Bits And Pieces

A Dog's Life

     What has happened to the old fashioned family dog?  Has he also become a victim of suburban living?  Has he lost his individuality along with his dog house and butcher bones?

     You never see a group of dogs out for a stroll and frolic of their own.  His acquaintances are as carefully selected as his food.  He's bathed, barbered and bacterialized.  He's given shots for allergies--has consultations with the vet--pampered and pacified.

     He conforms to being chained to a doggy stake, or is confined to a fenced in yard.  He wears an overcoat and even galoshes.  He belongs to the Kennel Club and he's exhibited at shows.  He's either a problem or a prize to his owners and he's forgotten the knack of knocking over garbage pails or romping through fields with the sheer nose-to-the-ground joy of being a dog.

     His diet is supervised.  Table scraps upset him and bones cause trouble along the digestive track.  He's fed from cans, sacks or boxes, and his weight is as carefully watched as a movie star's.

     He's immunized and deodorized, kept in the house and driven in the car.  Papers trace his ancestors farther back than the family bible traces our own.  He's pedigreed and he costs money, lots of money, so he's valuable property to be fussed over and worried about.

     He sports a fancy collar with a new license tag every year; and to keep that tag company he wears a compulsory rabies shot tag.  What has happened to dogs like the mixed-up stray who once followed me home from school and decided to remain as our family mascot?  Is he long gone in the suburbs?

     The farm dog like the country mouse finds he has all sorts of relatives living it up in town; and that town cousin is a highly sophisticated and nervous version of his country kinsman.

     We have a pampered pooch.  He has allergies in summer and fungus infections all year.  He occupies the middle of the kitchen floor and he hasn't the faintest idea what to do with a bone.  He's big and he barks which makes him think he's a watchdog, but he loves everyone and he's a problem as all his lots are gobbled up by houses and his lone spots of freedom are few.  He's a hunting dog who can't find a spot of food on the floor unless it is pointed out to him.  He's a charter member of the vet visiting club and he's constantly expensive; but he has only to gaze at me out of his always bloodshot brown eyes to make my heart melt.

     Mac is a fool and a clown.  Romps like a pup through the house and has several broken lamps to his credit.  He needs baths, sprays, clipping jobs and special foods; but he's our own pedigreed, lovable problem.

     Our Springer is old enough to remember puppy days of freedom when our house stood out lonesomely on the block.  He can recollect a couple of Spring seasons when he brought baby rabbits from the fields and laid them tenderly at our feet, unhurt with their fur not even mussed.

     So I guess dogs are here to stay even in the suburbs.  I suppose we can't have dogs wandering over the neighbor's landscaping so laws are made which chain him to the yard.  He can sit at the end of his doggy stake and envy the neighborhood cats free and on the prowl.

     Maybe dogs are bored and like humans with nothing much to do develop all sorts of maladies; but where there are humans there will be dogs and they've become as much a part of the rush and bustle of suburban living as their owners and react about the same way.

     Man's best friend will always love and adore these strange fellows called masters.  Although he may dream of green fields, plenty of trees and being once again a hunter after game, he'll follow willingly his beloved humans even to go rocketing to the moon if necessary.

     He's smart; he knows that "a dog's life" means he's really living on velvet in the suburbs today.

Written March 8, 1962