Frisco

Frisco was a good dog from the very beginning. Even as a pup he paid attention. He listened, and he learned well. He always did right, or almost always. He did love to chase a cat, which caused trouble now and then.

My wife brought him home in an effort to get me to move in with her. She knew I loved dogs. It certainly helped my decision. That very first day he laid his tiny body across my foot and slept for hours, until that foot grew so numb I finally had to move. I was hooked on the girl and the dog. Frisco bonded us no differently than a child would have.

He was a Shetland Sheepdog with a thick, beautiful mane. He would lie in the grass for hours, his head held high like a lion’s, his eyes bored but watchful as he awaited any danger that might come forth so that he could throw himself at it. We were his love. Protecting us was his passion. Thus the “shepherd” in his name, I suppose.

He is long gone. It has been twenty years now, but I feel myself getting choked up as I write this. There is a picture on my office wall that my wife gave me one Christmas. In it Frisco is sitting because he was told to sit, that is what he did, but you can see the uncertainty in his eyes. He is in a strange place, with strange dangers that he is unsure how to protect her from. It is about the only time I think of him anymore, when I look at that picture. But when I do it all floods back; his high, shrill bark, the velvet feel of his head and ears, and the way the hair curled down behind them like ribbon scraped through scissors. Or the way we would race each other over the Reafield hills when he was just a little fella, him yapping at my heels until he finally poured it on and got out in front, barking with unbridled joy. The way he once broke his leg and just laid down, refusing to tell me what was wrong, or that anything was. But mostly I recall how he watched. He always watched. Every move he watched. He watched for so long that he knew what was going to happen before it happened. He anticipated everything. I could get up to go to the bathroom and he would not move, but if I stood up in exactly the same manner to go outside he would sprint to the door. How did he know? From watching, I guess. There never was a more observant, or more faithful creature. Not ever. I would have died for that dog, just as, without doubt, he would have died for me.

But as nature will have it, Frisco lived his ten years and left us. It is both the curse and blessing of a dog, ten years. He developed a strange cough, and it wasn’t long after that. We cried for a few days. We got another dog, and moved on with life until we are only reminded every now and then when we pause beside a picture on an office wall; a picture with a worn collar hanging from the top right corner, a picture of this world’s very center, if only for a short while.