of dollars later, we had discovered that Katy (she had shown up anonymously, without any identification - we gave her the name Katy) was seriously malnourished and infested with heartworms. If she were to have even a slim chance of recovering her strength and energy (and not dying!), we would need to make a still larger investment in her.

Now, if you are someone who doesn't love dogs, you might be sorely tempted at this point to exhale forcefully and disdainfully and accuse me of being an irredeemable idiot. I will not even try to defend myself. We dog lovers are who we are, and we do what we love without apologies.

Katy came into our house and our lives that bright day, and we had nine months with her. She was perhaps the least needy dog we have ever had. She had clearly been enervated by the ravages of the heartworms, and she slept a lot in one of the bedrooms. She would never frolic or gambol with the other dogs.

But every few hours, she would emerge from the bedroom to amble from person to person (OK, there were only two of us so it didn't take her very long) to confirm our presence and validate hers, and then she would return to the bedroom. She didn't even want to stay to be petted for any length of time.

We gave her the best heartworm (and other) medicine that we could, and all the love, but too much damage had already occurred. On another bright morning, after some nine months of the simple joy of her presence, she quietly expired. I went to check on her, and she did not respond to her name, her normal practice. We cremate our beloved dogs when they pass, and I always cry. This was no exception.

I don't know why I started with a sad story. There are far more happy stories than sad ones. Big Red, for example. Big Red was a homeless dog, just like Katy had been. Red was a large Golden Retriever and the most docile dog I had ever acquired.There was a game he loved to play with me, and I was more than happy to oblige. Now follow along carefully, taking notes if you need to, while I explain the rules of this game.

Red would assume the universal play position, with his front parts pressed against the floor and his behind stuck up in the air. I, too, would get down on the floor on my stomach facing him, although I was much more modest about the positioning of my behind.

Usually, I would go first. I would reach over with my hand and place it on top of one of his paws. Red would then proceed to remove his paw from beneath my hand and place his paw on top of my hand. Then, and please follow this closely, I would remove my hand from beneath his paw and place it, in turn, on top of his paw. Red would respond by removing his paw from beneath my hand and placing it on top of my hand. This challenging and complex interplay would continue for some time.

Red stayed with us for a long time, much longer than the estimates of experts, and I am grateful for every minute. But what about Duke, Peyton, Mandy, Sam, Trixie, Mario, Fawn, Cody, Buffy … ? More next time.

Sifted Memories

Perhaps the most salient characteristic of the stereotypical image of human aging is the expected and dreaded decline in memory capabilities.Well, I just turned 60 last Sunday, thank you very much, and I am intensely vigilant against any perceived loss in my stored personal information. Hmm … that sounded a little militant, and the truth, as usual, is rather murkier.

I believe that people sift memories, slowly losing those that carry little or no significance, while retaining those that made an impact, even if we don’t know or understand the nature of that impact. My wife believes firmly that I am losing my memory, but, of course, I am not losing my memory. I am simply not an exception to the observation that aging people sift memories. It is similar to going on a trip: take what you need and want and leave the rest. You can free up a lot of brain shelf space that way.

Let’s see … I was talking about my wife and her unkind slurs about my memory, yeah, like she remembers everything … and sifting … and … OK, I’m back! It’s funny to me how selective the sifting process can be. I honestly cannot remember whether or not I attended my senior prom in high school; yet, I can recall in minute detail that day in third grade when I showed up wearing my first pair of glasses.

I cannot bring to mind the street address of the house in which we lived before our current domicile, and it has only been four or five years ago. But ask me my original Army ID number – go ahead, ask me – and I will rattle it off without skipping a beat. I needed that number in Vietnam, in the days before the Army began to use only your Social Security number. They said I didn’t need the original ID number anymore, so I will be reciting the damned thing with my final breath. Oh, yeah. How long ago? Almost forty years.

Don’t ask me where I parked the car in the parking lot less than twenty minutes ago, but I remember Mrs. Smith. She was my social studies teacher in the seventh grade. One day in class she announced that she was going to use a word in description of something, but, because it was a very difficult word, she was not going to hold us responsible for the word. We most certainly did not have to remember the word. The word she used was “Paleolithic.” I never forgot the word, although that, too, was a very long time ago.

My wife knows better than to send me out of the room with an extensive mental list of three things to do. Frequently, I will return within minutes and say: “Now, Honey, what was number two on my list?” Please notice I said “frequently,” not “always. On those occasions when I don’t return quickly to the room in which my wife is located, she will find me eventually somewhere else, doing something totally unrelated to our previous discussion, and she will inquire about the list. To which I will respond vaguely: “What list, Honey?”

And putting stuff down in unusual places and then not being able to find them later? Please, don’t get me started! But do ask me the Latin scientific name for the common guppy, and I can still tell you without hesitation. I learned that valuable piece of information before I ever entered high school. Do you think that maybe that might be on a trivia test sometime? I would like to win something. I have never won anything in my life; at least, I don’t think that I have. I just don’t remember.

I took the scissors from the kitchen utility drawer last night to cut something, and I forgot to put them back, and then I forgot where I had left them. As you can imagine, my wife became rather irritated with me, and I … I remember the first time I ever saw her. It was at a dance, and she was lovely. I can tell you what she was wearing, and I can tell you what she was talking about as we danced.

Men. She was talking about men and how awful they were. Halfway around the dance floor, I stopped, looked her in the eye, and said: “Whatever it was, I didn’t do it.” We finished the dance, and we have been together ever since. That was more than fifteen years ago. If I have ever had any complaints about our relationship, I don’t remember any of them now. And that’s just fine with me.

The Flood

There is something magical about living next to the water, something calming, maybe even primordial.

However, I had never much considered the appeal of living next to the water until I first saw … the creek. This little creek came into our lives in our search for the first house that we would own together. My wife and I were drawn to the creek; it was peaceful, attractive, charming … We were smitten, and we bought the farm, I mean, the house.

Hey, we are not idiots! Both the real estate agent and the neighbors assured us that, oh no, the creek almost never flooded, maybe only once in twenty years! Well, that was certainly good enough for us.

The creek was an endless source of amazing sights and entertainment. We were treated to the sight of huge snapping turtles, endless baby ducks and geese and their highly protective parents, muskrats, patient, wading hunters like the great blue heron, and the antics of my big red dog, Big Red.

Big Red was our golden retriever, and he loved the water. So the creek looked like a natural fit for him, and I was happy to oblige. Once every two weeks or so in the spring, summer, and fall, I would let him run free the length of the creek in our yard, and he was a very happy puppy.

April flowered into May, and then the Pennsylvania summer battered us relentlessly with the unending fury of three uncomfortably warm days in a row. September brought us the changing of the leaves, and October ushered in the first chill. One October morning I awoke with the strange sensation that something was wrong with my face. I could neither feel nor move one side of my face, and speaking seemed to be unusually difficult.

My wife was convinced that I had experienced a stroke. I was equally convinced that, if I just ignored the problem, it would go away by itself. This was my standard self-diagnosis for irritating medical conditions, and it had served me very well in the past.

As we pondered my affliction, the rain continued its assault from the day before. We both noticed that our bucolic little creek was no longer its usual eight or ten inches across. Instead, the water level was within kissing distance of the top of the banks.

My wife had to go into work, and I assumed the responsibility for watching the water level rise in the creek. Which it did. In the late afternoon, my wife returned from work, and we ventured through the deluge to the emergency room because my face was still paralyzed.

By the time we returned home, the creek had breached its banks, washing the largest snapping turtle I had ever seen onto the driveway and threatening the patio and back door. With a flash of brilliance, I knew that I needed to place one or two large towels at the base of the back door, but inside the house. This measure would serve to keep the floodwaters out. I smugly placed the towels, and we waited for the fury of the storm to pass. However, the storm gods had more humbling in mind for us.

The front room in the basement was below ground level; the back room was at ground level. When the water reached the front room, my wife started a pump borrowed from the neighbors to remove the water from the front room out the window onto the lawn. I explained to her gently that the hydraulics of water were simply moving the results of her pumping onto the front lawn, then swooshing them around the side of the house, only to re-enter the basement in the rear.

As we spoke to our neighbors about the vagaries of the flood, we noticed some of our lawn furniture floating by, never to be seen again. Following close behind was a six-foot ficus tree planted in one-third of a heavy oak barrel. I could barely move that tree because of its weight! And there it was bobbing along like the good ship Lollipop. I half expected to see Shirley Temple waving from the gunwales!

In time the flood waters receded, as they do in all such stories. The basement retained more than thirty inches of water for awhile. My towels, apparently, had not been enough. I was concerned that the water in the basement had become electrified. I proposed to my wife that we test for electrification in the water by throwing in the one cat that I didn’t like very much. My wife thought that was a bit extreme. In six weeks, my face was working again, and that cat remained with us for many years to come.

Smart as a Goose

Once I lived in a small, but comfortable house with my wife, and we had a lovely creek that ran the length of the yard. At least we thought the creek was lovely when we first laid eyes upon it. The creek was only ten or twelve inches wide then, and it made all of the appropriate sounds for a small creek, and we fell in love with it. That is, until the first flood when that little pastoral beauty expanded to fifty roaring, savage feet across and pirated away several six-foot potted plants, some lawn furniture, and one of our favorite neighbors ...

But this is not that story.

This story is slower, more deliberate, and doesn't involve the loss of any neighbors - just my sense of superiority. This story involves only me and a small family of Canada geese. One beautiful day, I was standing in my backyard looking generally at the point where the creek entered our yard from the wetlands behind us. I noticed some movement in the bushes. Upon closer examination, I descried a group of Canada geese. There were two adults and perhaps four or five babies. Definitely babies, not yet goslings.

From their movements, it became clear to me that they were on their way downstream to a large pond two hundred or so yards hence. I was delighted! I would just stand there and watch them convoy past. One adult was in the front of the line, one at the rear, and the babies were one after the other in single file. I stood quite still, about twenty-five feet distant, and waited for the parade.

But nothing happened! They were just milling about. I soon realized that I was the problem. They could see me clearly, and, despite how nonthreatening I felt, the adults perceived my presence with studied alarm. I apologized out loud to these very welcome passers-through, and I backed up several feet to conceal myself partially behind a large tree. Surely, this would make all of them feel safe enough to continue their passage.

I was now far enough back that I could not see the geese over the edge of the creek, but I was not concerned. I would still enjoy the show because the long necks of the adults would remain within my view. Just then, I noticed one of the two adults emerge rather clumsily on the far side of the creek. This adult proceeded to waddle up the short creek bank until it reached level ground. Then it proceeded to move slowly and dramatically in the original direction adopted by the goose convoy.

As you can imagine, I found this to be strange behavior indeed. For that reason, I continued to watch this awkward adult move up the creek for thirty-five or forty feet. During this period of observation, I concluded again that I would be able to watch the maritime parade because I would be alerted by the movement of the other adult's long neck and head above the level of the creek bank.

When the waddler on dry land had gone the distance, capturing my attention the entire time, it turned back towards the creek and disappeared below the level of the bank. I hurried from my place of concealment in order to witness the re-entry of the waddler and determine the status of the remainder of the convoy. I came close enough to see the water and the drama unfolding in the creek.

To my astonishment, the waddler was entering the creek bed to re-join the other adult and all of the babies who were already there! The others had moved stealthily through the water without attracting my attention while I was preoccupied with the waddling adult. However, I had been paying attention with my peripheral vision to the bank of the creek. If the convoy had moved through under normal conditions, I would have noticed the long neck of the second adult.

I could conclude only that the awkward stepper on the bank was a deliberate diversion, and the plan during my distraction was for the other adult, with head and neck down, to move the babies carefully along the creek and out of harm's way (harm being me). No one will ever convince me that this was not a deliberate danger-avoidance strategy conceptualized and implemented very successfully by two Canada geese.

When I realized what had transpired, I laughed out loud at my gullibility and congratulated them for a job well done. As I walked away smiling, I mused that hubris, indeed, was an innate element of the human condition, including mine, and that it was not always possible to be as smart as a goose.