I don’t know how old my little hound dog is. All I know is we just celebrated 10 years with her — a truly special animalversary. Chase, the dog, got a fish stick with a lit candle in it. OK, that’s pretty sad for such a special occasion, but the dog sure was excited and everybody knows the firstborn gets somewhat forgotten once the secondborn comes along.
But what it lacked in pomp and circumstance was sure made up for in memories of 10 wonderful years. A dog can bring such joy to a family, and my goofball of an animal has certainly done that.
It’s kind of incredible that it was a decade ago that my wife and I trekked off to the Humane Society in search of a K9. We had been married just a few months and found ourselves in a house of our own. So why not ruin it with an animal who might chew up the furniture and cause smells like a cross between a high school locker room and a cow barn?
We strolled down the enclosures looking for the right dog, trying to sort out in a glance who would make the perfect lifelong companion. I know I would have loved any animal we had picked, but I also know my life would not have been as rich without Chase.
She’s just that special a dog.
Yet, I was completely unimpressed when I first saw her. My wife pointed her out after we tried walking another dog that must have thought I was an Iditarod sled.
“How about this one?” she said.
“That one?” I replied, pointing at the little mongrel with sad eyes, ears that drooped like wilted spinach and a tail that seemed pinned to the floor, except for its wagging tip. “She looks like an old maid.”
I wanted a youthful looking dog, one with some swagger and pep. This dog looked like she might help clean up the dishes or do your taxes. I didn’t need an accountant. She looked part beagle and part spaniel, and the best way to describe her is like Snoopy with the black and white reversed.
But something about her drew my wife in. Maybe it was her brown eyes, which can really work you, or the fact that whenever you look at Chase you get the feeling that she’s trying to talk to you.
“Let’s just take her out,” Nancy said.
Chase knew how to make a sale. The minute the door swung open she started jumping straight into the air like she just realized she had been sitting on hot coals. Or like she was part mountain goat. Needless to say, we took her home. And she was instant family.
We named her Chase because she got loose the first couple of days we had her. She would follow her nose on some wild romp around the neighborhood while I chased behind her screaming, “Come back here you idiot dog!”
“Chase” seemed fitting.
She’s been an absolute personality — a total character — since day one. We went out the first night we got her and came home to find her sitting on the dining room table and staring out the front door window waiting for us.
She has climbed extension ladders onto the roof with me (don’t ask) and she’s rolled in dead fish. She’s stolen shrimp out of people’s hands with that unbelievable leaping ability. She’s slathered me in kisses every time she’s seen me upset, and chased birds on the beach until she looked like she might keel over. (Never caught one, though.) She’s only ever had one written warning from the Post Office, and she’s been remarkably patient with my daughter since we came home from the hospital.
Funny how a little furry animal without opposable thumbs can become such an important fixture in your life — so integral to your family that you can’t even remember a time without her. That’s the sign of a good dog. That’s Chase.
She’s getting up there in years now — there’s more white on her muzzle and she doesn’t have the same spring in her jump — but she’s still the same Chase. That same little knucklehead we picked out at the pound 10 years ago. Happy animalversary, you old hound dog. I’m sure glad I listened to your mother.