Louie's film debut took place under the direction of the famous French film-maker and dog-lover, Jean-Luc Gofetch. "Louie's Visit" is actually a trilogy of three shorter films: "Playing with the Yellow Ball", "Sit", and "Take it or Leave it".
In the first of these films, Louie expresses an astonishing range of emotion as the puppy who enjoys playing with a yellow ball, which he fetches with enthusiasm, a trick, it turns out, that he will not perform without a video camera aimed at him, preferably High Definition. In the second he is faced with the dilemma every little puppy must confront: having to sit before he can eat. While his attitude may seem one of indifference, the observant viewer can see the feelings flicker across his countenance: the tragic realization that puppy days pass too quickly and we must all eventually accept the responsibilities of adulthood. Then the sitting itself in all its complexity, the bending of the knees, the shift of the weight backwards toward the tail (note the almost balletic grace acquired through years of regular attendance at the Pawcatuck Center for Dance & Cheer-leading Skills); and finally, the joyful acceptance of his reward, dry kibble.
The final episode, "Take it or Leave It," requires no explanation. Note the sly references to earlier works such as "Panting" and "Mon Ami, The Fire Hydrant." Louie demonstrates an almost Chaplinesque sense of comedy as he rolls in the grass, accumulating millions of ticks which will take hours to remove.
The day arrived, as we both knew it would. Our daughter had left home to start a family of her own; our older son had moved to Los Angeles to seek work in the movie business; our younger son was away at college; and now Louie, our little caramel fluff ball, our substitute child, our our relentless teething machine, was leaving home. For two days.
Actually, we were leaving. The Reverend had a professional conference, and I had to be in New York for a couple of days. Our good friends N & P, who know a lot about dogs, and are extremely patient and loving people, not unlike the kindly couple across the street when you are growing up, who insist you come to dinner on those nights when your father has passed out on the floor from abusing prescription drugs and your mother, in the thrall of a dissociative episode, has driven off to Hollywood hoping she will be cast in the remake of The Postman Always Rings Twice, in the Lana Turner role, or if that fails, the Marie Dressler role in Tugboat Annie. Which is not to say that my own mother and father were anything like that. Where was I? Oh yes, N & P had agreed to care for Louie.
We took Louie over to their home earlier in the week so that he meet them and get used to the all the new smells. They live in a house in the country with rolling fields where dogs can without fear of being flattened by 16 wheelers. Seriously. On Monday, swept along by a great wave of separation anxiety, The Reverend dropped him off on her way to New Hampshire. Imagine our delight when we received the following email only a few hours later.
Date: Mon, 27 Apr 2009 18:21:19 -0400 To: The Rev From: N & P Subject: Louie's visit Cc: Bcc:
Hi mom and dad,
Just a quick note to let you know I'm doing just fine. I'm trying hard to behave myself so I can come back for future visits - but it's hard! I've got a couple of new toys I'm enjoying, especially the yellow ball. I "stole" the Ziploc box from the recycle bin but got caught! We had lots of fun today playing in the yard and the garden. I'm pretty pooped! In fact, I suspect P is trying to get a photo of me sleeping upside down in my crate after I wrote this! Maybe I'll send it along in an email tomorrow night.
Anyway, don't worry about me. I'm just fine but do miss you both VERY MUCH! N and P treat me fine but it's not the same as HOME!
Hope you're both well and miss me as much as I miss you.
I'll try to write again tomorrow if they let me use the computer. They're complaining about dirt on the keyboard! What do they expect? After all, my paws don't tiptoe across the keys as neatly as fingers do!
N is off to her Small Group and P will sit with me until she returns. Hugs to you both..."Chewie Louie"
I am taking Louie for a well pet visit with Dr. Chris, a really nice lady and, coincidentally, a breeder of the most gorgeous standard poodles ever. Take a look at her website, here. This business of having a vet who is also an authority on poodles is very reassuring.
Needless to say, Louie--that little caramel bon-bon--is the center of adoration in the waiting room. He's asked to sign autographs and pose for pictures. Somebody wants to know if he's a "Doodle." but he pretends not to hear. Later, he sidles up to me and whispers "Que'st-ce que c'est La 'Doodle'?" I shrug, pretending to have no idea. Why ruin this happy puppyhood? He'll find out soon enough.
A pregnant Pug emerges from the examination room, her once trim figure distorted by her distended stomach, her seven teats milk-swollen in expectation of the litter that is to arrive on the morrow. She glances in Louie's direction and her look seems to say, we are only puppies once. Enjoy the chewing of things not meant to be chewed--tax information and Louis Vuitton leather gloves--relish the caresses of strangers, for these pleasures pass too soon what remains then? You wake one day and, your vision clouded by cataracts, mistake your leash for a small yet deadly boa constrictor. In a vain effort to protect your human owner, you grab it in your teeth and leap out the window, inadvertently impaling yourself on the picket fence that everybody thought was so God-damn charming. They rush you to the vet, but it is too little and too late; your gallbladder has been punctured. They try to sew it up. The surgeon emerges from the operating room three hours later, and raises his hands, palms upward in a gesture of futility. We did what we could, but it was not enough. Soon you are no more than a a handfull of ashes stuffed in a jiffy bag or, if your human really loved you--really, really loved you--a nice marble crematory urn, with your name and your years of service engraved in script on a little gold tag and chain.
Dr. Chris is ready for Louie. Step up on the scale, please. Eight pounds. Heart, lungs, pulse... A shadow crosses her face.
"Yes?" I say, trying to keep my voice steady.
"One of his testicles isn't descended," she says. "Are you going to have him neutered?"
"I was planning on it," I reply, politically correct but experiencing a knot in my stomach.
"Well then, we'll remove it at that time."
"Remove it? Can't you just tie the tubes, like a vasectomy?"
She laughed. "No, we remove them."
"Could you..." I hesitated, not wanting to give her the wrong impression, "put something in to replace them?"
"Pardon me?"
"Implants?"
"There are such things, but they're expensive because they're silicon, and sterile. They're pretty much indistinguishable from the actual testicles in touch and appearance."
I mull over the idea that people are touching their dog's testicles.
"They even make them for bulls and horses," she says.
"Could I get really big ones for Louie? The kind they make for bulls?"
"I wouldn't suggest that," Dr. Chris replies, eyeing me in a way that suggests that I have crossed a boundary. "I certainly wouldn't perform that operation."
"Of course not," I agree emphatically. "But maybe someone in Tijuana..."
She tells me it is time for her next appointment and leaves the room quite abruptly, stopping to scratch Louie's head and remind him to be a good dog.
Check out the Neuticles website for the entire range of canine, equine and bovine testicular implants.
NB: Silicone implants for animals are pretty funny, but a neglected undescended testicle in a dog or cat is no laughing matter since these animals have a higher likelihood of developing malignant cancers and other health risks. Be sure to follow your vet's advice in these matters.
5:30 AM. Somewhere a dog is howling. Good thing I don't own a gun...
Oh wait, the dog is here in the crate next to my bed. How could I be angry at this little caramel creampuff? I could not! Hoping to let The Reverand sleep another hour, I toss my coat on over my pajamas, pull Louie out of his crate and rush him out to the lawn, so he can relieve himself.
But, how sensitive is this? He doesn't need to go! He just wants to watch the sun rise. Well, it’s a great sunrise all right, streaks of purple and orange, clouds like puffs of cotton. A beautiful sunrise, and yet I find it difficult to enjoy, standing there barefoot in the dewy grass, freezing my butt off.
Then, quite suddenly, a period of furious activity!
Unfortunately it involves chewing on my drenched pajama cuffs and humping my leg. Why is he humping my leg? He doesn’t even have testicles. He’s never seen dog porn. How does he know?
Finally, he poops! But is the stool too soft? In fact, I have no idea what puppy poop is supposed to look like. I proceed to make the second major mistake of the morning: I go online to see how serious the problem is and what can be done. Never—I repeat, never look up the symptoms of a disease online; this goes double for "what can go wrong when you get a dental implant."
www.SuddenPuppyDeath.com recommends rice boiled with chicken breast, so I'm off to Stop & Shop. The Sush rice is only a bit more expensive than Carolina, and organic chicken is probably a good idea since Louie is only a baby. I return home and start boiling the water. I don’t normally do this kind of thing.
I put the cooked rice in a bowl and set it out beside his crate. Louie sniffs at it, and I decide to go back to work while he makes up his mind whether it's worth his attention. I have devoted enough time on Le Petit Prince (I'm sorry, am I starting to sound resentful? It's nobody's fault but my own. I could have gotten the Carolina.) But I am having difficulty concentrating. After a few sentences I press "save" and stroll back to the diningroom to make sure that he hasn't somehow strangled himself on the curtain pull.
It is as though a snowstorm has struck. Floor, crate, bowl, blankey, and much of Louie are covered with sticky clumps of Sushi rice. I clean up. Busy morning.
We got up early this morning to drive to Windsor, Connecticut, 90 minutes to the north, to take ownership of our new puppy, an apricot standard poodle named "Bluey" a birthday gift from my wife. Our previous dog, Bridgette, passed away at the beginning of the summer. We had mourned her enough and now it was time to consider the possibility that another dog might be capable of taking her place.
A few words about Bridgette. She was a Husky/ Shepard/ Golden Retriever cross, who had inherited the worst genetic traits of each breed. She shed like a Shepard, leaving golden hair across every piece of furniture and clothes (but particularly block clothing to which she seemed drawn magnetically); she exhibited the goofy enthusiastic affection of a Golden, approaching every stranger as though they were a long lost littermate in desperate need of a tongue-grooming; and she had that weird husky thing of moaning at the moon while others were hoping to sleep.
A standard poodle, we hoped would be hypoallergenic, thoughtful, and have a Je ne sais qua attitude about strangers. And because they were big enough, you could wedge your feet under them on chill winter nights.
We packed up the Element, trying to anticipate what we would need. "I hope you're bringing the crate," my wife said, "because I'm not going to hold this dog in my lap for an hour and a half.
The 42" crate, courtesy of Amazon Prime (free shipping, 42lbs. you can't beat that in a economic downturn!) was a bitch to carry out to the car, and rattled through the whole ride. Babs attempt to quiet the ride by stuffing towels into the cracks between the panels was not entirely successful.
"What kind of name is that--Bluey?"
"A French name," I replied, "for a French dog. Because their black coats had a blueish sheen, they were often called bleu. One of the greatest poodles of all times was Louis the IVX's poodle, Bluey 3.5. On his coast of arms was written Apres moi, la poop!"
"You're making this up."
"Yes," I admitted. I drove for a while, alert to the traffic. "The name suggests a world-weary, chanteuse, a canine Edith Piaf. One who has seen the underside of Le Beau Monde but chooses to go on because of the songs of Irving Berlin, the poetry of Rimbaud, the bitter taste of a Gauloise at 3:00 AM, the silhouettes of couples walking down the Champs d'Elysee in the rain."
My wife turned on the radio and turned up the volume.
"I call him bluey," Bob Marcin, the breeder, explained, when we arrived at his home, "because he's got a blue ribbon around his neck. See, each puppy's got a different colored ribbon. There's Gracey, and Red, and Greeney, and so forth. That's how you can tell 'em apart. Of course I can tell 'em apart because I know them. But this system is good for the purchaser."
Indeed, each of the seven adorable puppies--five black, two apricot--had a different colored ribbon around the neck. The one I had picked out with my son a few weeks before before had a blue ribbon.
"Can I hold him?" The Reverend asked, her eyes welling with tears (this happens not infrequently.)
"Sure," Bob said, scooping up the puppy in one hand a passing it along to her.
She held it over her shoulder and started cooing to it and nuzzling it.
"So, shall we put it in the crate?" I suggested.
She looked at me like I'd just suggested roasting it for dinner.
"That crate is a death trap," she muttered." She held the puppy up to her face and stared into his eyes. "You could get hurt banging around back there... couldn't you bubby-wubby? Yes, you could!"
Se we drove back with Bluey curled into her lap, all the way back to Rhode Island.
He threw up on her at the intersection of Route 2 and 84, about 20 miles from home.
