I Would Take You Home

I always assumed I would outlive you. I mean, I hoped I would, though it was touch and go for a while there. Which just goes to show, you never know. Still, for all my preparation, for all my mental gymnastics about sparing you suffering, letting go is hard, so hard.

It was 2006 and I needed a friend. Yassou needed one, too. He was in a deep funk over the loss of our dear Java. But a toothy, 90-pound curmudgeon doesn’t make new friends easily.

You were the ultimate dog’s dog. How much so, I wouldn’t learn till later. All I knew was you were a gentleman, a Katrina survivor and Yassou liked you. You probably had no idea what a big deal that was. Or maybe you did.

You were so young and had already lived through so much. From your missing teeth, paperwork and Google Earth, a picture emerged: a dog, left behind in the New Orleans evacuation, who had chewed himself free, found high ground, and survived two and a half months on the street, contracting heartworm and foraging on God knows what. You certainty developed a taste for cats, as l discovered our first week together, grateful you caught a feral one, not a neighbor’s pet.

The only clue to your former life was your excitement whenever we passed hard hats. One of your people must have worn one. Were they alive? Dead? Trapped in circumstances not of their choosing? Missing you? Despairing of ever see you again? Thinking you dead?

No one knew your real name. The disaster relief team named you Beanee Weenee. As I was to find out later, it was your fondness for the VanCamp’s canned good which earned you that moniker. All I knew was it lacked dignity, and you did not.

For a week, I tried out New Orleans themed names, hoping to hit upon the right one: Gumbo, Mojo, Jazz, … None fit. None raised a whisker. Then, as if beamed by your watchful gaze into my brain, it came: Ripple. It was the illusion of your chestnut and black brindle and the metaphor for Katrina’s impact. The reference to cheap wine had a Bourbon Street swagger, and the allusion to the Grateful Dead song’s haunting lyrics fit your story.

There is a road, no simple highway
Between the dawn and the dark of night …

If I knew the way, I would take you home.

The terror of your experience bled through in your fears: water, separation and gunfire. We worked through it, though. Well, not the gun part, not completely. That’s okay. Gunfire is worth fearing.

I never expected a reply when I wrote the Louisiana-SPCA, sending a brief message about your new life and a photo of your home. I figured they had enough on their plate without answering an email from Maine. I thought it might be nice for the volunteers to learn what happened to one of the thousands they rescued.

I had no idea you had a fan club.

People started to contact me: the woman who arranged your transport to Maine, triage workers, shelter volunteers, even your vet. That’s how I learned your backstory, how special you were.

Skin and bones, adult, mixed breed and heartworm positive, absent an owner claiming you in a timely fashion, protocol called for your destruction. Heartworm treatment is lengthy and potentially fatal. And there were so many dogs, so few resources.

But your big heart won over others. Your team went to bat for you, lobbying for treatment, giving you more time. You survived.

You were so good with other dogs, they used you to test new arrivals’ dog-friendliness. When scrappy dogs barked and snapped, you were all “meh,” not because you were a pacifist, but because you had self confidence. Humans could take a lesson from you.

Months went by. Your owner failed to appear. No one adopted you. It was just wrong.

One of your rescuers, her home lost to the hurricane, had moved to Maine, a state with an approximately 90% adoption/reclaim rate. Callie had a plan. Bring the most deserving dogs to Maine in small batches. You were one of the first.

Without her, we might never have met. But we did. And, through you, Callie and I became friends.

It was she I turned to in our first crisis. You bit a visitor, albeit an impolite one. When he barged in without giving me time to answer the door, you grabbed him by the calf till he retreated outside. Granted, you didn’t break the skin, but he had one hell of a bruise.

I panicked. “What do I do, Callie?” I pleaded, hoping I wouldn’t be told you needed to be put down as a dangerous dog.

“In New Orleans we say, ‘Good dog!’” was the reply.

And there it was. You were always okay with whomever I asked in, even the crazed meth-head who crashed his car on a snowy winter night. You understood the difference between invitation and intrusion. Good dog.

You were the perfect travel companion, making friends wherever we went with your Big Easy cool. When we visited the new LA-SPCA shelter in Algiers, old friends of yours came out of the back to schmooze. They pointed to the bulletin board. There, in local-boy-makes-good fashion, hung the photo I had sent of you at the Grand Canyon. They’d labeled it “Beanee Weenee in Maine.” I guessed they didn’t get out of the city much.

Your top dog vibe pulled our fat out of the fire in Texas, where it’s still the wild west when it comes to leash laws. When we were confronted by a roving pack on our morning walk, I was certain it was going to end with one or both of us in the hospital. But you stood your ground and kept your chill. The neighborhood dogs left us be.

You were so good to me when I got sick and couldn’t hike or play. Your steady, undemanding companionship was such a comfort. I hope you know that.

I wanted to live for you. And I did.

And then your years started to catch up with you.

It was hard to discover you couldn’t do some things like you used to. But you were a good sport and always game for a hike, even if it was on the flat, or a ride, even if you did need a boost into the truck. Even our last ride. Even when you couldn’t walk because the brain tumor, or whatever it was, had short circuited your controls.

Your eyes pleaded, “Help me.” And we did. Even your vet was crying.

Godspeed, Ripple. May you find your way to the furthest field. Your friends are waiting for you, the ones who went before. May we meet again in that happy home.

All photos by Meg Barclay except the Grand Canyon. A random tourist helped out with that one.