Ga-lump . . . ga-lump . . . ga-lump, or the joys of a dog

Bill Lyon

is the author of Deadlines and Overtimes: Collected Writings on Sports and Life

The folks next door, who just happen to be close kin, have added a new member to the family. He is a rolling ball of exuberance. When he comes to visit, he bounds into our living room all a-quiver with the simple joy of being alive, and Boy-oh-boy-oh-boy isn't this fun?

When he recognizes me, his face lights up like the aurora borealis and he aims himself at me, an inviting target who is pretty much horizontal in a recliner and therefore pretty much defenseless.

Boy-oh-boy-oh-boy.

Ga-lump . . . ga-lump . . . ga-lump

"Brakes!" I shout. "Brakes!"

To no avail.

Boy-oh-boy-oh-boy.

Ga-lump . . . ga-lump . . . ga-lump

On he rushes, gathering speed, and now he has reached full gallop.

"Brakes! Brakes!"

He knows but one gear. He is so excited at the prospect of seeing us again that he cannot contain himself, and he is dead-set on demonstrating exactly how excited. His intent is of a single, unshakable purpose.

Boy-oh-boy-oh-boy.

Ga-lump . . . ga-lump . . . ga-lump

"Brakes! Brakes!"

He launches.

Boy-oh-boy-oh-boy.

Hugs all around.

His message is clear and simple: "Hey, hey, what do you say, what do you know, let's play, let's go . . . Boy-oh-boy-oh-boy."

Is there anything quite so contagiously enthusiastic, quite so Boy-oh-boy-oh-boy-oh-boy irresistible, as a puppy?

This one is a German shepherd, currently at that coltish, awkward adolescent stage, all legs and ears, paws as big as the tires on an 18-wheeler, and a relentless curiosity:

"Hey, what's this, tastes like a rock . . . oh it is a rock . . . pa-toooo . . . What's this . . . tastes like another rock . . . it is another rock . . . pa-toooo . . . boy-oh-boy-oh-boy, ain't life grand?"

His energy is boundless, and the backyard wildlife scatter before him, the chipmunks scurrying into their escape hatches, the squirrels performing their tree-to-tree aerial acrobatics and chattering their taunts, and you wonder, idly, do they make Ritalin for dogs?

Throw it and he retrieves it. Again and again and again, content that you are his for the moment, and vice-versa, prancing and parading and prideful, high-stepping and head shaking.

And, yes, we are dog people, the kin next door and us, and, unabashedly so, subscribers to this philosophy: If you think a dog should be treated like a dog, then you probably shouldn't have a dog.

For about half a century now we have been privileged to be in their company, and never have found more boon companions.

Some years ago, when my son took his Shepherd to the vet for the usual round of vaccinations, his eyes were drawn to a dog in a cage, peering at him with liquid eyes. The animal was almost grotesque, its body, stem to stern, cross-hatched with stitches . . . it seemed like hundreds. The vet had virtually sewed her back together.

She was found in a ditch, the victim of a hit-and-run, still alive, but barely so. She hadn't bled to death only because it was winter.

The shame of it all, the vet told John, is that, given her appearance, no one will want her. He had saved her only to have to destroy her.

That's not right, said John.

Pause.

We'll take her.

And thus did Sydney, of mixed parentage, join our clan.

She is with us still, graying in the muzzle now but still remarkably spry and feisty, chasing fearlessly, on pogo-stick legs, after birds and squirrels and lawn mowers and jetliners, while trying all the while to fend off Ga-lump . . . ga-lump . . . ga-lump

And Boy-oh-boy-oh-boy.

They can't tell time, dogs can't. Not the way we do. And when you leave without them they peer longingly out the window, certain you are never to return. Forty minutes must feel like 40 years. And when you do return they break into the unbridled dance of joy . . . Boy-oh-boy-oh-boy-oh-boy . . .

Do you think, a vet once asked me, you'll ever, in your whole life, have anyone who is that happy to see you?

Gives you pause, doesn't it?

There was a story the other day about the $1.6 billion Meadowlands Stadium, the posh new pleasure palace where the Giants and Jets will play their football this fall. Guess who is being entrusted with security?

Rufus is 2, Anja is 3. Black Labs. Effortlessly, they leap up four feet and into trucks that are making deliveries. Sniffer dogs. They'll be there the year round, their kennels only feet away from the playing field.

You don't mess with a sniffer dog. In the immediate aftermath of 9/11, I went to an Eagles game in the old Meadowlands. Security was heightened and tightened. A group of us, bearing computers and all the newfangled electronic tools of our trade, approached the media entrance, which was guarded by heavily armed soldiers, one of whom commanded, sternly:

"Gentlemen, please place your bags on the ground, and step back."

We obeyed.

He made a slight hand signal, and out from the shadows, as though materializing out of thin air, an enormous German shepherd appeared. You could put a saddle on him. His eyes glowed like embers. He set about sniffing. Nice doggie. Good doggie.

"Ohhh, I sure hope he doesn't find something he doesn't like," I whispered to the man next to me.

"What I'm hoping," he replied, "is that he finds an extra pair of shorts that I could really, really use now."

Boy-oh-boy-oh-boy-oh-boy . . .