Early in April, my eldest daughter sent me a text, with a picture attached. The picture was of my granddaughter Imani, snuggling with a puppy. The text read, “Your grands.” I have, on occasion, referred to my first crop of grandchildren as my “grandbeauties,” and my “grandpuppies.” My third grandbeauty was born in early May 2018, a welcome addition to my litter of grandpuppies. I am now “Cool Papa” to grandchildren Xavion, Imani and Myah, and a white dog named Ghost.
Lisa had often asked me, “Dad: If I get a dog, will you come and train it?” She would sometimes lose her mind and hanker to have a third child skittering around her house, another warm body that needed to be worked into the chart of football, basketball and soccer practices; school concerts that follow the honking musical attempts on trombone and saxophone and bedroom cleanings that include the guinea pig’s cage. My son-in-love, Bing, does most of the cooking, but for the complex scheduling of the lives of two small humans, he defers to Lisa. And when I would visit her menagerie, Lisa would often reminisce about her childhood dog, the great dog Duffy, the most well-trained dog “in history. The greatest training ever.” And pine for a dog.
“Nope,” I would say to Lisa. “I will not train that dog for you; that is a thing I will not do. In biting cold and driving rain, that dog for you, I will not train.” But their friend had a dog, and when he would bring the animal to visit, my granddaughter gladly followed it around the grass outside, and happily bagged and disposed of its warm poo. Or so I was told. (I installed an in-ground “Doggy Doolie” for the great dog Duffy; I scooped and dumped the offal into a mini septic tank, then power-washed the grass that had been tamped down by the pooch-doo. No one in the history of dog-doo grass-grooming has ever done a better job. Ever.)
“Dad,” my daughter did not say, “no trainer in the history of dog training could ever train a dog as well as you have.” But she did say that she remembers Duffy’s training. What she does not remember is how much sleep I lost teaching Duffy to sleep outside in his house, for instance. Just as does a child, a dog requires much of us. When my daughter expresses concern for her old man’s mental health (because he lives alone) she advocates for me to get a pet, a dog, perhaps. I remind her that when I come to New Jersey to visit my grandbeauties, I merely walk out my door and close and lock it behind me. The only other living things in my apartment are stinkbugs and spiders, neither of which need care from me. (The odd mouse might snack on a crumb but lasts only as long as it takes me to dust off the guillotine trap.)
In the classic short story “The Bride Comes to Yellow Sky,” Stephen Crane wrote a line that I have loved, for years. Marshall Jack Potter, “… spurred by his sharp impulse … went headlong over all the social hedges …” My daughter Lisa, spurred by a long yearning to snuggle with a dog, went headlong over all my warnings. There was once the great Irish setter, Duffy, then Sniffles, the abandoned and rescued long-haired Dachshund, and briefly, Allie Dog Woods, the gentle yellow Lab. Now, there is Ghost for Xavion and Imani, for everyone knows that every child needs a dog.
Almost as much as does the mother.
cjon3acd@att.net