Writing About Our Dog

“Advice to young writers who want to get ahead without any annoying delays: don’t write about Man, write about a man.”

 ~E.B. White¹

I spent a good hour this morning walking with our dog. (I won’t write ‘walking our dog’ here, because she is walking me as much as I, her. I feel fortunate just to chauffeur her to and from the park most days and to carry a supply of bags such that I might clean up after her along our path.) Most days we take a walk in the near-by, no-leash-required-during-certain-hours park. 

Depending on the season and the weather, the time of day for our stroll might be morning before ten or late afternoon, or both. My wife, who knows these matters, declares this mid-sized mutt, our pup that is, is a Jack Russell/white-haired Terrier mix. Our late, beloved pup, Shelby, was a Schnauzer-Maltese, says she, that is, my esposa. 

Were you to be at the park for the first time, it might surprise you to hear so many people asking about and offering to others the kind of dogs they have. It’s like I would imagine a United Nations daycare center might sound. (“Well, the parents said she was Greek, but we think she’s really a Tibetan-French mix….” “Oh, I know the feeling! They claimed this little one is pure Swiss, but I swear she has a bit of the Irish and maybe even some rural Kansan in her.”)  Most people, it seems, know the kind of breed their dogs are down to their DNA.

I respect how others relate to their dogs - they are, after all important members of their families, but I personally don’t care much at all what breeds our dogs are. They could be Sheepherd-Yorkle-MultiModal-Datshun-Poodledoor-Kelpies; comprised of mystery contents, like a hot dog; be an I-know-your-lineage-further-back-than-any-Buddhist-sect, Ancestry-dog-DNA-tested and revealed pup; or a sweet puppy found walking along a street, like our beloved Shelby was, and I’m just fine.

I do not care from whence they came or what royal-or-vagabond genes they carry. I do not care about that unless there is some medical issue involved. We have had a fair number of dogs of various types and backstories over my lifetime and loved them all. Cried when they were hurt. Keened when they died. Cackled when they did something silly. Commiserated when they had to take a bath.

I just want to walk with our dog most days, sit together on the couch every day, nibble on a snack, share some treats, watch a little TV or read together, and scratch each other’s ears all the time.

I do care mightily about “dogs” in general, their treatment and prospects and so forth, and not just “a” dog, like our own pup, that is, “our” dog, who happens to be named Tinkerbell, Tink for short (just as I am Michael, Mike for short, and Mikey for just once if a person wants to talk to me again in this lifetime). Dogs, as John Reese-Smith-Witherspoon-Garner-Smith-Jones III used to say, and I quote . . .

. . .nope, I’ll not quote another here. This whole subject of our dog is too personal to insert an expert quotation from a scholarly journal, a People magazine article, or a Dogs-R-Us catalogue.   I’ll say it myself, and I’ll say it plain. “I deeply love this dog, this pup, this waggy-tail, this Tink. Dogs and we-people-un’s are co-interdependent, cohabitants, co-workers (she’s lying on the bed encouraging me to write, even now), and co-conspirators, as we strategically find times throughout the day to break from whatever we are doing to jump on the couch and give each other hugs.

Tink is “a” dog, she is “the” dog, she is "our" dog and we are "her" family. I don’t know what pronouns she would prefer, she hasn’t indicated yet, so for now it’s “she” and “her.” No need for thee’s and thou’s and they's until she makes her wishes explicit. When and if she does, of course I will honor that request.

In the meantime, she is lying on the bed, now looking at me with reproachful eyes. I know she’s thinking, “Get off that computer and let’s head for the park!”

So, I gotta go. 

Footnotes

1 White, E. B. (1954). Some Remarks On Humor. In The second tree from the corner (1st ed., pp. 173-181). Harper.p. 198