Walks with Leporello, Thoughts on LOVE, GOD and DOG - 5. V. Walks with Leporello

V. Walks with Leporello

May 15, 2011

I suppose there is something in the very act of walking that engenders reflection. The heart beats along as we go, the limbs chug, nicely circulating the life force, and we become connected with the now in a way that our brains alone can never be. While we walk, we are simultaneously settled with the present and keep pace with what has gone before. The future, that is left to the side when we are really trekking along, and that condition is for the most part a relief to us. The body soothes the mind. But it’s also true that memories – nostalgia – keep pace with where we look and what we see. A building where we had friends live; a set of terrazzo steps where we are forced to pause; or a blooming iris that takes one to the scent of many springs past. These reminders seem to potential themselves with every footfall.

There is something of the tinge of heavy nostalgia resting on carefree Airedale shoulders. Any number of people we chanced to meet during our walkabouts bore witness to this. Leppy brought out – what I like to think of as – a far-away look of remembrance in some people. It should not be surprising that so many individuals have been touched by the breed, because as you cast back through the generations, Airedales will become more and more prevalent. It is only natural that America’s one-time Number One most popular breed should continue on in many peoples’ power of recollection. There also seems to be a shared memory, whether engendered from personal contact or not, of the Airedale’s traits of smarts and bravery. And why not? When Americans themselves were bolder, they kept bolder dogs to be the quintessential All-American mascot – Airedales perfectly fit the bill for the optimistic 1920s, and were for them the Golden Retrievers of our tuned-out, sleepier day.

As for Leporello, after turning the corner of his one-year mark, the adolescent “I can’t be bothered” steeliness of his glint slowly gave way. It returned to his puppyhood’s non-judgmental gazes. I like to fancy he grew to understand that, for one, he could hurt himself with some of his impulse decisions, and two, that we would always be there to comfort that ouchy paw he raised for our inspection. We, as the mouse, could Aesop-fashion remove the thorn from between our mighty lion’s tender toes.

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Leppy went out morning and evening on his constitutionals; Sunny taking the morning shift, and I the evenings. We’d always meet members of the diverse crowd that peopled our neighborhood. Duboce Triangle is like the overlapping sheet corners of surrounding districts. It seems that several ‘halves’ meet on common ground to live in the Triangle. Half are Gay folk from the Castro, half Latino from the Mission; half are working class from the Western Addition, and half are moneyed easy-streeters from the Corona Heights and Buena Vista enclaves. It’s a melting pot with a gentle, sweet savor from the few old-timers born there, or moved there just after the war. These were mostly ladies, in their 70s and 80s, whom I’d meet gaily folding their laundry next to us apartment-renters at the laundromat. I’d also meet them chatting with the proprietors of the corner groceries. Very happy souls, they always had a warm smile and open, soft-reaching hands for Leppy and me. Encouragement and optimism were the lifeblood of their generation.

There was also a small proportion of Vietnam Vets, like our next-door neighbor, who would carry his geriatric dog up and down the steps of his building’s stoop. The man got a young companion dog from the SPCA who was the very model of patience. This young dog would pace his youth to wait for the elder dog on their walks, and because of it, he slowly lost all the looks of youth. His coat became thin, his shoulders and neck stooped, and his eyes obtained a far-away look, gazing intently as they did on his human companion to tell him if was going too fast. One day, the elder dog passed away. Slowly, walk by walk, the young dog shook away the fetters of slowness like a child shedding the trappings of mourning garb. His eyes took on a new cast, and he now looked with glee upon every encouragement from the man he walked with. He explored new nooks, new trees and his tail rose to a prominent position of confidence and joy. Step and eyes brightened, his coat thickened and glossed, and the spots of hairlessness from the elder’s affliction of mange disappeared. This rebirth was complete when the veteran brought home a new puppy. Now the young dog was a young parent, and to complete the arc of his growth, he could turn his quiet deferential love to an active ardor. He seemed to me like a butterfly cracking his chrysalis.

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For people in general, walking is a way to make time to tune out, but for dogs, it’s a time for all senses to be reporting to the processing centers of the brain at full force. Bored at home, to be able to smell something challenging – something natural – is a stimulating relief to canines. For the longest time I wondered in frustrated impatience why, after sniffing a tree for a long time and then raising his leg upon it in benediction, Leppy would often insist on turning right back to the same spot and sniff it in slow contemplation for a second or third time. But looking at it through his eyes, or rather, smelling it through his nose, I realized his concentration was applied to one thing – deciphering one scent. This item analyzed, he went back to process the next piece of information, and on and on. I figured this out through applying the same logic to my listening to a friend’s voice in a noisy restaurant. The muzak, the silverware clatter, all is cut out, but if I wanted to eavesdrop to the neighboring table, I could focus on that other voice with no problem. People who did not know him, or his sense of humor, may find this hard to believe, but sometimes when my impatience manifested itself with a gentle tug of the leash away from a thirdly inspected tree, Leppy would overreact and stumble back on the pavement like I had just yanked with all my might. He would, believe it or not, only do this when there was a person walking right past us at that moment. As this third party glared with hostile intent at the brute I was, Leppy would shoot a devil-dog “Serves you right” glance in my direction.

With dogs, so much information comes through the nose that the eyes are given second-class priority. Since all kinds of people were drawn to Leppy, I occasionally had to divert his attention onto a waiting admirer. This however was never especially true with children. Children presented their own unique challenges to me when walking, not because I didn’t know what Leporello would do – as his kind actions were guaranteed to be straightforward – but because of the sheer unpredictability on the child’s side. The best kind of youngster for him was one who just extended open arms for Leppy to walk into. He’d place his head literally in their hands to receive their gentle petting, and he’d turn his flank for them to reach their arms around his middle. By this time, usually a wide-eyed parent would yank the child by the other arm to disengage them. Their lesson about not every dog being as friendly as Leporello was a valid one. As for the myriad displays from average children – running, screaming in delight, or cowering, crying, or screaming in fright – they could all be seen, sometimes one right after the other. Leporello, for his part, was exemplary with children even from his youngest days. His approach was to mirror their actions towards him. He ignored children who ignored him; he acted fearful of those fearful of him; and was warm and generous with those of open smiles and beckoning hands. As I said, he would walk into their embrace, meet them eye to eye, and turn his body just right for a childish grasp to hug him in the most effective way.

As for adult encounters, often we met with people who grew up with this breed and would wax longingly over Leppy’s visage and smiling tail. At other times, we’d encounter those who had some surprising intelligence to relay about Airedales. One fellow, wearing a camo jacket and looking a bit world-weary, stopped us. With some cautiously fleeting glances at the dog, he proceeded to relate how Airedales are fearless; how they died carrying messages between trenches in the Great War; and how they were the preferred weapon to hunt lions in Africa. “A gun with reasoning ability,” he said, adding, “Air-dale – that’s spelled E-I-R-E-Dale, right?” Not quite, but he later went on to mention he believed there was an Irish connection to the breed, which would explain his EIRE for Ireland. In the meantime, so engrossed was he in his information relay, that he failed to take any further notice of Leppy’s presence. Eventually, bored because of the prolonged stop, Leppy sidled up to the man’s knees, leaned on him and looked him in the eyes. This was Leppy’s invite for a good long stroking session, but the man started at the physical contact with the “lion killer” and jumped to the side. In half an instant though, he looked with amazed eyes and asked me, “Is it all right . . . ?” He meant to pet Leppy, and I encouraged him whole-heartedly. In the moment after a tentative caress of his hand, Leppy’s artless warmth prompted the man to genuflect and rub vigorously. Leporello, as “Thank you,” gave him a quick lick on the face, and the man rose with a beaming smile as bright as the sun. The abstract made concrete; fearful tales of Airedales absolved by the loving blessing of one. “Go and sin no more,” Leppy seemed to say.

Another time a woman stopped us. She was a slightly bedraggled baby boomer who told me she’d kept Airedales in the good old psychedelic days of the 1960s. “Butter,” she advised in nervous earnestness. “They’ll do anything you want for butter. Try it.” She raised her eyebrows in a quick confidence and went her way. I puzzled for a moment there on the sidewalk and thought that Leppy probably had not ever tasted butter. So, that evening, after the walk, I pulled some out to see if Leporello would go wild for the good stuff. Regardless of it being laced with nothing hippier than a suspicion of salt, Leppy liked it, but appeared to me to be of the opinion that he could take it or leave it.

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Coincidentally enough, just about this time, the November 1997 issue of Food and Wine Magazine arrived on my doorstep. I have said that everyone in the 1920s had Airedales, and Julia Child had been no exception. She provided a girlhood Thanksgiving memory set in Pasadena where she grew up. Their family Airedale Eric had caused a Turkey Day butter crisis. Little Julia’s mother had set the table, including her special sterling silver individual serving butter plates. All the crystal was set; all the silverware and napkins had likewise been placed. Confidently knowing everyone preparing the dinner knew their role, she stepped out of the house for an errand. Coming back through the dining room to the kitchen, she immediately asked the maid why the butter had not been placed, and was told that the special holiday-mood curled portions had indeed been doled out. Standing dumbfounded over the immaculate table, the head scratching of the two women resolved nothing, until they heard a slightly scrambled sound from behind the living room sofa. “Eric!” they cried. Hearing his name, he dutifully presented himself, but with guilt-lowered ears. A cockeyed tilt of a picked-up butter plate to the light revealed clear tongue streaks. Even as Mother waved the silver plate accusingly under Eric’s shiny black nose, she had to admire how the dog had gone from serving to serving, stretching his proboscis to snatch every last dreg of the solidified nectar. It’s doubtful he appreciated that each portion had been formed into pretty little curls. But that he had done his pilfering without upsetting one piece of crystal, moving one plate or wrinkling a single napkin comes as no surprise to the experienced Airedale person. Eric for his part, even though he looked demure and regretful, had had a great Thanksgiving. The conversation sparked about him continued as the family sat down to view the dinner spread, and I suspect a certain little Julia gave him a little extra butter under the table, because life is short, as she’d often later say. [i]

Similarly, as in the kismet fashion of the ‘butter connection,’ a few years later we bought an unassuming book called All About Airedales in our new neighborhood. [ii] This rare little gem was on decorous display in a pet boutique on Church Street. This store rounded out their off-the-shelf stock with one-off antiques that featured dogs or cats. This book, from 1911, for example, was open and standing next to a 1930s child’s hanger with a cutesy-cutesy transfer of Scotties in mid frolic. Buying this tome, I learned that the author provided that exceptional and important California view of Airedales. Here in writing was proof of what someone long ago, perhaps even Leppy’s breeder, had told me about Airedales. One of the purest stocks is found in the Sierra Nevada Mountains, the originals having left the Aire Valley of the English midlands only twenty or so years after the breed was settled. Their distinctive features being unalloyed intelligence and bearing meant that by 1910 Airedales were the aristocratic companion dog of choice, and two were First Class passengers on the Titanic, neither of whom survived. [iii] The performance of this amazing breed on the battlefields of Europe catapulted their renown into people’s hearts, and resulted in some unwanted pressure on breeders. With the sudden rise of Airedales from a very rare breed in 1917 to America’s number one breed by 1920, many smaller terriers were tossed into the American kennels providing pups to an eager market. And lo and behold, we found a written reference to Airedales hunting lions! But not in Africa . . . more like Placer County, California. Page 122 of the book mentioned above, under the chapter called “Using Airedales to Capture Mountain Lions Alive,” gives printed account of a grand chase and eventual tree-cornering of a pair of cougars; one nine-foot-long. Two photos on an earlier page show cougars run up trees so they could be captured unharmed. [iv]

So it turns out, our sidewalk informant, the man in camo, got his facts correct, but his continents misplaced. [v]

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On our walks, Leppy would make life-long friends at the slightest of provocations. Once we were crossing the street, and he glanced over his shoulder. Another man was crossing behind us, and Leppy insisted he knew him. We had to stop, Leppy lowered his ears and forced the man to stop and greet him. He was a good sport, and the dog was happy. On occasions like this I wonder if dogs do not sometimes suffer from cases of mistaken-smell-dentity? – that someone smells so similar to someone else the dog knows, they mistake one for the other. It’s merely speculation on my part, but it somehow seems plausible to me.

Another of Leppy’s human “finds” of this nature was a man who lived around the corner. One evening as we were walking past, the door to his ground-level flat opened and he took a step out. Leppy insisted we stop, and the befuddled man – another good sport – had a new best friend for life. This was reinforced by the coincidence of the man being there occasionally as we walked by. I believe Leppy always knew when the door would open just for him.

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Other Airedales may not have been lion hunters, but they were national figures. Teddy Roosevelt was the first White House resident to have one, or possibly several, but he was far from the last. [vi] Woodrow Wilson had his Davie. [vii] Calvin Coolidge’s had two: Paul Pry and Laddie Buck. [viii] And these beloved pets formed a GOP presidential passing of the baton, because the first was brother to, and the second, son of, Warren Harding’s Laddie Boy.

Of all the well-known Airedales in history, Laddie Boy is the best loved by memory. The First Dog of his nation, Laddie Boy won the hearts of millions with his nationally syndicated column – in which he talked about Harding’s official doings in the White House – and the many photos of Laddie Boy jumping almost into the President’s arms when the man came home from official business. The dog’s love and devotion to the President was on international display, perhaps as a nothing-special type of love for an Airedale, but it was surprising in its degree to the average dog owner. Many are Laddie Boy’s exploits, captured as they were by a press corps ostensibly there to follow Harding. Like the times Warren sliced golf balls into trees, and dutiful Laddie Boy scampered up the trunks and into the foliage to retrieve them. If you think this is easily accomplished for a dog, it is not, but an Airedale-mind-made is a match for all challenges.

News of the dog’s premonition of the president’s death in office added immensely to the national grief. Even though the President and First Lady had been gone for weeks on a trip to Alaska, Laddie Boy held down the White House fort with calm normality. This all changed when he inexplicably became agitated, stopped eating, and was prone to baleful howlings. Left to his own devices, he began to spend all of his time standing by a pair of French doors on the west side of the White House. A photographer captured his worried and far-sighted eyes looking to where the sun would set. All of this began and ended as the President lay dying in San Francisco. Seventy-two hours of Laddie Boy’s restless agitation became quiet, numb grief at the moment of the man’s passing on the other side of the continent.

Nearly 20,000 pennies were donated by children, Statue of Liberty fashion, to build a permanent memorial to Laddie Boy in the White House. Sculptor Bashka Paeff melted the pennies and rendered a life size bronze portrait to always stand guard in the People’s House and be as loyal and loving to every forthcoming President as he had been to Warren G. Harding. Their dreams were altered by the whims of future trends, and Laddie Boy’s statue was moved to the Smithsonian, where he is no longer on display. However, this is not the only memorial to Laddie Boy, as a beautiful stained-glass window in his native Ohio also celebrates his life. And in many people’s hearts he reposes comfortably with those who do not forget the service he faithfully rendered his country. [ix]

(Photo Source: Library of Congress)

Laddie Boy, captured on the afternoon of August 1st, 1923, looking anxiously from inside

the White House as the President lay dying in San Francisco. Warren Harding was to pass

away in a matter of hours from the time this photo was taken. [x]

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One ‘command’ I taught Leppy sometime when he was five or six years old was “Say Hello.” The nose leads the way, and when the canine olfactory sense is engaged, concentration shuts down perception-processing from the other senses. It’s the same with humans; when we read something, for example, noises become something easy to shut out. With Leppy, because of his size and beauty, people always wanted to pet him. If he was engaged in smell analysis, even though he was looking directly at someone, he’d miss the signs that they wanted to greet him. It dawned on me that if I let him know, he’d want to socialize. So “Say Hello” would instantly cause him to stop smelling, blink and look around for some warm-hearted, interspecies mingling.

In more current times, two moves later, our new neighborhood was much like the first. It had a mix of people – new-timers and old-timers together. On the corner lived a lovely Polish lady. Perhaps in her 70s, she always greeted the tail-wagging Leppy by getting on one knee and crooning a low “I love you . . . I love you . . . ” right into his ear. She’d hug him dearly, and he responded with deferential mannerisms and an upward gaze. She’d kiss his forehead.

One evening – a lucky evening for Lep – she emerged with a ziploc bag containing about half a pound of cooked pork chop pieces. She spoon fed him until I felt embarrassed and said she should keep some for other dogs. “But . . . Kocham cię,” she replied in Polish, all while Leppy dutifully emptied her bag one delicious morsel at a time. Other lucky sidewalk finds were not so enjoyable for him though. Many were the discarded drumstick bones that needed rescue, but I’d pry open his mouth and make him drop them. I came to realize that for him this was equivalent to me finding a perfectly good twenty-dollar bill on the sidewalk, and someone slapping it out of my hand. “Why?” his eyes would try to reason with me. “That was still good . . . . ”

As for the dear lady, her very hugs were suffused with the sweet pangs of nostalgia. She told me how she’d come to this country after World War II, got a good manufacturing job and enjoyed dancing in the ballrooms of the old San Francisco she knew. “I used to raise Poodles,” she told me confidentially, “and believe me”—said glancing over a shoulder—“dogs are better than people nowadays. Much better, like your angel!” And then to him, she’d add a soft, “I love you . . . . ”

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A couple of weeks before he died, Leporello had his last warm encounter with a child. As we walked, a young South Asian couple with tot in stroller, purposefully crossed the street in front of us. Leppy was busy with the smells on a tree and did not notice them stop. I tapped him twice, my new signal for him to come along, since his hearing was almost all gone. He looked up, and when he did so, a pair of little arms extended from the stroller. The little attached hands wiggled slowly with open and beckoning fingers. Leppy walked right into that embrace. He placed his head on the little boy’s lap as the child’s mamma gave him his first lesson on how to gently stroke a dog’s head. Leppy for his part, wagged a slow and supremely contented tail. Sad to say, but in these final few weeks, his tail-wagging became less and less, but as he was invited into an open-armed embrace, and his head petted by a little hand, his backside began to smile. I fancy in that quiet moment, where the current time was all-important, and the future forgotten, Leporello was overcome with the memories of the good old days. He was buoyed with the simultaneous pang of nostalgia and the warm and loving embrace of the present.