Ever by My Side (8 page)

For some people, when it comes to their dogs, there’s a fine line between devotion and raison d’être. Regardless of the label, all I knew was Dad kept his promise to Patch through a wholesome recreational alternative to a big backyard. Every morning without fail, they would be up at five, though I am led to believe the four-legged accomplice was the one who provided the alarm clock. Dad would don a waterproof coat and Wellington boots, regardless of season, and attach a leash to Patch’s collar, and together they would set out for the fields and an opportunity to run free on more open land than Patch had ever known or could ever want for.

Accompanying them was unworkable for a boy who consistently
struggled to regain consciousness before seven, but I might tag along for their evening walk, perpetually amazed by Patch’s enthusiasm for the same routine, as though he had no idea where he was going and always thought that this time around would be a whole new adventure.

Of course we all saw through Dad’s choice of off-peak hours. It was as if my father had confirmed something we had suspected for some time. Dad had given up trying to curb Patch’s antisocial behavior. His solution was simple, some would argue lazy, but if nothing else, practical. If you can’t stop the dog from behaving badly at least you can reduce the risk that he will get into trouble. Dad had found a possible solution to a problem of his own making. He was trying to be responsible and, perhaps more importantly, he was trying to protect the dog he loved from being misunderstood.

The first time I joined them on their walk I discovered that Dad had also incorporated a backup security measure into their route. Within a few minutes of leaving the house we were lost in fields that consistently offered unencumbered vistas of the pathway ahead, providing plenty of lead time to grab a leash and call a name. There’s no debating the fact that my dad did a far better job of teaching Patch to come when called than he ever did with me.

By the time we returned from that first walk, all my fears for Patch’s mental well-being were allayed. I had watched him chase rabbits, explore a copse, leap over wooden stiles, and trot along, smiling, always slightly in the lead, his huge tail stretched out, down and low, bouncing with the beat of our footfalls. Neither my father nor I knew a thing about the science of animal behavior, but instinctively we both knew this was a happy dog.

When it came to the rest of Patch’s well-being, there wasn’t much to notice because there wasn’t much that went wrong. These days, I often chat with dog owners who remember canine companions of
yesteryear who similarly never got sick. They fondly recall a less complicated bygone era, governed by fewer conventions, when dogs knew how to be dogs, as though ailments and disease are disruptive innovations, like TV, rock ’n’ roll, or the Internet. I have no proof that dogs were generally healthier a generation or two ago, but if they were, then Patch’s good health was emblematic. Still, from time to time, we did take him to see a veterinarian and on one memorable occasion when I was eleven or twelve I asked if I could join Patch and my father for a scheduled annual checkup. Based on this experience, it is remarkable I would ever show any interest in working with animals again.

“Arthur suggested we get there early, slightly before afternoon clinics begin,” said Dad. “That way we should get seen straight away.”

I studied the man gripping the steering wheel as though our car had no brakes. Dad was a wreck, all clenched jaw muscles and white knuckles and a sweaty Nixonesque upper lip. Though he had kicked his cigarette habit years earlier I could still tell when a nicotine craving was rippling through his body and making him wide-eyed and jumpy, as if he were fantasizing about lighting up and exhaling his mounting anxiety on a long and curly puff of smoke.

“Who’s Arthur?” I asked.

“Arthur Stone, the practice’s office manager. He’s the gentleman who organizes the veterinarians and schedules the appointments and the farm calls. Coordinates the day-to-day running of the business. He’s always been good to us. Understands how our Patch dislikes these visits. He tries to make them as painless as possible.”

I didn’t know whether our dog was feeding off Dad’s negative vibe or had tuned in to the route he was driving, his innate canine GPS screaming, “Please don’t turn left in two hundred yards because then I really do know where you’re taking me!” but Patch stood on the backseat, refusing to lie down and panting excessively.
He was a picture of apprehension and if my father had been a German shepherd, at that moment the two of them would have looked identical.

As we pulled into the small parking lot we both noted the presence of two other cars. I almost said something sarcastic about Arthur Stone being such a nice guy he was inviting lots of other anxious pet owners to turn up early, but kept my mouth shut as Dad took a deep breath, attached a leash to Patch’s collar, and headed for the front door.

I trotted along behind, like a reporter assigned to a combat unit in a war zone, trying to keep out of the way, maintaining a safe distance but still drawn to the action. I wasn’t even inside the building when the first explosive went off. It started with the door swinging wide open on its hinges and Patch barreling into the waiting room, barking orders, instigating a pitched verbal battle with a defensive West Highland white terrier. I had time to see Patch lunging forward, the leash as taut as a bowstring, his front legs off the ground. Dad shouted over the din, apologizing to the Westie’s owner, apologizing to a woman with a cat carrier on her lap, apologizing to Mr. Stone, finally getting the message that it might be best if Patch waited in the car rather than the waiting room.

I was still a ways off from perfecting a cocky adolescent sneer and pushing my luck with “That went well,” so I said nothing as we did as we were told. I actually think I was too shocked and humiliated to speak. This was not the dog I knew and loved. Patch’s obvious fear of all things veterinary had taken some of his disagreeable shortcomings to a whole new level. Dad had managed to keep him under control, but all we had done was enter the clinic’s waiting room. What nightmarish transformation awaited us when the man in a white coat appeared? How would Dad be able to rein Patch in during an examination, let alone a shot? Then there were the other
pet owners sitting quietly and politely, minding their business, right now shaking their heads, justifiably cursing the dog with bad manners and the reckless owner who had failed his dog with inadequate socialization and training. The three of us were sent to wait our turn in the car, where we sat like scolded children, certain we had not been forgiven even though we had said we were sorry.

The woman with the cat carrier emerged ten minutes later, walking quickly to her vehicle, key at the ready, as though this were not a parking lot in the middle of the afternoon but a dimly lit underground garage at midnight. I could tell she sensed the guilty threesome skulking in the nearby car though she never once glanced in our direction. She didn’t need to—her bearing and pace said it all, a derisive “How dare you frighten my cat!”

I wondered whether Dad would abort the mission if more cars started turning up, but they didn’t and as soon as the little Westie emerged with his owner in tow, so did Mr. Stone, waving for us to come in, the coast clear.

Arthur Stone seemed to be enjoying himself. He was probably in his early sixties, heavyset, with cheeks that had succumbed to gravity a long time ago, melting into jowls that drooped over the collar of a brown plaid shirt and the knot of a brown woolen tie. He stood well back as he waved us inside.

“I’m sure you know the way, Duncan. First room on the right. Mr. Jones is waiting for you.”

His voice was gravelly, his smoking habit betrayed by the small cardboard box distending his breast pocket. And his words were spiked with a mischievous edge, as if he knew sparks were about to fly and he was titillated by the prospect of watching the show from a safe distance.

Dad marched forward, keeping Patch on an extremely short leash. Waiting for us was a man with thick white hair and heavily
tinted glasses. Back then, photochromic lenses were in their infancy—trendy, expensive, and extremely slow to change from black to transparent during the transition from sunlight to room light. This had the effect of turning Patch’s doctor into a pasty English version of Roy Orbison. I’m not sure what I had expected. Up until now, the potential perils of such an encounter had been handled mostly by avoidance. For the first time in a long time, Patch needed to interact with a complete stranger. Maybe I had expected someone in a safari suit wielding a whip and a wooden chair.

“Come on in,” said Mr. Jones, as though we just happened to be passing by. “I thought I recognized the sound of Patch announcing his arrival.”

Patch completely ignored the polite banter and continued to rant, his volume all the more impressive in the confined and resonant space. Mr. Jones leaned up against his examination table, no more than ten feet from Patch’s snout, talking over him, totally unfazed by his tirade, and suddenly I was faced with something completely new and unexpected: a stranger who was not the least bit intimidated by our big unruly dog. Maybe it was this abrupt contrast between a posturing dog and a reserved professional, but for the first time I felt truly embarrassed by Patch’s behavior.

“Is this your son?”

Dad nodded and replied, “Yes, this is Nick,” but when Dad tried to smile he was betrayed by a grimace that said, “Can we please just get on with this?”

I said a meek hello and I saw Mr. Jones thinking about a formal greeting, hesitating, and backing off, since any attempt to shake hands would have forced his own hand into the strike zone, a maneuver guaranteed to produce the same response from Patch as dangling a T-bone steak in the air between us.

“Any problems since your last visit?” asked Mr. Jones.

“No. Not really,” said Dad. “He seems a little stiff first thing in the morning when we go on our walks. Otherwise I think he’s fine.”

Mr. Jones nodded, scratching a note on an index card.

Patch continued to talk over their dialogue, but his listing of grievances began to slow down, becoming more muttering than shouting, the cranky gripes of an aging dog who resented being ignored. His posture had also changed, his hackles became less prominent, his ears flattened a little, and his tail relaxed into an enormous hairy question mark. Oh, he was still wired and Mr. Jones was obviously keeping his distance, but Patch seemed like he was prepared to accept this state of play, this standoff—no fast moves and nobody gets hurt.

“I’m not sure I’m going to get to perform a meaningful examination,” said Mr. Jones. “But I’m happy to try.”

These days, this is precisely the kind of line I might employ, the “cover your ass” offer to wrestle with a powerful dog high on adrenaline while praying the owner has a modicum of understanding.

Dad did the right thing and shook his head, saying, “Might be best if you just give him his shot and then we’ll be on our way.”

To Mr. Jones’s credit he managed not to look relieved or disappointed.

“Now, how best to do this?” said the doctor, more to himself, though this question had been foremost on my mind for some time. I didn’t know a thing about veterinary medicine but I was pretty sure Patch was not about to sit still, roll up his sleeve, and look away when the needle pierced his skin.

Funny how sometimes the littlest details stay with you. I remember two posters pinned to the wall, one showing the anatomy of the dog, the other, the cat. All the internal organs were labeled and I wanted to find them fascinating and distracting, but the scrimmage that ensued kept vying for my attention. Patch seemed so afraid,
completely unable to comprehend why he was being put through this ordeal, insensible to every attempt my father made to keep him calm. It was like my best friend was getting picked on by a gang of bigger kids in the schoolyard and I was standing there, watching it unfold and doing nothing to help. At the same time there was this overwhelming sense of frustration caused by our collective inability to convey trust and goodwill. I was too close to the action to feel this helpless.

Dad tried to place a leather muzzle over Patch’s snout, failed, then tried to place it while offering a bribe in the form of a dog treat. Mr. Jones proposed a muzzle formed from a long single loop of bandage material, but it was like trying to lasso displaced air and moving teeth. My father recalled previous success with something akin to a “rabies pole,” a long rod through which a thick, stainless-steel lanyard was passed, to be secured around Patch’s neck in the manner of a snare. Fortunately, Mr. Jones had a better suggestion.

“Why don’t you walk him out of the room and I’ll carefully close the door on him, leaving his head outside so I can get to his backside?”

Frozen in fear, I stayed on the business side of the door, watching the action. Mr. Jones worked quickly, offering me a wink and an “all done” as my father rode Patch’s momentum from the jab, the dog scampering straight through the now busy waiting room and out to the car.

“You all right?” said Mr. Jones.

“Yes,” I said, thinking how Patch’s fur had masked the site of steel piercing skin, an observation that made me cower and look away every time I was the victim.

“You sure?”

Obviously my pallor had not convinced him.

“Don’t worry,” he said, “Patch will be fine. He’s not the first
protective German shepherd I’ve ever met and he certainly won’t be the last.”

I nodded, felt awkward, and made to shuffle out of the room.

“Here,” said Mr. Jones, handing me a small dog biscuit in the shape of a bone. “For him, not you. Most of my patients prefer them to lollipops.”

He pressed the biscuit into my open hand, while I offered a barely audible thank-you and ran out to catch up with Dad, who was paying his bill.

“Next time,” said Arthur Stone in a polite whisper, “you might want to give Patch a little something an hour or so before he comes in. I can ask Mr. Jones for a prescription if you like. Make it a lot easier on you and easier on him.”