Tuesday, December 16, 2003

Good Old Boy

The dog has gotten old.  It’s been 12 years since we got him and he was about a year old then, a 75-lb superball with a pink fist for a tongue and a keenly developed conscience.  Obviously, a good boy.  All his life he’s been smiling, energetic, perky and wagging his little cut-off stump of a tail, ready to stand on his hind legs for a better perspective on the world’s counters or tabletops, alert and primed to leap to his feet at any moment, for any reason.  He was big, fast, and strong - stronger than other dogs his size, so strong that professional trainers of big dogs expressed surprise and admiration.  But more than that, he was vibrant, so full of the pure energy of living that his whole being was like a dance of life.  For year after year, people - even dog people, even vets - would be amazed to learn of his age.  They always asked if he was a puppy, and I got to brag - “no, he’s seven years old; he’s nine; he’s twelve years old....”

Well, now he’s 12 and he looks it.  Suddenly, drastically, our puppy got old.  He has to pull himself up the stairs now using his front legs; the hind ones just don’t have the strength to push him up two flights anymore.  This morning I had to lift him bodily off the ground to put him in the car so he could go to work with Kel, where he has a private kennel.  He barely gets off his bed to greet us when we get home; when a skateboarder rides down the sidewalk in front of the house he can hardly rouse himself to growl and stomp at him through the window.  He needs to go outside more often.  He gets tired faster on our walks.  He is no longer lightning fast - I can finally react faster than he usually does to food on the sidewalk or a squirrel on a tree. 

I took him with me a few mornings ago to the dry cleaner, a two block walk.  We got there and he sat down heavily, curling his hips under him to take the pressure off his dysplasic joints.  The dry cleaner stepped out from behind the counter to greet him, as he’d been greeted there for more than a decade; the dog remained seated even when she offered him her hand.  “Back from a long walk?,” she asked me.  “No, just starting out.  But he’s an old man now,” I replied.  She’s got a dog too, and nodded empathetically. 

Maybe we were only two blocks from home, but I’ve been walking that dog for twelve years now.  I guess that’s a pretty long walk after all.  No wonder he’s tired.  But as we walked back to the flat we saw some pigeons on the sidewalk eating a discarded bagel and he lunged, nailing what was left of the bagel and sucking it down his capacious maw before I could stop him.  Sure, he’s old - but he does seem game for a block or two more at that.