READING

Bad Dog

RACHEL MAIZES

Rachel Maizes is an attorney, a writer, and a dog lover who currently lives in Boulder, Colorado. Her essay “Bad Dog” was published in the “My Story” section of The New York Times online in September 2013.

1

My dog, Chance, is old. White fur circles his eyes, coats his muzzle, sprouts between his toes. Although still alive, he looks like a ghost. He used to stand like a champion, his chest and muzzle forward, his hind legs back. Now he can hardly support himself when he sits, balancing precariously like a pile of kindling propped against itself.

2

He takes an anti-inflammatory medication for arthritis and pumpkin for constipation and fish oil and glucosamine for his joints and mind, though it may be too late for the latter. He walks an endless circuit between the guest room and bedroom and master bath searching for what I don’t know. When he tires, he lies next to me as I work. Sometimes he groans.

3

I think about what it means to have cared for Chance for most of his life. It confirms that I, too, am growing older. I turned 50 a few months ago. Overnight, wiry gray hair has sprouted at my temples. Always a theater buff, now I attend matinees. My back stiffens after weeding. In the mirror, I see a face rearranged by gravity’s heavy hand. I remember Chance as a gangly puppy with floppy ears. I keep a picture of myself as a young woman, a 20-something with spiky hair, my arm around my mother, now dead 10 years. A dog’s life is shorter than ours, but ours is, as the Talmud says, “k’heref aiyen,” like the blink of an eye.

4

Chance’s fur is long and mats easily. I brush it, collecting thick, webby piles. My second husband, Steve, saved the fur of a dog he once owned and a friend wove it into cloth. It’s one of the things I love about Steve, the over-the-top affection he bestows on animals. I toss Chance’s hair into the trash or scatter it outside for birds to install in their nests.

5

Fourteen years ago my ex-husband and I adopted Chance from a shelter. He was a 4-month-old puppy, an Australian Shepherd mix, with brindle fur. We had another dog, Tilly, a 2-year-old black Lab, who trained him. When we told Chance to sit, he glanced at Tilly and followed her lead. We crated Chance, as the shelter recommended, keeping him in an enclosure for brief periods of time to housebreak him and give him a sense of security. Once I left him in the crate for several hours. I returned to find him trembling, squeezed into a corner of the crate to avoid the puddles and piles he had made. No emergency had kept me. I had been chatting with a friend and time got away. It wasn’t the only time I failed Chance. It was easy to fail him, a mere dog, who couldn’t insist that I return, who couldn’t even embarrass me by telling the story.

6

When Chance turned 2 he became aggressive. He growled at other dogs and bared his teeth. He flattened puppies under his heavy paws. He chased children and cyclists, clamped down on their ankles and knocked them over. He even bit Tilly in a scuffle over my bed.

7

When I tired of apologizing for him, I hired a trainer. She told me his aggression was set off by fear. She said to keep him away from unfamiliar dogs and people, for their sake and his.

8

I fled when other dogs approached. If I was distracted and we crossed paths with another dog, I ordered Chance to sit and rewarded him with meaty treats if he stayed calm. Most days he preferred the fight. He hurled himself at the other dog, barely restrained by the leash. He barked furiously, drowning out my attempt to explain to the other dog’s owner, “Chance doesn’t like to socialize.”

9

I didn’t know when I adopted Chance that puppies need to interact with other dogs to learn social cues. A well-socialized dog employs a soft growl to tell another dog “you’re in my space.” A puppy who interacts with a variety of other dogs learns to roughhouse in a playful, rather than a threatening, way. Chance had Tilly for company and I mistakenly thought that was enough. I was depressed and in a bad marriage. Nothing got me off the couch. By the time I started taking better care of myself and walking the dogs every day, it was too late.

10

I divorced my first husband and the dogs took care of me. Chance made me feel safe in a large, empty house. Tilly shared my bed, resting her head on my ex-husband’s pillow. But I hated being the owner of a bad dog. I felt ashamed turning away someone whose dog wanted to play and telling a schoolchild she couldn’t pet Chance. I lived in constant fear of him attacking someone.

11

Yet in some ways, I am the perfect owner for Chance. An introvert, I identify with his desire to be left alone. I empathize with his feelings of jealousy. When Steve and I married and Tilly transferred her loyalty to him, lying at his feet instead of mine, I could hardly suppress my rage.

12

It’s easy to love a well-behaved dog. It’s harder to love Chance, with his bristly personality and tendency toward violence. Yet in the end, I measure the success of my relationship with Chance by its challenges, because if I can’t love him at his most imperfect what use is love?

13

A few years ago, an old yellow Lab got loose. The dog lunged at Chance, sinking his teeth into the soft flesh of his throat. He bit his head and tore at his face. The Lab foamed, reveling in the attack. I kept hold of Chance’s leash and screamed at the owner, but she was frozen. I didn’t see how Chance could survive multiple, vicious bites.

14

Finally, the owner pulled the Lab off by his hind legs. Chance whimpered. He hadn’t fought back. What saved him were the other dog’s teeth, so worn by age they were mostly ineffective. Chance’s teeth were sharp and he was young and strong. Why had he held back? Perhaps he wasn’t such a bad dog after all.

15

In his old age Chance has mellowed. When we walk, he attends to what is directly in front of him, a flagpole or a mailbox, barely sensing other dogs. It takes us 40 minutes to go around the block, but when I look at him he grins. It’s his favorite time of day and mine.

16

I try to be gentle with Chance, hoping when the time comes others will be gentle with me. When I catch myself tugging his leash, I remind myself these are his last days and to enjoy them. The night before Tilly died she tried to get my attention, resting her muzzle on my keyboard. I moved her aside. I was busy writing and I thought there would be time to play, not knowing her cancer would take a dramatic turn in the morning and we would have to euthanize her.

17

I often think back to that night, wishing I had cuddled and cradled my girl. I hope not to make the same mistake with Chance. Steve scratches his belly every night before we go to bed. Chance deserves at least as much from me.

18

He is, after all, my good dog.