Day 4 of launch week!
Photo by Don Agnello on Unsplash
Life in London with dogs is different than elsewhere, for us. Elsewhere, our dogs have lots of enclosed lovely outdoor space to run free. In London, we have only a tiny balcony. They’re amazing at adapting and are aside from the odd crazy moment (a small wrestling match, outrage at policemen on horseback passing) super well behaved and calm at home (our direct border neighbours still like us, so we must be doing something right). We go a lot to the green spaces, obviously, but also (especially because of Jackson’s - ahem - behavioural struggles) do a lot of street walks. This was one of them.
We’re walking along the Goldborne Road, as we often do on a Saturday. It’s less busy up this end of Notting Hill, it feels less touristy and more real, somehow. I see a man struggling along, on crutches. I think to myself how that was me, a year ago. I remember how difficult it was - how I had had to sit on the side of the bath and lower myself backwards into it to wash, keeping my right leg out of the water. I remember how the long, brutal join where they had entered had been jagged and raised and crudely stapled. It had shocked me when I first saw it (and those close to me understandably couldn’t bear to look at it, it was too stark – too honest a sign of what my leg had been through) but it hadn’t bothered me really, that bit of it - vanity isn’t so much of a thing for me any more. But the reliance on crutches had. Still watching him, I reflect further. Yes, it was difficult - but it’s over. Eventually, I got off the crutches. Eventually, every step didn’t cause pain. And now, a year and 3 months on, I’m even starting to get my normal gait back. I had felt weirdly not like myself walking in such an affected, careful way, so I’m pleased about that. Things pass, even though they don’t feel like they ever will, in the moment - in the midst of painful, difficult times. Everything passes. Everything will pass. Even grief, I presume. Grief is the one I’m scared of, the big one. I haven’t had it yet, you see, not really. My parents, my dogs, perhaps even my husband and my siblings – likely, I suppose, since they’re all older than me. All to come. Awful, when you think of it like that. Terrifying. But we bear things, don’t we.
Well, at least: we have to.
I look down at our dog in his yellow vest. He’s stalking, scanning the environment. I smile. He’s endearing to me now where once he was a cross to bear, a burden. He is lithe, strong, ready for confrontation. When we stop to cross a road, his stance is stiff. He’s on his toes, game, gunning, I can tell, for a bit of argy bargy. Maybe I should have given him a day off today, I think. But this is what we do, mooch up to the Goldborne Road on a Saturday, and it just wouldn’t be the same with only 3 out of 4 of our little family. He’s eyeballing all the dogs he can and getting a kick out of it. His spunk makes me smile. I nudge my husband and gesture down at him discreetly. He smiles the same smile as I do. We have given up for hopeless finding our dog’s behaviour unreasonable and somewhere during that process remembered to find some humour in it; difficult though it - this unreasonable behaviour of his - often is. It’s akin, I think, to relinquishing control when you’re naturally a badass control freak. Hard, but (allegedly) possible, and quite freeing, a bit of a relief (I imagine). Hearing a shout, I look up to see a guy walking along some scaffolding. He’s wearing a yellow vest. I watch him for a few seconds and notice, amused, that his carriage, as well as his vest, mirrors Jackson’s. Does he eyeball people and pick fights too? Is he nice inside, too? I wonder. I find myself hoping that he has someone at home to love him, like Jackson has us. A warm and comfy bed, a safe space he can retreat to, somewhere he can let his guard down.
A lady standing with her bike outside a health food shop putting on her helmet watches us openly as we approach. I know she’s going to talk to me, even though she hasn’t yet met my eyes. I can feel it. What’s that about, I wonder - that intuition, that premonition. There’s no preamble. My husband walks on, with our other dog, as I had known he would. I stop, so Jackson stops with me.
‘Why’s he wearing that thing?’ she asks, brusquely. She means the muzzle. It’s a light one, made for racing greyhounds. I’m not sure how it fits him, but it does. It’s purple. Somehow, purple feels less threatening than black, and also, less like it’s trying to hide itself, to blend with the background. I like that about it. I’ve never liked blending and I like to hope at least that any differentness I have, I wear like a badge of honour. For a split second I consider telling her a lie, saying that he’s a scavenger. I don’t though. Endeavouring to stick to my new persona – the one who doesn’t lie and doesn’t apologise - I tell her the truth. It’s a spiel, but it’s important to me to get the details right, to present the case for the muzzle in as succinct a way as possible. To this end, I’ve learnt it off pat - aware that I often get lost, in the moment, and forget what I want to say. It makes me sound a bit stiff, a bit pompous, but never mind.
‘Because he’s not comfortable with all dogs and having the muzzle on allows me to let him safely greet them, thereby decreasing his frustration. It also lets me relax when we’re walking in places where a dog could pop up close to him, unexpectedly.’ This London of corners and doorways and buses that stop beside you and let out a rush of beings and amongst them here and there, four-legged ones. Potential targets for my yob dog.
She nods, unsmiling but not hostile.
‘I used to have a dog,’ she muses, leaning the bike on her hip, settling in. I in turn shift my weight to fall evenly on my two legs and their joints; I am much more aware of my body since the accident, aware of the burden it bears, its fragility and how much I need it.
‘Oh yes?’ I comment politely, leaving it open-ended. But that’s it, she doesn’t feel the need to tell me about her dog. I like that about her. I find her droll. She’s unhurried. It’s refreshing. And peaceful, not striving. That’s refreshing too. So much superfluous chat these days, hard to sift through it, hard to sustain it at all, I find. So much chasing after fun, connection, life, it’s exhausting. Things happen in the gaps, too, in the spaces, that’s what so many people don’t realise. After a few more minutes of chat on haphazard topics and as abruptly as she had started the conversation, she brings it to a close. She readies her bike to depart, straddles it. She has finished with me, I sense – she doesn’t have to say it. Non-verbal communication, I think. It works fine, if you allow it to. She turns her attention to my dog and says a sweet goodbye, entirely separately, to him. She gently strokes his head and leans down to croon secret words into the space near his skull. She draws back a bit to check he’s assimilated whatever she’s said to him, and his eyes blaze golden as he gazes into hers. I wonder if she’s a sort of witch, a healer. I think she is. My heart swells with love, for Jackson and for the magical that exists in our world, despite all the mundanity. Hope surges in me that perhaps she’s fixed him, but just as quickly I dismiss the thought. He doesn’t need to be fixed, I remind myself. She doesn’t look back to me again before she cycles off. I like that. It gives him as a being as much importance as me. That’s how it should be, I think.
Further along the street, we stop to get a coffee from a hatch. These hatches popped up across London during covid and some have stayed. They’re handy for those of us with dogs who don’t like small spaces.
The lady queuing behind me looks at him askance, distrustful.
‘Why’s he wearing that?’ she asks, making a hand movement that looks like she’s trying to describe a goatee. I smile, and tell her the same as I told the other lady.
‘Aha,’ she says. ‘So he’s friendly to people then?’
‘Oh yes,’ I say, ‘absolutely.’ I stop myself going on to explain, like I had used to, that he has a big scar under his chin, that he lived on the streets as a puppy. From going on to defend his intolerances, to theorise about why he might feel the way he does, why he’s not a normal dog. In stopping myself from what is effectively apologising for him, I feel proud, and free. What dogs are these days anyway, I think, happy go lucky dogs are rapidly becoming a thing of the past in this London with streets full of frustrated greeters and howling, lonely souls shut behind doors.
A dog is approaching. It’s too close. But selfishly, I don’t want to lose my place at the front of the queue - the man before me is just paying up - so I sacrifice Jackson’s nerves. Life isn’t ideal; I’m learning to reconcile myself with that, finally, after a lifetime of struggling, a lot like the Princess and the Pea. I don’t beat myself up about every little thing any more. Thank god. I’m trying not to beat anyone else up, too, but I have a way to go there, so I retreat into myself instead of lashing out at others for not doing the exact right thing in the exact right moment every single moment.
‘Here we go,’ I say to the lady, grinning ruefully. He reacts, as I’d known he would. I take it in my stride but it certainly looks awful. The lady is duly alarmed but, to her credit, quickly recovers herself, almost as quickly as he does. It’s all over in a few seconds. Peace descends.
‘We’re on a rollercoaster him and I,’ I tell her. She nods and says, ‘I can see that.’ But there’s no judgement in it, and I smile at her. She knows too that life isn’t ideal, I think. Most people do when they get to our sort of age. It’s not necessary to explain away or justify our likes, our dislikes, to categorise or litanise the things that trigger us, our intolerances, the things we can’t any longer sustain. We just need to find a way of navigating through life as smoothly as possible. I don’t need to apologise for my dog being a difficult being, for his finding difficulty in being. Aren’t we all and don’t we all, in some way?
He looks up at me and grins, full of love and full of the devil, too, despite the whispered words from the white witch. I don’t mind, he’s perfect as he is. I grin back. We continue along the Goldborne Road and onwards in life, my golden-eyed, forgiving boy and I. We make mistakes, but we continue on. The rest of our little family are waiting for us a little way ahead. We rush to catch up with them. I smile and he wags. And at the edge of that pavement ahead, looking back at us, he smiles and she wags.
If only I could let go of being a control freak, just as I have let go of resisting the vagaries of Jackson’s behaviour and clinging to the good moments wanting to repeat them over and over, I could start to fully enjoy the pure joy of such moments. I’ve often thought you can apply what you learn about studying dogs to your own - human - life, and this is the thought I muse on for the rest of the day.