I have fallen out of the habit of writing, and the struggle to sit on a Thursday, or a Tuesday, to sit and focus, to sit and have anything to say, to move my fingers over the keys and press them and make words, to put words together to depict my indescribably bleak outlook. It’s not happening. I will instead put on my boots and follow the dogs outside into the yard.
There was so little rain in Bedhead Hills last summer and fall that when the leaves fell, they lay in a thick, loose layer, noisily tumbling up to my knees in the woods, and they seemed to neither compress nor crumble over time. It was perfect for ticks, somehow, even though they’re supposed to need moisture.
One of my best readers died this past September; it was my mother’s younger sister. She was always darkly funny, even when struggling with a debilitating illness, and would text me the briefest, most real encouragements. I would shoot back something not for public consumption. She never missed my birthday. She was a terrific aunt.
But did anyone really notice the leaves falling last fall? Everyone was super busy freaking out about the possible outcomes of the upcoming U.S. presidential election. And then it happened: the worst possible outcome.
The arrival of a little snow just before Christmas promised something we haven’t had in a few years: proper winter weather. I had bought a new pair of slip-on snow boots, on sale (made in U.S.A., even).
In mid-January we had a decent snowstorm, followed by weeks of cold weather. TikTok got banned for half a day and came back before anyone was able to watch all the farewells. Eggi finished another course of chemo.
Eggi’s oncologist says a happy goodbye
The snow melted in the sun and froze at night, getting a couple of dustings over the weeks, but by the end of February we had a huge solid sheet of ice across the backyard. The news was a chaotic salad of threatened tariffs, canceled federal programs, and illegal firing of workers, all reported like it was completely normal and totally expected.
Now that it is March, it’s mud season, and every time the dogs want to be let out (which is constantly), we have to wipe their paws with an old towel. Even seemingly clean paws leave wet spots which dry to become mud prints. There has been an explosion of anti-trans legislation across America. What kind of ignorant mob of dunderheaded nincompoops goes after trans Americans, who’ve never asked for anything other than maybe to exist the same way anyone else does?
My brother sent me an obituary last night via text. It hit my phone while I was eating dinner and I didn’t have the good sense to save it for later. Instead, I read it while I ate broccolini and tortellini with pesto. It was my mother’s best friend, going back to elementary school, who lived more than twenty years after my mother died. Imagine living twenty more years than your best friend. I cried during dinner. I cried again now, writing this.
We got snow in Bedhead Hills overnight, layered whitely on top of the rotted, frozen remains of the last snowfall. First thing in the morning, when I walk the dogs, it is still below freezing and the new coating hides the icy patches. The dogs slip. I slip. I believe it will change to ice pellets and then freezing rain as the day goes on, because I saw that in a forecast.
Eggi running on snow
The guy who plows our driveway hasn’t been by yet, though I can see by the speckled blacktop that he visited in the night and applied a light layer of salt. The roads are iffy—ours is slushy mess—but driving conditions improve as I travel toward the highway. On the highway, I catch up to the salt trucks, driving three abreast like a phalanx, and going 30 mph. Cars cluster behind them. The trucks merge into single file at my exit, and, at the stop sign, pull back into formation, blocking the cars behind. Some of the drivers behind me think that there is a way around the trucks—driving on the unplowed shoulder—and two drivers start maneuvering towards it, honking at me to get on with it, honking at me for hesitating, and then tailgating me for several miles to prove their point. Whatever their point was. At the barn there is evidence of plowing, and it is quiet. Since my trainer has gone to Florida for the winter, I often ride alone. Sometimes I run into one or another of the other boarders still here, but not today. There are no hoof prints in the fresh snow outside the barn, which probably means no horses had been out to turnout. I walk my horse to the indoor ring, and have to change my stirrup length; my husband’s horse went to retirement this past summer, and since then we have been taking turns riding Gidget. Last weekend I was at a dog show with Friday, so my husband had the ride. We walk. It’s cold. We do serpentines, change direction. I stop and take off a layer, check the girth. We walk some more. Gidget stumbles. It’s really a spook, or the kind of tripping you do when you’re rubber-necking. She’s fresh.
We trot. Last time I rode, last week, it was so cold my hands hurt and went numb. Today, I can feel my fingers. Gidget takes the contact better than usual. We trot serpentines, do half the length of the ring in a shoulder-in, circle, and finish the half with haunches-in. And repeat. Change direction. Repeat. After some lengthening and shortening, and a walk sequence from a third level dressage test, I ask Gidget to canter. We canter several 20 meter circles and change direction. We canter the other way. Gidget spooks. It’s the kind of spook my trainer calls “recreational.” She wasn’t actually startled but it was fun to pretend. We work on a little lengthening and shortening at the canter, and some lead changes. We do a long canter sequence from a third level test, and it feels like enough. I park her by my jacket and get off. I put my coat back on and turn off the lights. Leading my horse out, I press the button to close the doors to the arena. They close with a clang. Gidget gives a small startle. Recreational.
Gidget giving me most of her attention (but not all)
Back in the barn, I give her a banana and hand her off to the groom. I write Gidget’s name on the board for the rest of the week. My phone rings just after I get back in my car after closing the gate. It’s my brother. We talk about the latest horrors. How surreal things feel. I stop at the post office to mail a couple of bills. “Do it now,” says my brother, “While there’s still a post office.”
January: Systems Collapse, by Martha Wells The Deerslayer, by James Fenimore Cooper All the Pretty Horses, by Cormac McCarthy SPQR, a History of Ancient Rome, by Mary Beard
February: The Origin of Capitalism, by Ellen Meiksins Wood Up the Down Staircase, by Bel Kaufman Stoner, by John Williams Ann Leckie’s Ancillary Justice The Ear, the Eye, and the Arm, by Nancy Farmer Year of Wonders, by Geraldine Brooks Doppelganger, by Naomi Klein There’s a Boy in the Girls’ Bathroom, by Louis Sachar
March: A Time of Gifts, by Patrick Leigh Fermor Babel, by R.F. Kuang Ancillary Sword, by Ann Leckie People of the Book, by Geraldine Brooks Small Things Like These, by Claire Keegan Ancillary Mercy, by Ann Leckie
April: Lonesome Dove, by Larry McMurtry The Crying of Lot 49, by Thomas Pynchon Bluebird, Bluebird, by Attica Locke
May: Angela Carter’s Nights at the Circus Provenance, by Ann Leckie
June: Independent People, by Halldór Laxness Ned Beauman’s Venomous Lumpsucker The Goblin Emperor, by Katherine Addison Shards of Honor, by Lois McMaster Bujold The Ride of Her Life, by Elizabeth Letts
July: Gentlemen Prefer Blondes, by Anita Loos The Telling, by Ursula K. Le Guin The Long Way to a Small, Angry Planet, by Becky Chambers Ursula LeGuin’s The Eye of the Heron Barrayar, by Lois McMaster Bujold
August: The Sun Is a Compass: A 4,000-Mile Journey Into the Alaskan Wilds, by Caroline Van Hemert The Gifts, by Ursula K. LeGuin The Warrior’s Apprentice, by Lois McMaster Bujold Voices, by Ursula K. LeGuin The Witness for the Dead, by Katherine Addison
September: A Closed and Common Orbit, by Becky Chambers Owls of the Eastern Ice, by Jonathan C. Slaght Catwings, by Ursula K. Le Guin Catwings Return, by Ursula K. Le Guin The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym of Nantucket, by Edgar Allan Poe
October: Powers, by Ursula K. Le Guin Record of a Spaceborn Few, by Becky Chambers The Vor Game, by Lois McMaster Bujold Katherine Addison’s The Grief of Stones The Mighty Red, by Louise Erdrich The Wind in the Willows, by Kenneth Grahame The Little Prince, by Antoine de Saint-Exupéry A Walk in the Woods, by Bill Bryson The Old Man and Me, by Elaine Dundy
November: Fried Green Tomatoes at the Whistle Stop Cafe, by Fannie Flagg Cetaganda, by Lois McMaster Bujold A Wizard of Earthsea, by Ursula K. Le Guin Death Comes for the Archbishop, by Willa Cather City of Ghosts, by Victoria Schwab Between the Woods and the Water, by Patrick Leigh Fermor
December: The Shipping News, by Annie Proulx Dorothy Allison’s Bastard Out Of Carolina The Thirteenth Tale, by Diane Setterfield
There was a moment in time at the beginning of the pandemic when things were shut down and it seemed like people could work together to make the world safer for each other. It was so quiet in Bedhead Hills it was amusing and alarming when people started racing their cars on the 684 at night. These days, I think people go faster than ever on 684, as if the rent air left by the wake of those races tickles today’s drivers into trying it again, just this once.
Or, maybe I’m slowing down.
A couple of days before I needed to leave for the Vizsla National, it was clear the car wasn’t going to be ready in time.The parts it needed were only available from Ford if we took them fully disassembled, and so I was pricing rental cars. I hadn’t rented a car or flown anywhere since the pre-pandemic days, and why am I not surprised it’s more expensive and unpleasant than ever. The travel industry was hit hard by the pandemic, and responded by raising prices, hiding fees, limiting hours, and making their new policies less transparent. I started with what was once my favorite car rental company, and found in the fine print that they intended to charge for a cancellation and also charge for a change in reservations. So I went with Budget, made some reservations, and over the course of the next days, changed those reservations repeatedly, free of charge.
Our show week at the Vizsla National Specialty was to begin Monday, the 22nd, with agility, and if I had learned anything in Schenectady, it was that Eggi needed time to adjust to a new venue. So I entered Eggi and Fellow in the agility trial held at the facility the weekend before.
From the first go, Eggi was fast, funny and confident. She had a sneezing fit in the ring, running a few steps, stopping to sneeze, taking another step, to jump, land, run another step, stop and sneeze, and go on, through the first four fences, but still managing to have qualifying runs and a great attitude. I was on my own, running dogs in and out, and up and down the stairs between the crate area and the competition space.
Fellow, Novice standard
I was not running fast enough for Fellow, so he some of the time he was barking at me, and spinning around on course, racking up refusal penalties for just being a goofball.
By Monday, when the national specialty started, Eggi had finished another title and was running fast and clean. Fellow was tired and silly.
I needed a hand on Tuesday, which was obedience and rally day, but after three days of running agility, the drive home (to get a rental car, the other dog, and my husband) sounded exhausting. So, I chose to do one more day on my own. And I missed the course walk in rally because I was showing a dog in the obedience ring, and it was exactly the thing I had worried would go wrong.
Eggi was more interested in sniffing the obedience ring than in heel work, and Fellow didn’t want to take the dumbbell from me, so neither Eggi nor Fellow had qualifying scores. We can do better. As I left the ring with Fellow, the judge told me she’d never judged at a vizsla specialty before and really liked the breed’s work ethic, so I felt positive about that anyway. Our trips around the ring in intermediate rally were not as smooth as they would have been had I been able to walk the course, but both were qualifying, so both dogs finished another rally title.
I thought I had just enough time to jump in the car and get home, go to the airport for the rental (a minivan!), reload crates, suitcase, and dogs, and make it back to the national venue in Massachusetts.
Wednesday was the sweepstakes day, and I showed both Friday and Fellow in the conformation ring. Showing in the breed ring as a beginner handler is always humbling for me, but never more so than at the national specialty show, where the ring was four times bigger than an all-breed show, and the whole thing was being live-streamed. Friday was kind of a handful for me, so I was a little disappointed in how that went. Fellow’s competition didn’t show up, so we went through the motions of showing.
Thursday we had no events.
Friday was Friday’s day. My show handler was at the Whippet National Specialty, so we hired another professional who is her good friend. Friday was competing in the 12 and under 15 month bitches, with serious competition from the whole U.S. The judge was very methodical, watching every dog’s movement. Friday made nice eye-contact with him, and really showed at her best with all that space in the ring. When the judge pulled her out first, I threw my hands over my face so I didn’t do something like scream or squeal, and when she actually won this class, at the national specialty, I was not breathing. What a thrill.
All the work and expense of breeding Eggi, and months of letting the raising of puppies dominate our lives validated in one ribbon.
Saturday, I showed Eggi in the breed, but didn’t make even the first cut. Alas, the photographer caught me showing the other two of my dogs, but missed me with Eggi. She finished ahead of Fellow in the Iron Dog, in the middle of the 26 competitors. But she had a good checkup at the vet the day we left for this show, so that’s her win.
We had another mild winter in Bedhead Hills, with only one noteworthy snowstorm which dumped a lot of wet, heavy snow the day of Eggi’s last chemotherapy appointment. Eggi is a special favorite of her veterinary oncologist, who said goodbye to us and told us to see our usual regular vet to check for cancer symptoms once a month. The last thing the oncologist said was she hoped we wouldn’t be back.
There is no way to know how much time Eggi now has. On average, dogs treated with similar chemotherapy for lymphoma will get one more year. Knowing this has meant that the plans I had for doing something someday with Eggi are things to do now, this year, as soon as I can. Throughout her chemo, we continued with training obedience and agility; I was always ready to give her a day or a week off if she needed it, but she was always game. When entries opened for the 2024 Vizsla National Specialty and Companion Events, I entered Eggi and Fellow in the Iron Dog again, and went looking for a couple of local shows to warm up for it.
Our first warm-up show was two days of obedience and rally at a brand new facility in Schenectady, New York. I took the dogs up a day early, to take advantage of drop-in schooling. We had some mistakes in obedience but both dogs qualified in intermediate rally both days.
The next weekend, the same club had an agility trial. Now, Eggi loves to run agility, but she can be sensitive about the contact equipment sometimes, so she hasn’t had any qualifying legs in agility in the past. My goal was to take advantage of the fact that the venue was familiar, and to keep things positive for her; maybe she could actually get around.
Eggi was very excited to try all the contact equipment, but bailed halfway across on Saturday. I cheered her on for trying. On Sunday, she bailed midway across the dog-walk, but ran to touch the yellow contact zone at the end of the ramp, as if to say she knew what she needed to do. After that, she attacked the teeter and the scramble ramp like she’d never had a bit of trouble with them before. Fellow finished that weekend with two qualifying legs in standard novice, while Eggi had qualifying runs in novice jumpers with weave.
Ten days later, Eggi, Friday and I packed up the White Whale again and headed to Doswell, Virginia to show conformation. Friday went best of winners two out of four days, and Eggi won owner-handled best of breed on Saturday (I was so stunned I forgot to get a win picture).
The next weekend, we were packing up the car when some of us in New York felt a little earthquake out of New Jersey, and we were still thinking about it most of the drive to the Adirondacks. We’d loaded up a bunch of dogs, and some snowshoes, and were headed up in the hopes of seeing the total solar eclipse. Our oldest son came with us, and as we hit the highway, he asked how long the White Whale had been making that noise. “What noise?” I asked. “Oh,” said my husband, “It’s been doing that for a while.” The while that included all my trips upstate and down to Virginia? Yes, that while.
The eclipse was very cool to see, and well worth the drive to get to an area in the totality. When we got back, the White Whale went back to the shop, where we found out its differential had lost its fluid and had been grinding metal shards for a while.
There was less than a week before we planned to leave for the 2024 Vizsla National Specialty, in Boxborough, Massachusetts, with three dogs, two sets of crates, and my clothes for showing in three disciplines.
On Saturday, I had planned to hike up Goodnow Mountain, which is a two mile hike straight up to the top, where there is a hundred-year old fire lookout tower. But of course, when Saturday comes, it is with rain, just as the forecast predicted, and what with those big boulders on the trail, all slick with leaves and rain— the ones you have to scramble up like a crab— I changed my mind. Maybe, I thought…Maybe we should just go home.
After breakfast, I put on some rain layers, dressed Eggi in her new hi-viz vest, and made the few steps down the main club drive to the spot where I pinned a nameless trailhead in my memory. I wasn’t wrong; it was there.
We were not many steps in when I heard a shotgun blast.
Now, I do have hunting dogs, but I know as little about hunting as you might expect of someone with my voting record. But, I secretly want to learn someday, if I can find the right person to teach me.
Anyway, we took a short walk, greeting the Hudson River at its wild and cute, creek-like start and turning around when the heebie-jeebies of hearing live gunfire built into bona fide creeps.
As we came out of the woods, we saw three women on the main road, and at first glance they were dogless, but their small dogs had been dawdling and came on noisily. Eggi squared herself and sharply warned them off.
One of the women hollered that their dogs were friendly. I have owned dogs since 1992, and I can tell you that when people say their dog is friendly, it is only true some of the time. Over the years, I have responded to this claim by dog owners with truths, half-truths, and outright lies, almost always without planning. This time, what I said was, “She isn’t.”
Which is the sort of half-truth intended to shorten our encounter as much as I am able. I am not in the mood to explain for the third time in as many days about how she’s an intact bitch, and how she’s doing chemotherapy.
One of the small dogs responds to a third or seventh command and is leashed. The other is still farting around.
As we try to walk by at a peaceable distance, the spokeswoman takes a second look at me and decides she doesn’t know who I am. She introduces herself by first and last name, and then, likewise, her companions. I say my name, first and last, and it lands without recognition.
This is a club, and she thinks she doesn’t know me. Her family has been members for three generations, and, indeed, I am nobody, with a seemingly unfriendly dog. I turn and head to the lodge.
Eggi asks to be put in the car, so I do that and go inside the lodge to use the bathroom, and consider my options. I could pack up my stuff and be on the road in about 15 minutes. I’d be home in time for dinner.
But I’m here, and I don’t get up here enough.
So we head out to the pond (which is a lake), which the club holds a lease on. It’s a little drive onto a state route, and then a residential road, and then a dirt road. There are two gates to open, the first having a string of padlocks of the various parties having rights to access, and the second being just the one padlock. There is also a cupboard and book to put your name on the register. The last folks to write themselves down have done so in 2021.
After passing through the second gate, and closing and locking it behind me, I put the White Whale into four-wheel drive. Here the way is a narrow, rough dirt road, hemmed in by boulders in parts, winding up and down until it terminates at the boat house.
Now, work weekend has come and gone, so the rowboats and canoes are all stowed for the winter. It is deeply quiet and pleasant here.
Today, we go around the lake the other way around from how we went yesterday, when we went counter-clockwise.
Eggi dashes ahead, disappearing down the trail.
Eggi finds her way handily today, with none of the disappearances of yesterday. When she has a choice of trail, she usually picks the right one, the one you’e supposed to take, so I am surprised when I’m slapped in the face by a pine tree; no, she has chosen a wildlife trail parallel to the one for people.
We come to all the little bridges we crossed the day before, wetter today in the rain. There is one I know may not be traversable today. I slip exactly where I guessed I might, and get much wetter.
I stop at the log cabin to use the outhouse. Eggi loves the outhouses and always wants to come in with me to look down the hole.
We see fungi, and get scolded by a blue jay. As we approach the car, I slip on the last bridge, startling Eggi and a duck on the water. The duck rises from the water at a low angle, flapping furiously and quacking. Eggi barks.
Yesterday, when it wasn’t raining, we went around widdershins, leaving a cooler with my lunch on a picnic table. Eggi was wild when I let her out of the car, and stayed ahead of me most of the walk. She came back every few minutes on her own, except when she didn’t, and I had to call her.
I had other plans for this weekend, but then I dreamed I took Eggi to the Adirondacks to go hiking. So I did.
Last year when I thought about entering the dogs in the Wine Country Dog Show circuit, I was too late to find a hotel. This year, I made hotel reservations in early August, and did show entries mid-month, and received Eggi’s diagnosis the last week of the month.
Now, her oncologist was clear that we should continue to do everything with her that we have been doing, so we spent September doing all the training we normally do, with agility on Mondays and Wednesdays, obedience on Tuesday and/or Wednesday, and fitting in weekly chemotherapy appointments as well.
Eggi seemed to be feeling great, so we got ready for our trip as if nothing unusual was going on. We dremeled the dogs’ nails, gave them baths, and packed up the car.
Did I think this might be a bad idea? Sure. Did we go anyway? Yes.
This is my 13th autumn in New York. When we moved here, I was ready to leave almost immediately. Had you asked in 2012, or 2015, or 2019, I would have told you we’d be here just a few more years and then we’d move back to the west coast. And, the longer we live in New York, the newer I feel here. Surely, this will be our last New York winter.
New York’s nickname is “the Empire State,” because New York is bigger on the inside than it appears on the outside. Many New Yorkers (whenever they find themselves growing grim about the mouth) can walk due south and quietly take to a doomed whaling ship, while others, heading west, might take two weeks on horseback, and lose half their party along the way.
One of the New York places I had never been before the other weekend is the Finger Lakes, which is a beautiful corner of this nine-cornered state. Even the drive from Bedhead Hills to the Finger Lakes is punctuated with regular insults to my neighborhood, as Catskills towns are blessed with Covid-transplanted Brooklynites serving better coffee, cuter bakeries, more legit barbecue, and a spooky abundance of craft breweries. And cinematic! We stopped for lunch and got to see a matte-black Audi that had gotten creamed on Main Street be towed away while the owner stood on the sidewalk, wordlessly swatting at angry, late season yellowjackets. And the sandwiches were also memorable.
There are eleven Finger Lakes, because what else would you expect from New York. We had reservations at a fancy new Hilton on a different lake from the lakefront state park that used to be an Air Force Base hosting the dog show, but the drive was so pleasant from Canandaigua to Romulus that I would stay there again. They hosted several weddings over the weekend, which was not great noise-wise on Friday night. But our spacious room had a view of the lake. And dogs were welcome.
The first day of the show, Friday made her debut in the regular conformation classes. She behaved reasonably well, winning Vizsla puppy 6 and under 9 month bitches, going on to compete for Winner’s Bitch, but not getting anything there. Fellow and I competed in Graduate Novice obedience, and while he had some moments of goodness, he chose to exit the ring before we were finished, so we were disqualified.
Though Eggi struggled to keep focus during the off-leash heel work, she improved during the figure eight, and nailed the drop on recall, the dumbbell recall, the dumbbell recall over the high jump, and the recall over the broad jump. By the time I asked her to stand and stay while I went to get her leash, she had the satisfied gleam of a dog who knew she’d done a good job. We won the class.
The next day we were at it again. Friday won her class as the only 6-9 month old Vizsla bitch, and took reserve in winner’s bitch. No points yet.
Over in the obedience ring, Fellow was slightly less distracted than the day before, and though we didn’t have a qualifying score, he made the judge laugh three different times, most memorably because he took a bonus jump as we were heeling between exercises.
Eggi did a little sightseeing during her off-leash heel work, but still managed to get another qualifying score and win the class again. We actually finished her Graduate Novice obedience title on this day.
Now for every day of the dog show, you get a judging program, which includes the schedule. On the front of the judging program, in large block letters, it says “MOVE UPS MUST BE MADE BY 7:30 AM,” so what I should have done when we picked up the new title rosette (pictured above). But didn’t.
That night we had dinner in the hotel bar, and toasted Eggi’s success.
On the third day of the show, it was warm enough to need to cover the car in the enormous woven aluminum tarp we carry in the White Whale. We have cordless fans in there, and all the windows open.
Friday had another day of going reserve to Winner’s Bitch; a major win was at stake. Our show handler T looked like she was having so much fun with our keeper puppy.
Fellow continued his misbehavior in the show ring, wandering around, trying to leave, and spitting out the dumbbell.
Eggi and I did a bonus round of Graduate Novice, getting a score of 194 1/2 out of a possible 200 points.
We had a delicious dinner at an adorable French restaurant in Canandaigua. If there is a soufflé on the menu that you have to order with dinner, always get it. You must.
Though we had a few minutes of drizzle at some point over the four day weekend, the weather was picture-perfect, with highs around 70F each day. (Downstate, over five inches of rain fell at our house in Bedhead Hills.) Showing dogs in conformation out of doors can be ideal; what dog wouldn’t rather be outside? Sometimes, the footing is uneven, and you might see a handler take a misstep. Friday jumped a spot she thought was a hole. In obedience, showing outside adds extra challenges–so much so that some competitors never compete outside.
On our last day of the show, Fellow wandered around instead of doing any heel work, found a good spot to pee, and took a piss on the fence; we were immediately excused, having spent perhaps only seconds in the ring.
Friday had another good day, once again taking reserve in winners bitch.
Eggi and I moved up to Open A. The exercises are mostly the same as Graduate Novice, except for the signal discrimination exercise and I had to throw the dumbbell instead of handing it to her. Now, I have been avoiding throwing the dumbbell in the ring for about a year. Because I did not learn to throw as a child. I have been on the receiving end of a lot of unwanted advice about learning to the throw the dumbbell accurately, and now that I have been slowly improving over a few years, I can say that the best thing to do is practice (but not too much), and don’t be so nervous about it.
It was Sunday, and the fourth day of showing in a row. Eggi was tired. The sun was bright. From the start, our heel work was disorganized, and really not up to the standard of Open. We muddled along. Sometimes when she’s lackluster to start she perks up at the figure eight. Which she did. The next exercise in Open A is command discrimination. We set up in heel position, the judge asked, “Are you ready?”
I looked Eggi in the eye and said, “Yes.”
The judge said, “Stand your dog.”
I gave Eggi the hand signal and verbal command to stand. She stood. The judge said, “Leave your dog.”
I told Eggi to stay, walked about 15 feet away, and turned around. The judge said, “Down your dog.”
I looked at Eggi, and she looked at me. I could tell that she was a little surprised and excited to be doing this exercise in competition for the first time. I put my hand up and at the same time said, “Down.”
Eggi dropped into a neat down. Then, on the judge’s signal, I walked 15 more feet, stopped and turned to face Eggi, and, on the judge’s signal, told her to sit. She popped her front end up into a tidy sit, the way we’ve practiced for years. This was going to be fun after all.
In Open A, the drop on recall is next. On grass, especially wet grass, Eggi will hover above the ground instead of actually dropping into a full down. But even though she is tired, even though she is on grass, even though she is about a month into a multi-drug, weekly chemotherapy protocol to fight lymphoma, Eggi does it just right.
Next is the dumbbell retrieve on the flat. It’s time for me to conquer my embarrassment about being bad at throwing in public. The thing is, a dumbbell is awkward to throw; you have to hold it by the bell. Also, you can’t take a step; you’re expected to keep your feet together. And you’re not allowed to bend your knees a lot, or twist, or make any kind of extra movement. You’re supposed to stand like a wooden nutcracker and give it a perfectly accurate toss.
And I do. Eggi is delighted to fetch it and show me her prettiest, squarest front sit. The judge invites us to heel over to the high jump. When the judge asks if we’re ready, Eggi looks up at me with so much excitement I realize she is trembling. Will she stay sitting until I release her?
Yes. I throw the dumbbell over the high jump, and it disappears on the other side. Eggi is very eager to go, but waits for me to send her. I say, “Jump,” and she jumps.
She is expected to pick it up, and return to me over the fence, even if it might be faster to go around it, and she does, giving me another pretty front. The judge asks me to finish, and, in turn, I send Eggi to heel.
Last before the stand/stay while you get your leash is the broad jump, where you stand next to the planks. The dog is expected to jump straight, land, and turn, coming to front of the handler. This is the last element of the Open A exercises that is different from Graduate Novice, where the broad jump is a simple recall. As we walk to set up, Eggi looks out of the ring gate, so I offer some quiet encouragement to finish. We’re almost done, Eggi. This is your favorite part.
She jumps straight, comes to me promptly, and I ask her to heel. Only thing we have left is the stand/stay while you get your leash.
Our score isn’t great, but it’s good enough. We have our first leg of Open.
Someday, I am going to die, and you are going to die, and so is your dog.
Our first dog, Pluto, certainly died from complications relating to cancer, but by the time we found it, his lungs were full of metastasized lung tumors, and there was no question of treating it.
If Captain had cancer, I did not know it, because he was very healthy until he was almost 11 and had a bad case of Lyme; he had few health issues until the last of his 14 5/6 years. And then one night he went to sleep in his bed, and that was it.
I have had friends who did chemotherapy on their dogs (and cats), and while I never said anything to them, I secretly believed it was kind of sad and ridiculous. My cold-hearted thinking was: chemotherapy for a dog only benefits the owner, who won’t let go. It is unfair, thought I, to prolong a pet’s suffering because you can’t do the humane thing.
In early June, just 2 1/2 months after having puppies, Eggi had her annual exam with the vet. Aside from detecting another possible tick-borne infection, the upshot of the exam was that Eggi was the picture of health. Two days later, I noticed an enlarged lymph node in her neck.
Then she spiked a high fever. After trying several courses of antibiotics, our vet did an exploratory surgery, thinking there was an abscess. None was found. Eggi spent a couple of weeks with a cone on her head, and just about when it was ok to take it off she went into season.
A few weeks after that, I noticed the lymph nodes in her neck were enlarged again, and now on both sides. I called to make an appointment with my vet, and had to see another vet in the practice. He examined Eggi, did needle biopsies on the swollen glands (which he found all over her body), and said that the lab work would take a few days.
Then he gently asked me whether I wanted to be referred to an oncologist.
I felt paralyzed by the question. My dog is not yet 6.
On the day that I expected to hear from the vet about the lab results, I waited all day and did not get a call. Then, close to dinner, my vet called from her cell. I knew it had to be bad news.
And it was.
My vet’s voice was so tired and sad, telling me this impossible news. I had, of course, been imagining a scary diagnosis for weeks, cueing up the catastrophes depicted by the toxic inner voice that tells me that everything good or fun or fulfilling I pursue in this life gets fucked up somehow. Eggi had lymphoma. My vet and I talked on the phone for a long time: about dogs, about cancer, about Eggi. My vet said it wasn’t the worst kind of lymphoma, and that she could refer us to a really good oncologist– the one she trusted with her own dog.
The oncologist turned out to be at the veterinary hospital near to my home in Bedhead Hills. When I called for an initial consultation, her scheduler made an appointment slot open for us the next day. I thought I would at least see what chemotherapy entailed. I hadn’t said as much to anyone: I still opposed it on principle.
It would be expensive, I reasoned. It would spoil her quality of life. It wasn’t fair to her to keep her around, feeling sick, missing out on the things she loves to do, because I was unwilling to say goodbye.
Eggi had to see the oncologist, Dr. M, with an empty stomach, so they could take ultrasounds and x-rays. So, my normally hungry dog was exceptionally so that day.
Dr. M introduced herself by telling me about her relationship with my vet, and reiterating that Eggi’s lymphoma wasn’t the worst kind. She said that her goal for chemotherapy in dogs was to preserve their quality of life. That treatment takes 25 weeks, and that without a multi-drug chemotherapy, a dog with B cell neoplasia would have a median life expectancy of 4 to 6 weeks.
I asked how expensive it would be. The number she offered is about the current price of a 2015 Subaru Legacy.
We came back a week later for her first treatment.
Last July (and the one before that), I took my dogs to show at the Vermont Scenic Circuit. This year, I reserved a room weeks before the show entries opened. The Bacon Provider was coming with me. The innkeeper and I had discussed meals. Friday was going to make her show debut in the Beginner Puppy division. I bought tickets to the barbecue on the last night of the show.
Then, the weekend before the show, a big storm rolled through and flooded the grounds. By Tuesday, the show was canceled.
There is no one show that can replace the special things about the Vermont Scenic Circuit, so I am adding shorter shows to my schedule, starting with a weekend show in Rhode Island, put on by the Providence County Kennel Club.
The night before we left, Eggi came into season, so our plans of going together and taking all three dogs no longer made sense. I usually only show Eggi in obedience, and bitches in season are not allowed. So the Bacon Provider offered to stay home, and I rearranged the car to take just Friday and Fellow, and let my show handler know I was coming alone.
I left just late enough on Friday afternoon to hit lots of beach-bound traffic.
Day 1:I wake up at 5:40 a.m., 20 minutes before the alarm. I get dressed in the dark, trying not to wake dogs. I fail. The puppy re-commences digging at the walls of her travel crate, which is how she put herself to sleep. Why didn’t I have her practice being in one of these crates before this?
I have moments to get the fail-safe snap off the zipper pulls before she completely loses it, and Fellow lets out his own anxious groan. I now realize I will have to take them out together. We have not practiced being on leash together.
Outside, it’s raining lightly, and already 73F. I suggest we do our business under the big tree. Fellow needs to stop and smell the lamppost and the handicapped parking signpost. Friday is delightedly running in circles, winding herself under Fellow and around my legs. I haven’t had coffee yet, and if I don’t keep us untangled, we will all fall in a heap. She pees. I decide poop can wait.
We go to the car. The dogs explode with joy to get back into their normal crates. Fellow jumps in with a burst of his typical enthusiasm. Friday tries to do the same, but only makes it halfway up. She only weighs about 30 pounds, but it’s 30 strong and squirmy pounds. Anyway, with some help, she’s in.
I go to the bags of kibble behind the driver’s seat and measure their portions. I add water since they probably haven’t been drinking enough. I give them their dishes, close and lock the car and head back in the hotel. Is there breakfast yet?
I see the guy who was sitting under the big tree last night when I was dealing with Friday—the one who asked me in accented English if my dog was young. I let him pet her. She was wild, leaping from his hands like she was being tickled.
We say good morning.
I get a paper cup and fit it with a cardboard sleeve, filling it with the bold blend coffee from the big thermos, and add a tiny tub of half and half. I stir it with a wooden coffee stirrer. I fit a plastic lid and head to the elevator
I do not trust myself to ascend the flight of stairs to the room without tripping and spilling.
As the elevator door closes, the big sticker on the inside of it is revealed, announcing the hours of breakfast: starting at 6:30 a.m., Monday through Friday, and 7:00 a.m. Saturday and Sunday. It is 6:38 a.m.
In the room, I gather an extra pair of shoes, a change of clothes, and some puppy toys. I hear the rain surge.
In the car, the dogs are quiet. The dog show facility is only 2 minutes away.
I set up crates at the show facility the night before, running into T, my show handler, in the parking lot. She said to put my crates with hers. The show is held at the Wide World of Indoor Sports, on artificial turf sports fields. Throughout the venue, there are large tarps in a variety of colors taped to the floor in the set-up areas, and neat arrangements of empty dog crates and grooming tables making an array of half-filled rows. The show rings are delineated by the low, yellow collapsible fencing you see at many dog shows, enclosing expanses of vivid green strands of fake plastic grass with a spongy-backed carpet flecked with tiny bits of rubber. It was amusingly springy to walk on.
The energy is different in the morning. More noise, more action. Outside, the parking lot is filling up, and it is already hot. Inside, the gaps between the rows of crates have filled in with people and dogs. I carry in a couple of different kinds of treats, several leashes, crate pads, water buckets.
AKC dog shows begin with the National Anthem. Sometimes, someone else says, “Play ball!” when it’s over, so I don’t have to.
My schedule for the day begins at the start of the show, and I have written it out on a piece of paper. Vizslas are in ring 4, at 8:30 am, after 20 Retrievers (Labrador) and 9 Pointers (German Shorthaired). Fellow is number 7, and the only Vizsla entered in the breed, so when my handler takes him in the ring, has him stand, and the judge examines him, asks her to take him down and back, and he wins Best in Breed, it is certainly no surprise.
I have also entered Fellow in Novice Obedience B, in ring 6 at 11:10 am. We’ve taken him outside several times; going pee at the dog show always jollies him up. He waits quietly in his kennel. I go to watch my obedience ring, nominally to learn the heeling pattern, but really just to make myself nervous.
When Fellow’s obedience class begins, I watch the first dog and handler team and go to get him when they finish. We go outside into the blistering sun for a quick pee. Now, we are at this show in the hopes of getting our third and final leg in Novice, so we’ve done this a few times. I know from last year that sometimes, spending the morning dealing with a tire problem, showing up late, and running full speed across the show grounds to beg for a chance to show despite missing our assigned time is an adequate warm-up. But instead of focusing on what would be the best way to prepare Fellow for the ring, I throw us into a full and thorough warm-up. He is attentive, bright, and ready to compete.
When we are called to the ring, we walk from the warm-up area to the gate, and in those twenty (or so) feet, Fellow deflates like an untied balloon. He lags. He is no longer making eye-contact. I plaster an encouraging grin on my face, tell him he’s a good boy, and swallow my regrets.
We muddle through the paces of Novice obedience, and might have even qualified for group sits and downs. Alas, the very last requirement is to sit your dog, and on the judge’s cue, go get your leash; then, again on the judge’s cue, return to heel position with your still-sitting dog, and finally, put the leash on the dog and leave the ring in control. As I return to Fellow, he stands and shuffles to me, head down. He knows he shouldn’t. He has disqualified us. The judge, unhelpfully tells me that someone walked by the ring with another dog just then, and probably distracted him, but they weren’t very close, so she wasn’t going to let me re-do that step.
I keep the fake smile on my face, take Fellow to pee, tell him he’s a good dog, and put him away. It is time for Friday.
Friday is entered in BPUP, which is how the beginner puppy division is known. It is for registered puppies between 4 and 6 months old, where handlers are non-professionals. The judges are usually helpful and understanding about puppy behavior, and I have found the competitive environment to be lighthearted. I find a willing and able junior to take Friday in the ring, which Friday thought was great.
Friday wins the vizsla puppies, and then loses to a cute English cocker spaniel in the sporting group. She looks a bit unruly, but seemed to have fun.
A pointer breeder once told me, when I was brand new to dog showing, that even the best dog loses more than they win.
Then it is time to wait. When you don’t win at dog shows, you get to leave early. When you do win, you don’t. I sit by Ring 1 and watch the non-sporting group.
My handler also has a pointer in the sporting group, so she found another handler to take Fellow in the ring.
He looks great.
When we are done for the day, I load the dogs into the White Whale and pick up a sandwich at a deli nearby. I park at the hotel, but the dogs are so quiet and tired, I feed them in the car and eat sitting in the driver’s seat, running the AC. Our last walk of the day is lit with the golden light of Rhode Island summer.
Back in the room, I draw the curtains and brush the dogs’ teeth. Fellow shows Friday the best thing about staying in hotels.
Day 2: By 6:45 a.m., I have checked out and loaded my suitcases, the dogs’ bag of stuff, the cooler (with an ice pack, string cheese and the last Ziploc bag of roast chicken inside), and the travel crates back into the White Whale. Overnight, a storm blew through, with rain and thunder. The grass is wet, but the sky is clear, and the crushing humidity of the day before is gone.
The clothes I brought for the second day of the show included a skirt and a pair of pants that both have pockets. But I didn’t try them on before I packed, and both turn out to be a little too big. I choose the pants because they are a little bit loud, and someone at the dog show will say something about them and that’s always funny.
The second day of the dog show has Fellow scheduled to show in ring 4 at 8:30 a.m., and Friday in ring 3 at 8:30 a.m. , after 2 spaniels (a black cocker and an English cocker). I take the puppy in the BPUP ring myself, and she’s delighted to squirm so much that judge has to help me. The other vizsla puppy did not show up, so Friday wins. I try to shove the winning orange ribbon into my shallow pants pocket.
They hold the beginner puppy sporting group immediately, so we stay in the ring. The ribbon falls out of my pocket as I try to steer my nutty 4 1/2-month-old around the ring. Today, Friday wins over the English cocker spaniel. Best puppy in show will be a little later, so for now she can chill in her crate.
The junior handler is available to take Friday into the Best (beginner puppy) in Show, and thank Dog for that. How nice is it for me to clap, and take pictures and watch someone convince a squirmy puppy to stand like a show dog!
Fellow will compete in the sporting group in the afternoon. In the meantime, he and I have one more shot at Novice obedience. I have a game plan, which is to get him out just in time to show and no earlier.
I sit and watch some open dogs, and the graduate novice team. There is a long, distracting stained area in the turf along the far side of the fence which smells interesting to a number of dogs. There are signs in the facility about summer camps, and I imagine that that stain is 4 weeks of popsicle juice and child sweat. I resist the urge to get Fellow too early.
We warm up on the way back inside from going out to pee. I have string cheese, roast chicken, and bits of dehydrated lamb lung. I bite off a chunk of cheese and hold it in my mouth to maintain eye contact with Fellow. The dog and handler team ahead of us finishes and it is our turn. I give Fellow small and smaller pieces of cheese as we wait by the open gate. The judge pauses to write something down. A ring steward notices me, working to keep Fellow’s attention. She says, “Look how serious he is!”
I can only think of how the last time we showed, he rolled onto his back for the group downs. There he was, four legs in the air, and the judge says, go to the end of your leash. I don’t know why he flipped himself half-over, putting his elbows on the floor. But he did, getting us our second novice leg. But, no, he’s not serious, no matter what he looks like.
At last, the judge invites us into the ring. Novice obedience begins with an on-leash heeling pattern, including a halt (and sit), left and right turns, an about turn, a fast section and a slow section, ending with another halt (and sit). Fellow isn’t perfect but he’s getting better, and he’s good enough here. Next is the figure eight. We’ve come a long way on this. Next is the stand for exam, when you surrender your leash. As a conformation show dog, Fellow has stood to be examined by dozens of conformation judges, but somehow in the obedience ring he sometimes turns his head to watch the judge touch his body. As long as he keeps his feet still, this is ok. Next, we do the heeling pattern again, off-leash. I try to stay in the moment, and not think about all the dogs I saw over the past two days, wandering around the ring, sniffing the stained area. After the heeling pattern is the recall. Usually Fellow nails this. The judges asks the handler to sit their dog, and then leave their dog and walk to the other side of the ring. Then, on the judge’s signal, the handler calls the dog (to their front). The handler finishes the exercise by telling the dog to go to heel position on the judge’s command. Last of all, the handler goes and gets the leash.
Having successfully completed all these elements and having gotten a good enough score, the judge invites us to return for group sits and downs. We leave the ring, and I give Fellow almost all the chicken in my treat bag. Because we were the last dog to compete, there is not much time to think or prepare for the group exercise.
A steward calls the qualified handler-dog pairs into the ring in catalog order. The judge arranges them about six feet apart. The judge asks if everyone is ready. I try to say “Yes,” and not, “Ready,” because Eggi likes to leap onto her feet if I say “Ready?” Then the judge says, “Sit your dogs,” and then, “Leave your dogs.”
As the 6o second pass, I try not to count. I smile. It’s a cheesy, ear-to-ear grin. I try to maintain eye-contact. Fellow looks around at the other dogs, as if he’s looking to start something. At the end of 60 seconds, the judge says, “Back to your dogs.”
I return to heel position. I quietly quietly tell Fellow he’s a good boy, and that he’s almost done.
The group down goes about the same way, except the judge says “Down your dogs.”
At this, Fellow flops onto his side, his legs outstretched stiffly, his head on the floor. I hear the judge ask me if this is ok. I don’t know how to answer her. No, it’s not ok; everyone can see it’s not ok. I want him to lie down like a proper obedience dog, but I know that if she’s letting me try again, I might be inviting other, worse, creative ideas from Fellow’s head, like leaving, or wrestling, or barking. I say nothing.
I leave him like this; he has his head down. We have a chance of keeping this together. For the next 20-30 seconds, I am convincing myself not to laugh. To keep smiling. I watch him. Fellow is very relaxed. His eyes are open but he’s not really looking around. I think about that. With about 10 seconds to go, he lifts his head and looks around, but the rest of his body is still solidly down. When the judge says, “Exercise finished,” I try not to explode with joy. We still need to leave the ring in control.
When the judge calls the qualifiers back into the ring, two of the teams have finished a title today. And Fellow’s gotten a good enough score for second place. I give him the rest of the chunk of roast chicken still in my bag.
After another potty break and a picture, I leave Fellow to recharge. He still has the sporting group.
Someone tells me they like my pants. We talk about our dog showing clothes.
My handler T is available to show Fellow in the sporting group. You can’t necessarily see in these pictures, but he was wagging his tail the whole time.
And to my delight, Fellow takes 4th place in the sporting group. He gets credit for defeating 94 dogs.
As we drive home, we hit all the Sunday traffic from people returning from the ocean. I don’t even care.
Almost Every Thursday 
