Frank Garland is an assistant professor and Journalism Communication Program director at Gannon University in Erie. He lives in Cranberry (garland003@gannon.edu).
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It was just about a year ago to the day — a day before my birthday, in fact — that a forceful front-door knock interrupted our sleepy, coffee-slurping Sunday morning.
No one knocks at our front door — at least unannounced. I couldn’t imagine who it might be, but I managed to get out of my dining room chair, shuffle to the front door and open it.
There stood Kava.
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I’d seen Kava before. She belonged to my significant other’s nephew, and we’d exchanged pleasantries — human to dog — at a couple of family functions. If I were to size her up as a baseball scout, I’d describe her as good-looking with a sort of foxlike face, small but sturdy build, pleasant and eager to please. In short, a pretty good dog.
In fact, good to the point that when, a few months earlier, Sandy mentioned that her nephew had accepted a new job and would be moving to Denver, I suggested that we offer to take Kava off his hands. Sandy bristled at that suggestion; she had to put her beloved lab, Bella, down a year or so earlier and wasn’t quite ready to rejoin the canine game. I didn’t blame her. Bringing a dog into your life is no trifling matter.
Still, when said nephew had to take his family to Denver for a week to scout out a place to live, we offered to dog-sit Kava as a favor. The week went well. In fact, Kava was the model dog. No accidents. Went outside and did her thing with very little fuss, came when called, didn’t beg for food. As Sandy is wont to say, “What’s not to like?”
Still, when the week ended and Kava had returned to her home, Sandy did not seem anxious to add Kava to our family roster. I asked her about it a couple of times as the weeks went by, but each time she replied rather tersely that she wasn’t interested. After all, I spend half of my weeks in Erie, which would leave her with too much of the burden. It made perfect sense. I decided it was a lost cause and resigned myself to going the rest of my life dogless.
This was no easy resignation. I’ve had dogs for much of my life, and I’ve always been better for it. The first family dog that I knew about was a mutt named Blackie. Legend had it that my dad once left his shoes unattended for a while and when he came back, all that remained were the eyelets that once held his shoelaces. That earned Blackie a trip for “ice cream” — a family euphemism for a one-way ticket out of the picture. The first dog I recall seeing was a boxer named Babe. The most memorable event I associate with her was her ripping open a bag of peat moss and delivering several small puppies under the steps.
My first real dog, though, was a half-beagle, half-dachshund named Bullet, who more closely resembled a short, tubby torpedo after a few years of leftover spaghetti and meatballs. Bullet was the King of Aiken Road. It was the 1960s and Bullet would wander all over our neck of Robinson Township, which included acres of woods and an intricate network of horse trails that could occupy a dog — and a young boy — for hours at a time. He also had no qualms about walking straight up the center of Aiken Road and defying any vehicle he encountered. Cars always yielded the right of way to Bullet. In the woods, Bullet made an excellent companion for the hundreds of times I would grab a basketball and hit the horse trails that led to Montour High School. There, I would sneak into the “old” gym, flip on a few lights and shoot baskets until a janitor would unceremoniously usher Bullet and me outside. It was always worth getting yelled at.
Bullet wasn’t exactly friendly. In fact, looking back on it, he was downright grouchy a lot of the time. “Playful” would not be in his scouting profile. Still, Bullet lived a long and fruitful life, despite having to be sewed up at least a half-dozen times after scraps with who knows what. In fact, it wasn’t until I was away at school in San Francisco that he finally left the woods of Aiken Road and passed on to those endless horse trails in dog heaven.
As an adult, I had the opportunity to share my home with several memorable dogs. Sam, the troublemaking black lab mix, gave way after 10 years to Willie, the purebred yellow lab who once knocked a retired bankruptcy judge off his bicycle and into unconsciousness in front of our house. (Willie was taken for “ice cream” shortly thereafter.) Then came Idgie, the half-chow, half-retriever who was clearly too smart to be a dog; and Spanky, a hulking black lab who was the Lou Costello to Idgie’s Bud Abbott.
Death or divorce ended my relationship with those dogs, and never was it easy to say goodbye. To the dogs, that is.
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So, when I opened the door that March morning a year ago and saw Kava, I wasn’t sure what to think. I turned to Sandy. I don’t recall what she said, exactly, but the gist of it was, “Surprise — and Happy Birthday.”
Fast-forward a year. Kava has adapted nicely to our family, earning her keep as a watchdog and accompanying me on regular walks in the neighborhood. She’s already left her mark — particularly on our new laminate floors and Sandy’s blood-pressure readings.
Other than that, though, what’s not to like?
First Published: March 17, 2018, 4:00 a.m.
