Goodbye Sophie

     We didn't have too much trouble getting Sophie, our 13-year-old mixed breed dog, into the back of the car -- she just needed a little help with her back legs. She's done this many times, making trips to the vet and the dog park, and going on vacation with us. But this trip was a little different.

     When she was a puppy Sophie hated to go in the car. It would make her anxious to the point that she would begin shaking and slobbering. We'd have to lay newspaper down on the car floor just to drive her a few miles to the vet. But eventually she got used to the idea of traveling, and we once even took her with us as far as our beach vacation.

     I like to think that beach vacation was one of the highlights of her life. She took walks on the sand, and loved sitting on the deck of the beach house, basking in the sun and watching people walk and bike and drive down the beach road.

     We got Sophie when B's older son went away to college. She came as a rescue dog from the North Shore Animal League, a no-kill rescue and adoption organization. Her younger son wanted a dog to keep him company while his brother was away at school and his mother went back to work.

     Her son bonded with the dog, played with her and fell in love with her -- despite the fact that she wasn't too active, or too bright. The truth is, Sophie was the laziest dog I've ever seen. She didn't play with doggie toys; she didn't chase balls or sticks; she didn't even eat that much. Mostly, she liked to lie around and sleep, or watch us with her soulful eyes, and then ask to be petted. She loved to be petted.

On the bathroom floor

     They took her to a series of training lessons. She learned how to sit, but not much else. She refused to come. She didn't lie down or shake. She never understood the concept of heel. In fact, she didn't even like going for a walk. We had to coax her out the door, then pull her along when we walked around the block. But as soon as we turned for home, she'd suddenly move out front, now leading the way, anxious to get back to her favorite activity, which was lying on the floor, keeping watch around the house.

     Despite her poor performance at doggie school, Sophie was a well-behaved pet. She never climbed on the furniture. At night she kept watch outside our bedroom door, in the hallway or the bathroom. When a thunderstorm came, her anxiety would hit, and she'd climb into the bathtub. That seemed to give her a sense of security and comfort.

     She almost always waited until we woke up before she barked to go out. It was only in her later years, when she had some urinary issues, that she got impatient and would yelp a few times around 6 a.m.

     B's son went off to college, and then a career, but Sophie stayed at home. She was always there to greet us in the morning, and was deliriously happy whenever we came home after we'd been out ... even if only for a few minutes. She became a passable guard dog. She'd bark when anyone came to the door. But no matter who it was, after a couple of barks she would sit down and nuzzle the person's leg and ask to be petted.

     She was pretty good with other dogs, and I like to think she developed a friendship with my daughter's dog. Whenever we arrived at her house the two dogs would sniff each other and go out in the backyard together. After that Sophie would curl up in my daughter's dog's bed -- and her dog seemed okay with that, satisfied with finding a spot on the rug instead. But it was at my daughter's house that Sophie learned to eat her dinner, only because if she didn't eat right away my daughter's dog would steal her food.

     As Sophie got older she developed arthritis, like a lot of dogs do, and now for the past few weeks she couldn't get up the stairs at night. Her back legs had become too weak. But we were in for a surprise a few days ago. We had a thunderstorm during the night. In the morning we couldn't find Sophie. Finally, we looked behind the shower curtain in the upstairs bathroom, and there she was, looking at us with her soulful eyes. We helped her out of the tub and she gingerly make her way down to the first floor. That proved to be the last time she was upstairs.

     It was last fall when we noticed that she seemed to be drinking more water and peeing a lot, and maybe having a little more trouble than usual with her back legs. Her squatting looked a little awkward.

     We took her to the vet, and he thought she might have Cushing's disease, an endocrine disorder common in older dogs that would explain her thirst. He gave us some pills and suggested we come back in a few weeks.

     She did seem to get a little better, but when we went back to the vet, and after he poked and prodded her, he said we should get an ultrasound. Sophie might have a tumor. If she did, he told us reassuringly, it was likely benign, or if not, probably slow growing.

     We went to get the ultrasound, and then later another one. She did have a tumor. The vet explained that the protocol was surgery, followed by chemotherapy, but it wasn't worth it, not for a 12-year-old dog. The tumor seemed to be small and non-invasive, and we could hope that she had plenty of time left -- as much time as any 12-year-old dog.

     When we went to the Carolinas this winter, we left Sophie with my daughter, and she did okay. After we got home we took her back to the vet for a checkup. He could feel some tumor activity, he acknowledged. But she hadn't lost any weight. Was she still eating? Yes. Were there any elimination problems? No.

     So we went home, knowing that her time was limited. But then her decline began to accelerate. It soon became hard for her to stand up. When she walked into the kitchen, her legs splayed out on the slippery tile floor. We started to bring her water and food dish into the TV room so she didn't have to get up. Before long, we were feeding her out of our hand.

     B finally made the call. She told me, through watery eyes, that she'd made an appointment at the vet for the next morning.

     That night we took Sophie out for her usual evening walk. She tripped out the front door and lumbered down our short driveway and then just seemed to stand there, looking out on the street. Finally she hobbled across the street, did her business, and slowly made her way back to the house. Several times she just stopped, as if unable to go on. We coaxed her along and back into the house, where she settled on the TV room rug and went to sleep.

     And so the next morning we got her into the car. The vet had us come in the side door, where there were no steps. She made her way inside and sniffed around the floor of the office. Then we lifted her onto the table. We stroked her and petted her while the vet prepared a shot. The first one would just put her to sleep -- she'd barely feel the stick. The vet explained that a second shot would stop her heart. B and I would stay for the first shot, but not for the second.

     The vet was very supportive and made some light conversation, then pointed out that Sophie's legs were swollen -- a sign of kidney failure. We were doing the right thing.

     Sophie barely flinched when the vet stuck her back leg. She kept looking at us with her soulful eyes, suspecting nothing, I think, but we'll never be sure. We continued to pet her as her eyelids drooped and her stare became vacant.

     She's asleep, the vet told us.

     But her eyes aren't totally closed, I protested.

     I petted her some more. There was no reaction. She was clearly unconscious. And so we paid the bill and arranged to have her ashes brought back to us. It would take about a week.

     B and I drove home in silence. She called her son, who now lives in South Carolina with two dogs of his own, along with a wife and two kids. He knew it was coming. We all knew it was coming. Still, it's hard to say goodbye to a dog.

The Push and Pull of a Pet

     We have a dog, a mixed breed, mid-sized female who is getting on in years. She weighs about 60 pounds. B got her as a rescue from the North Shore Animal League in 2006. So now Sophie is 12 years old, with a cloud of white spreading around her nose, and a touch of arthritis in her legs.

     B's sister-in-law and her husband used to have two dogs. One died a couple of years ago, and the other died last year. They had dogs for most of their lives, but now for the past year or so they have been without a dog. They live near us, and so last spring we thought they might like to dog sit Sophie. They agreed, and took her into their home for two weeks while we were away.

     Then, when we were going to Cape Cod this summer, we asked them if they'd like to dog sit Sophie again. But they begged off, making an excuse.

A camera shy Sophie

     Later, B's sister-in-law confided that having Sophie around made her husband sad. She reminded him of how much he missed their old dogs. He really didn't think he could handle dog sitting Sophie again.

     We saw them again last month at a family get-together, and I got talking with him about dogs. His daughter has a mixed-breed dog, and his son has two standard poodles. And then he reflected that he'd had dogs all his life, until recently. But he didn't think they would get another one.

     Why not? I asked.

     I'm 68 years old, he told me, and getting a dog is a long-term commitment. Sure, I'd like to have a dog now. But I don't know if I'd be able to handle the responsibility in six or eight or ten years. And, you know, I'd hate to be in that position -- having to find someone else to take my dog. And giving up a dog at that point would be really hard for me.

     My first reaction was that he was borrowing trouble -- worrying about something that might happen in the distant future, and missing out on all the things a pet brings into your life in the meantime.

     Or maybe he and his wife were just tired of having a dog tie them down -- and he couldn't admit it. Their kids are grown. They are retired. Maybe they want the freedom to travel, or the freedom from having to train and walk and take care of a pet.

     Then just last week I found out my former brother-in-law John (my ex-wife's brother) just got a new German shepherd. He, too, has owned dogs for most of his life -- as well as a couple of cats, and he once had a parrot as well. He's now divorced and lives on his own.

     John is 71, or three years older than my brother-in-law. And he suffers from multiple myeloma. He's been dealing with myeloma for a few years, and he is now stabilized, but his life expectancy has to be a lot less than my brother-in-law. But he has decided he can take on the responsibility for a new dog. I guess he feels that he can manage it. Or, maybe he just needs the companionship.

     There are many different reasons why someone wants a dog, or any pet for that matter. I have the best of both worlds. Since B got Sophie before we moved in together, she feels that Sophie is really her responsibility, and she does 80% of the upkeep. She feeds and walks her in the morning. She takes care of her medical issues. And she's the one who arranges for a pet sitter when we go away. All I do is feed her at night, and go out for a brief walk with B and Sophie in the evening.

     So I get all the benefits of having a dog, without the work. But if I ever found myself living alone, like John, I would probably get a dog of my own. I'd want the companionship. And I'd think that eight or ten years from now, my dog would take as much care of me as I would of him. (Many studies, including this one from Scientific Reports, show that dog owners enjoy health benefits and actually live longer than those who don't own pets.)

     I hate to think that one day we'll be without Sophie. But that will probably happen. Will we get a new dog at that point? Maybe we'll just downsize. My sister in Arizona has a Pomeranian that weighs in at about five pounds. He looks kinda cute!

Is There an App for That?

     The time: last night, about 9:30 p.m. B, the librarian, is doing something in the kitchen when she calls out to me, "Is it about time to walk the dog?"

     I am sitting comfortably in my recliner reading a book. My shoes are off. I'm getting toward the end of The Oregon Trial by Rinker Buck, who a few years ago bought three mules and a wagon and set out with his brother and his brother's terrier, Olive Oyl, to recreate a 19th-century pioneer voyage from Missouri to Oregon.

     I look up from the page, then back down, where Buck is skidding precariously down the side of a cliff in Wyoming, about to tip the wagon over into a gulch.

     "Come on, Tom," the librarian calls out again.

     I'd think a librarian would be more understanding of my need to at least finish this chapter. So, thinking myself clever, I call out to my librarian, the proud owner of a new smartphone: "Hey, isn't there an app for that?"

     Needless to say, about 30 seconds later I was off the Oregon Trail and out the door, leash in hand, taking the dog down the driveway.

     But as I walked the dog in the chilly night I began to wonder: How much has technology actually improved our lives? After all, there's no app for walking the dog.

     Okay, I could have been reading The Oregon Trail on a kindle or other electronic device. But it would have been the same story. And besides, I wasn't using my kindle. I'd gotten the book the old-fashioned way. I'd borrowed it from our local library.

     Later, getting ready for bed, I made my usual ablutions in the bathroom. And I recognized that the typical middle class bathroom has not changed a bit in my entire lifetime. The same toilet, the same toilet paper, the same faucet and sink and medicine cabinet. The style might be slightly different; but otherwise these items are no different from those found in the bathroom when I was a little kid in the 1950s.

     So how much has technology really changed out lives? How much progress have we really made?

     Granted, we carry around a smartphone and can text and email and access the internet at a moment's notice. But when we actually do make a phone call, the connection was really better on our old land line. And what do most people do with their smartphone when they're waiting in line or sitting on the bus or train? They are playing Candy Crush or Words with Friends. Other than being electronic, these games are not all that much different from the Chutes and Ladders and Scrabble we played as kids.

     My car has air bags and other safety features. But other than that, is it much different from the car I drove 50 years ago? You still fill up the gas tank at the service station, get in, start the car, and use the steering wheel to roll four petro-tires down the road at 60 mph. Well, there's one difference. There's no service at the service station. Oh, and another. The traffic is worse!

     Admittedly, when I was a teenager our car did not even have a radio. But we hung a small transistor on the little handle of the front vent window (remember those?). And boy, I recall having a lot more fun listening to The Rolling Stones belt out "Satisfaction" back in 1965 than I do today sedately listening to Sara Bareilles warbling on my fancy new XM radio.

     I don't want to sound like an old curmudgeon. I do love my laptop, and I love email, and I love google. I'm just not completely enamored with the smartphone. If only there was an app to walk the dog . . .
    

What the Dog Sitter Knows

     I'm dog sitting for my daughter for a few weeks. She's between apartments, staying with a friend, sleeping on the living room floor, in a building where they don't allow pets.

     So for the time being we have two dogs in our house. They are both "mixed breeds" -- a term we prefer over "mutt." There's B's dog, who's always with us:

She knows how to relax

     And my daughter's dog, who's with us until sometime in June:

And she's ready for anything

      I'm sure you've all heard the Groucho Marx quote about dogs:  "Outside of a dog, a book is man's best friend. Inside of a dog it's too dark to read."

     A lot of wisdom has been inspired by dogs:

     Golda Meir observed, "The dog that trots about finds the bone."

     Mark Twain wrote, "It's not the size of the dog in the fight; it's the size of the fight in the dog."

     Ann Landers warned, "Don't accept your dog's admiration as conclusive evidence that you are wonderful."

     Abraham Lincoln pondered, "If you call a tail a leg how many legs has a dog? Five? No. Calling a tail a leg don't make it a leg."

    And Will Rogers admitted, "I love a dog. He does nothing for political reasons."

     As for daughters, well, it was Garrison Keillor who said, "The father of a daughter is nothing but a high-class hostage ... when she says, 'Daddy I need to ask you something,' he is a pat of butter in a frying pan."

     

12 Great New Year's Resolutions

     Generally I'm not in favor of New Year's resolutions. I mean, if it's a good thing to do, or a bad habit you want to get rid of, shouldn't you make that resolution right away, instead of waiting until January 1?

     If you want to know more about how habits form, and how to break the cycle of a bad habit, check out The Power of Habit by Charles Duhigg. B suggested I read it over Christmas break (what was she trying to tell me?!?) and while it's no cure-all, it did open my eyes to some of the things we do unconsciously, without thinking, without paying attention.

     But speaking of resolutions, a friend of mine posted the following on her facebook page, which she got from Avivagen Animal Health, a Canadian pet company, which in turn got it from rockpapercynic. Just had to share.

Rin Tin Tin Vs. Lassie

     A new book, Rin Tin Tin: The Life and the Legend by Susan Orlean, is getting mentioned everywhere, including the front page of yesterday's New York Times Book Review. I happened to read the book a couple of weeks ago -- for complicated reasons, I was asked to look at it for a work assignment, even though it didn't immediately appeal to me. After all, Rin Tin Tin was long ago and to me at least, forgotten in the dim, distant mists of Hollywood past.

     I only knew of Rin Tin Tin as a TV star. I didn't know he had a whole life before the 1950s, with a radio show, and a whole string of movies under his leash. He was voted "most popular performer" in 1927. Once the talkies came in his popularity faded, but he made several comebacks, including a successful 1947 film called The Return of Rin Tin Tin.

     As a kid I was actually more of a Lassie fan. Not that I recall liking Lassie any more than Rin Tin Tin. It's just that while both TV shows, The Adventures of Rin Tin Tin and Lassie, premiered at the same time, in the fall of 1954, Rin Tin Tin only lasted five seasons, while Lassie stayed on the air for 20 years.

     I also didn't know that Lassie was "just" a fictional character, who was then cast in Hollywood, played by a collie named Pal, born and raised in California, and later by his son Pal, Jr. But Rin Tin Tin was a real dog, a German shepherd rescued from near-death, brought to America and trained to be a movie star.

     During World War I dogs were routinely used by the army as messengers and guard dogs. They also served in the medical corps, roaming the battlefield with saddlebags full of medical supplies. If a soldier was wounded but conscious, he could call over a dog and help himself to bandages or water. Dogs were also trained to identify who was dead or alive, and if a dog found a fallen soldier who was still alive, it would alert the medical corps by barking or tugging on the unconscious body. Dogs were also trained as suicide bombers, released into enemy territory with explosives strapped to their bodies.

     One day in Sept. 1918, a U. S. soldier from California, named Lee Duncan, was inspecting the ruins of a German encampment when he stepped into a low-slung building. He was aghast at what he saw: a pile of 20 or more dead dogs, killed by artillery shells. Then, from the back of the darkened room, he heard a noise. When he carefully edged to the rear of the building he found a German shepherd who was alive -- a female surrounded by her litter of five puppies. Duncan picked up the dogs, maneuvered them into his army vehicle, and brought them back to the U. S. base. He gave away the mother and three puppies, and kept two of the puppies for himself, a female who he named Nanette, and a male he named Rin Tin Tin, after a pair of dolls that were popular at the time.

     On the way home after the war, Nanette developed pneumonia and died. When Duncan finally got back to Southern California, he began training Rin Tin Tin -- Rinty for short -- with the idea he could breed him, sell some puppies, maybe make some money at dog shows.

     But this was a time when the movie business was beginning to flourish in Hollywood, and Lee Duncan caught the bug. He wrote a screenplay and began taking Rinty around to different studios, trying to get someone interested either in his screenplay or his dog. Eventually he got a "bite" and Rinty landed a silent film role as a sled dog belonging to a Canadian Mountie. One role led to another until Warner Brothers signed Rinty, then agreed to produce Duncan's own screenplay Where the North Begins, with Rin Tin Tin as the hero.

     Rin Tin Tin's career was launched. He appeared in more than a dozen silent films, until he died in 1932. By then the "talkies" had come in, and demand for non-talking animals had waned. But Duncan kept going. He worked with Rin Tin  Tin, Jr., finding him smaller movie parts, developing a radio show, and bringing him to dog shows, county fairs and stage shows. Later, Rin Tin Tin III, was used during World War II to promote Dogs for Defense, a program encouraging people to donate their dogs to the army.

     By 1954, when television got interested in Rin Tin Tin, Lee Duncan was training Rin Tin Tin IV. The dog was signed for the part, but by the time the show actually got on the air the directors had retired Rin Tin Tin IV and were using a repertory of other German shepherds as Rin Tin Tin. The Adventures of Rin Tin Tin became a TV hit for ABC, second only to the Walt Disney show, beating out Lassie, which premiered the same year. Rin Tin Tin also helped usher in the modern world of marketing, as fans began buying up Rin Tin Tin lunch boxes, uniforms, hats and guns.

     Lassie was "born" as the hero of a 1940 book, Lassie Come Home, by British writer Eric Knight. The book became a hit movie in 1943, starring Roddy McDowell and Elizabeth Taylor, and was followed by several sequels. Lassie was a quieter, more domesticated canine than Rin Tin Tin, who was often involved in gun play, Indian attacks and knife fights. But it was Lassie that proved the more durable TV show, eventually topping Rin Tin Tin in the ratings and winning two Emmy awards before it was finally canceled in 1973.

     One more thing I didn't know is that Susan Orlean writes for The New Yorker. So she's well connected, and whatever she writes will pretty much automatically get the royal treatment from the press and the literati of New York. I actually could only give the book two or three "barks" out of five. The first half, focusing on Rin Tin Tin the first, is really good; the rest trails off into a grab bag of early movies, early TV, and the author's attempts to put the dog into some kind of perspective. So I'd recommend the book only to real dog lovers, or those interested in Hollywood history.

     Nevertheless, it offers up an interesting footnote to American history. And, you don't have to choose between the two dogs. In fact, in 1955, after "several weeks of negotiation," Rin Tin Tin and Lassie, along with their trainers, appeared together on the cover of TV Guide. And both dogs were awarded a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, on the same day in 1960.