wendy

something my dad wrote for the weekly bulletin at his Temple:

I did not want a dog. I resisted my familys importuning and constant whining about the pleasure of dog ownership which I affectionately called, in mock Yiddish, canine hora.

But Miriam worked on me, and at that she does not fail. Though I insisted that Fido live a dogs life and though I swore that if necessary I would soon leave the warmth of the family hearth for the doghouse, I relented. OK, then. Lets get a dog.

Kasha was chosen by Giliah and Max from a litter of boxer puppies, born to a well-regarded breeder of boxers in the Boston area. She came to us a little puppy, whom we crate-trained and, within a year, obedience-trained at doggie kindergarten.

She was a little rambunctious and did manage to destroy one sofa in her young days, but was generally well behaved. She delighted in the sight of new human friends and often became so excited when she saw any one of us (especially after a vacation) that she lost her usual and customary urinary control. In short, she was a great dog.

She would play in the back yard and woods with great abandon learning rudimentary soccer from Max, and often exercising herself by running an elaborate figure-8 at full tilt, until she was winded and exhausted. I can still see her jumping from our deck onto the yard (four big steps) at a gallop with the agility of a wild hare.

There was the time she ran away from me one morning and sent me on a wild chase through the back yards of my neighbors, thence to the nearby woods, in frantic pleading. She emerged from deep in said woods some twenty minutes later, at the very spot on the street where my car was stopped, and where I sat paralyzed with fear that my negligence had lost her. She knew I was not pleased, but must have reasoned that every teenager has at least one wild ride.

But this was not the norm. She was a great dog and became, almost instantly, a member of our family. She was cooperative, disciplined, always affectionate, and great (as the kids used to say) at just being cute.

Every one of the four of us would soon argue, privately, that though Kasha was the family pet, she was really the dog of each one of us. We would all claim that special status and that special relationship. And we would all be right.

When Giliah went off to college, Kasha waited for her to come home, sleeping in Giliahs bed by day and monitoring the house driveway from her window. She would follow Giliah around the house incessantly when Gil would return home, never leaving her side.

And Max was so close to Kasha. Theirs were the wrestling matches and the serious soccer games. Kasha would only permit Max to drape himself like a pretzel around her each night as his room was re-arranged to accommodate two. Kasha waited up each night (beyond the endurance of Miriam and me) until Max came home. Only then would she sense it safe to sleep in his room.

Miriam was her care-giver. In Kashas last year, it was Miriam who renewed her life, probably extending it by many months. When Kasha wasnt feeling well, it was to Miriam that she turned. This was her reliable confidant, her private nurse, her loyal roommate as others went off to their private worlds.

And me? I never forgot Harry Trumans great admonition: In Washington, if you want a friend, get a dog. Kasha was my comforter, my bridge over troubled waters. When I would come home from days of stress and torment, Kasha would not just seek my side and divert my attention. Sometimes she would slowly, in several steps, climb all sixty-five of her pounds up into my chair and into my lap and look at me with her beautiful brown eyes as if to say Its OK, boss . . . dont let em get you down. Youre the best.

We were all a bit shocked when Kasha was first diagnosed with lymphoma. Her only symptom had been excessive thirst. Her first regimen of chemotherapy was successful. But the cancer returned months later and successive drug protocols proved less and less effective. She slowly weakened and had some good days and some bad days. Her veterinary care was excellent, but by the end (just days before her seventh birthday), she was wasted.

Giliah had rushed home from Indiana, thanks to Maxs sensitivity and her own clarity. They were watering Kasha with a turkey baster as she lay, unable to walk anymore, on that terrible Saturday night at midnight as Miriam and I returned home. We had no choice.

We can learn so much from our pets. We can learn about loyalty and love, about the intense value of non-judgmental appreciation and simple acknowledgment.

Dogs are not human beings. We rip them from their mothers without hesitation and domesticate them in abject violation of their nature. They know nothing of history or even time, and are incapable to acknowledge, in any way, the mere existence of a grandchild. Some animals (not dogs) even prey on their own young.

But if we can become so emotionally attached and affected by a four-legged creature my family was simply devastated by the loss of our Kashi (one of her many nicknames) so should we be careful to attend to the lives of the people in our midst. Judaism teaches that life is precious that all of it, for its own sake, has value. It has.

My life and that of my family, without Kasha, will never be the same.