Whodaboy

The list I promised: there isn't a list. I can't quantify the fruit of these years of practice. I don't want to.
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Sometimes I like to just watch Anakin breathe. I love the way his ribs spread as he draws in air, and he only belly breathes. I never expected that I'd have a small dog. He's stylishly cute, a chic little dog. But all that stuff--style, cute, chic--those are the consequences of years of breeding, followed by the mystery of what made him, since he's a mutt, none of which he knows the first thing about. What he knows is the safety of someone he trusts near him, the pleasure of a full belly, the exhilaration of running across the lawn with his ears flying and his tongue lolling, the requirement many sounds make of him that he announce a deer in the woods or a truck on the driveway.

Favorite quirks: He doesn't have opposing thumbs, of course, but he uses his paws skillfully to hold a rawhide chewie as he tears at it. In an outdoor game of ball, he loves to turn 180 degrees in the air to make his catch. He has a missing tooth. Sometimes I draw his top lip back to see the tiny space where a tooth used to be.

A couple of months ago, he must have found something nasty to eat in the woods. His stomach was so upset that he didn't eat for two days, and I could hear the gurgling gas from across the room. That night when we went to bed, he turned onto his back and for a long, long time I rubbed his belly to help the gas move through. The next day he was well enough to eat.

I think I'm his first choice in companionship (although his best friend Chaco, and Chaco's family Carol and Pam are closer than second choice), but I know that in my absence he'll stick close to whomever he identifies as the person most likely to feed and care for him. He's gotten pretty attached to Joy; when she wakes in the morning and comes out from her bedroom he greets her, so glads to see her--it's a real occasion, brief but celebratory.

He's pretty cagey about knowing patterns in my behavior. If I invite him to walk up to the mail box at around 4 or 5 PM, he knows there's a good chance that shortly afterward, I'll be leaving him at home alone for a few hours, and he'll try to stay outside, as though that improves the odds that I'll take him with me.

We have funny little routines neither of us ever tires of. When I've been out for a while and return to the house, I call him through the door and he starts to yelp. He waits for me to open the door and then after a brief moment of jumping up to welcome me home, he goes running through the house to find his toy of choice which he brings to me for a bit of play. When we're walking from the elevator to the door to Joy and Evan's apartment, I sometimes take off his leash and he runs ahead to the door. Then he turns to look over his shoulder at me and I throw up my hands and gasp and he comes running back to me. At my side again, he makes a sharp U-turn and runs back to the door. In this way we work our way to 15D, me laughing, him panting.

He has many names. Anakin, Ani, Whodaboy, Whoda, Treasure Boy, Mr. Whitchick. He comes to all of them. When I call him by name to come back to the house from the woods, my voice is clear, and he hears me and comes running like returning to his home is the most wonderful thing in the world.

I don't think I ever believe that he's human, but I do forgot that he's a dog. Then I realize that his whole body is covered with hair, that he walks on four legs, that he sniffs lamp posts and licks his penis, and I remember precisely that he is a dog. But what is this? I ask myself. What is "dog"? What is this dog? And what am I? Who am I?

After a little I am taken in and put to bed.
Sleep, soft smiling, draws me unto her:
and those receive me, who quietly treat me,
as one familiar and well-beloved in that home:
but will not, no ,will not, not now, not ever;
but will not ever tell me who I am.
from James Agee's "Knoxville: Summer 1915"