In my prime I topped out at six foot two and a half inches; I tipped the scales at 205 very solid pounds. Biceps a respectable 19.5”, flat stomach, calves the size of most women’s thighs. I hunted with bow and arrow, shotgun, and rifle; backpacked 15 miles or more a day at 10,000 feet; swam, body-surfed, scuba-dived, biked, and ran; even fought bare knuckle.
People who know me have often said : “Man, you just have no fear of anything”.
And yet, this story is all about my being afraid.
My earliest memory is from before I was 2 years old. Not too long after I had to start wearing glasses as a matter of fact. My parents decided that my brothers and I needed a family dog.
Most likely it was an effort on their part to teach us three wild animals some manners. I think there plan was to get a dog that could whip our little pack into shape. A little fang here, and nasty growl there, and a nip in the ass once in a while, and they figured my brothers and I would be tamed right down.
So off to the local animal pound the family went one Saturday. For us, back then living in Livermore California, that meant t a trip to Oakland and the SPCA facility there. Trips out of the Livermore Valley were pretty rare for us. Everyone was an occasion, usually a shopping excursion to either purchase some repair parts that were not available locally (no internet back then, you actually had to find someone who had the part you needed and drive to them to pick it up, up hill, both ways, in the snow….).
Sorry about that, think I slipped into one of my Dad’s stories there for a moment.
So we were piled in the family station wagon and out what was then the two-lane Highway 580 that ran through the Livermore Valley and over the hills into San Leandro and north to Oakland.
In truth, I can’t say that I really remember the drive over..but I sure remember the drive back.
We got to the SPCA building and went inside. I am sure that there was some time listening to the spiel about the pets and how they had been rescued, and the whole adoption process and the rules, and the blah, blah, blah as far as any kid is concerned.
But I can’t say I remember any of that either.
The first thing I really have a conscious memory of is that bitter, acrid smell that hits your nose in a place with too many animals too close together; that stale smell of urine and feces and wet concrete floor. You know the one; it steals slowly up each nostril, even if you carefully pinch your nose and breathed through your mouth? Yeah, that’s the smell.
No I’m not saying that they didn’t take good enough care of the dogs and cats, horses, and other critters there. Just that they hadn’t cleaned up after them as often as might have been nice. I can remember walking along the alleyway of chain-link fences that formed the cages the various dogs were kept in.
I vaguely remember some stacked cages of cats near the door, and then a long straight walkway with chainlike on both sides. Each cage had one or more dogs in it. Some were excited by the people close by, some cowering in the back corners of the inside cages. Most of the dogs were yapping and barking, and carrying on so that it was hard to hear my parents talking about the different dogs.
After we had walked the length of the building, peering in at the dogs on either side, and back again. Mom and Dad asked which dog we thought we wanted. My parents seemed to be pretty set on a dog named “Lady”, in fact, we stopped in front of the cage she occupied on the way back to “talk things over”. Lady was a long haired, brown and white Springer Spaniel. She seemed quiet and calm, no barking or yipping, and she came to the mesh instead of hiding in the back corner of the cage.
But I wanted nothing to do with that dog. To me, she was a monster. I was only 2, but I certainly hadn’t put on any growth spurt yet. She looked me straight in the eye, heck every other dog in the place looked me square in the eyes, even if some of them had to bend over to do it. And I could tell, she was just putting on a show being calm. I could tell she was just doing what she needed to do so she could get out of the cage and Eat Me.
Yep, I immediately began campaigning for the only dog in the place littler than I was; a little wiry dog with course brown hair that stood in the middle of its cage and whined and shook, and shook. That dog was obviously afraid of me, yep, that was the dog for me…but my Dad said; “There is no way we are taking home a dog named “Puddles”.
Best I can figure it, my dad valued the carpet more than his third son (years later I found out he had wanted a girl the third time around and ended up with me instead).
And so, certainly not for the last time in that family, the youngest of the bunch got short shrift (it was a theme I was to get pretty familiar with over the years) and the final selection was to take “Lady” home.
I still remember standing on the outside of that cage looking in, straight into the big brown eyes of that man-eater. I can even remember thinking that I was going to join ole “Puddles” in action if that Spaniel ever got out on my side of the fence.
Longest car ride of my life was the one back home with Lady in the back of the station wagon. She kept sneaking up behind me, I could feel her hot breath on my neck.
I just knew I would never get home alive.
Copyright © 2012 - Marty Vandermolen - All Rights Reserved
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