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About a Dog
My daughter chose him. Of all the puppies at the shelter, he seemed the sweetest and kindest — big floppy ears, gangly legs, and big paws, covered in beautiful brindle fur. His shelter name was Garth, perhaps because he’d come from the South and someone who worked at the Humane Society was a country-music lover. He was a stray by the side of the road, picked up and put in the pipeline that takes dogs from areas that don’t have shelters to states where rescue dogs are in demand.
She named him Scout.
He was an exceptionally even-tempered little hound, and only ruined two pieces of furniture when he teethed. One of them was the sofa, and this gave my wife an excuse to get that new piece she’d been eyeing. The other was a sofa in the gazebo, where he would gnaw on the wood between springing up to chase rabbits. I worked at home a lot; he sat on the steps or the sofa or his bed, as if waiting for me to pick up the shootin’ iron and head into the woods to ping away at squirrels.
He ran away the first summer. He smelled something that needed chasing, and burrowed under the fence. We found him a few blocks away, and I filled in the hole. He made another, and ran off to harass rabbits on the waterpower hill. I pounded 120 galvanized iron spikes under the fence, spaced six inches apart all around the property — no weak spots except for one in the back under bushes. He found it.
If he got out, it was because SOMEONE, not me, left the gate ajar. I was always telling everyone to make sure the gate clicks. I could hear that click from my studio, even if the window was closed. If I didn’t hear it I’d run downstairs in a panic, only to find Scout on the sofa outside: what?
One night we couldn’t find him, and feared for the worst. After five hours he came home exhausted and dropped in the corner, having run his paw-pads ragged. Another night he didn’t come back at all. I slept family-room with the back door open. In the morning my wife found me balled up on the tiny sofa, door open, food dish outside, and Scout on the gazebo sofa, snoozing.
Eventually I made everyone in the house as paranoid about the gate as me. I’d hear daughter say “it has to click!” and know we were good. But I still always feared he’d gone off. In the evening he liked to sit in the cool recesses of the bushes at the back of the yard, and being a black dog, could not be seen. I’d rustle the Milk Bone box and exhale with relief when he trotted out from the shadows.
He had a conscience, inasmuch a dogs can. When he ate something off the table, and knew very well he shouldn’t, he would come up to my studio, sit, and put a paw on my leg. He would stand very still and his tail would move a little, and I would know he’d done something. So I’d go downstairs and see the pizza box tipped to the floor, and all I had to do was look at the box and look at him without changing my expression or posture, and he slunk away — only to come back and put out a paw. Sorry, boss. We good?
He loved to fight; he boxed well. For a while he was afraid of your hands if they moved under the bedsheets, but then he figured it out and pounced. Most of all he loved to run, and my wife took him to the woody off-leash park by the Mississippi where dozens of people and dogs every day and night cavort in the woods. A few times she told about some worrisome moments — he ran into the woods, and didn’t come back, right away.
But he always came back.
Until he didn’t. It was a warm night, early August. Twilight on the banks of the Mississippi. Across the shallows the woods thicken, and there are often deer in there. He ran. He didn’t come back.
When my wife called me to come to the park with flashlights I had the horrible feeling he was gone for good, lost in a place on the other side of town. But you have to look. So we headed into the woods, down to the water in the dark, and I can’t tell you how empty it felt: I couldn’t sense him. Sometimes you can; sometimes you know. There was this horrible vacancy.
What followed was three weeks of searching, aided by a volunteer organization that whips you into shape and sends you out with a mission. We gathered up stray dog sightings, set up Facebook pages, pinpointed where we thought he might be, and posted big neon-paper signs on streetcorners. These gathered leads, and we honed in on the neighborhood where it seemed he’d fled. A rather bad part of town. My wife and I had our anniversary dinner in a scruffy park — two pastrami sandwiches — waiting for the park to empty out so Scout might go to the food bowls.
We had positive sightings that turned out to be nothing. Pet psychics called. Two men tried to lure me to the area for a robbery under the guise of a reunion. Phone call: yeah, a homeless woman has him at Franklin and Cedar, on a chain. Phone call: yeah, I saw in by the train station this morning. Phone call: the homeless people who live in the apartment behind me ate him last night, I heard it. Sixty five signs spread across six neighborhoods in Minneapolis; daily trips to check their condition, swap out the pictures for the rain-ruined images, note which ones had been removed by vandals or city officials.
We had it covered.
My phone rang constantly. Sometimes it was someone who was sure they’d seen Scout, and that sent me racing to the spot, and while nothing ever came of it, he was alive in my mind again. We’d just missed him. More signs for that area, then. Fliers. Walk around, hand out pictures, see a crooked sign, run back to the car for the hammer.
Every sighting of every lost dog went to my phone, it seemed. Dog in the road on 55: go. Dog in the street in Uptown: GO! Someone saw a dog running down their street four days ago: they call me. The good leads seemed to shift back towards the place where he fled, and then one night a lady said she’d seen him in the dog park.
Our case worker said they do that. They circle back.
So the case worker drove over and we walked in the black woods for a few hours, tracing the area where he’d last been seen, leaving old clothing to remind him of the family scent, smearing Alpo on tree trunks, giving him a reason to hang around. Our case worker said two to five weeks was normal for them; the signs would get the sightings, the sightings would nail down the location, and then we’d put up the feeding stations and trail cams and remote-controlled cages.
And then, nothing.
And then, the call. The Department of Transportation had been cutting the grass by the highway, and they found him. Scant remains. A collar. In all likelihood he’d been hit the night he fled. We’d been chasing a ghost for three weeks. He’d never been anywhere. He’d always been there.
You reach for consolations. We had an end; we knew. As much as we’d said oh he’s having a fine time chasing squirrels, we knew the truth was otherwise if he was alive — cold, wet, alone. He didn’t go through that. He died on a night when our scent was still fresh on him, so in a way we were with him when he passed.
Scout could stand up and put his paws on your shoulder and give you lick hello, and I’ll miss that. He mostly did it to my wife:. I remember his paws around my shoulders when he was small and I took him upstairs the first month he was home, cradling him like a baby, wet nose on my neck. I thought that he would be around when Natalie came back from college, wagging his tail, a reminder of the home she’d left for the big world. But there are no guarantees. Ask any dog who’s run after a squirrel.
Can you blame them? You have to do what you’re born to do — to sniff, to stop, to brace yourself for a second, and then run.
He ran. He didn’t mean to leave us all behind when he caught the scent of the deer across the dark water. There was just so much joy in the moment he had to go.
I, too, had been following the story and praying for a final story of Scout’s triumphant return. I am so sorry for your loss, James.
I pass along the following information in the hope that, when you adopt another dog, it might help you avoid another heartache.
We own an earlier version of this product, for those times when our dog is off-leash. We have found that, in most cases, just the vibration mode is sufficient to stop him from running.
Again, my sincere condolences to you and your family.
All of the above James, expresses how I feel. I’m so sorry.
I’ve been following your tweets about this, James. This just breaks me up completely. I’m very sorry to hear this.
A beautiful tribute. Reminds me of how much joy the dogs I’ve had have brought to my life and how much I still miss them all. My condolences to you and your family.
Also, how did it get so dusty in here all of a sudden? That’s all it is. Just dusty.
I followed James’ diligent efforts in search of his loving dog from afar, on Twitter. On such occasions, all of us who are dog owners become emotionally involved by proxy. Despite having never met Mr. Lileks or his loving Scout, I was nonetheless desperately hoping to read good news. Alas, when I read his tweet last night, I was devastated.
I hugged my dear Ava (pictured below) a little more last night afterwards (James asked us to do so in one of his tweets last night). As we all know, God’s love for us is manifest in many ways in our lives. I’ll always believe that primary of those manifestations are the lives of the loving animals He shares with us. May God bless Scout.
Damn. Damn, damn, damn.
I’d like to add my voice to the chorus of sympathies.
I lost a little TeaCup poodle many, many years ago and still tear up when I get to thinking about him. Someday I might post about Etoile, pronounced ey-twal, French for star. He was pure bred, black, but had this giant white star on his chest. We could only show him in obedience trials, etc. After Kaylett tragically lost her dog, she took my spoiled little tyke, trained him and they were the CA 4-H Jr. Dog Handling Champions 1975 and 1976.
Like others here I know the anxiety of deer-chasing dogs off-leash in the woods. A trick that mostly works for me and my Cha-cha (short for Charlemagne, our handsome tho cowardly prince of dogs, a rescue) is this: habituate the hound to getting treats at the same place every walk, say a hundred yards or so from the car-park, then leash him up. That tends to make our paths converge.
I was tipped over the edge finally to pay up for Ricochet because I wanted to pass that on in the hope that it may be useful.
It will be useful. And thank you for joining us, welcome.
I was married to a woodsman once upon a time, and he would take us (my girls and I) hunting with him. We had a mixed mutt that decided she would chase the deer. And all my obedience training went right out the window. We couldn’t stay in the woods all night waiting for her to come back, so he put his coat on the ground where she parted from us. He stated the dog would always come back to the spot where they started their run. Sure enough, when she didn’t catch the deer, and got hungry, she was waiting on Joe’s coat when he went back for her the next day. She was pretty young, a little over a year old, but her instinct directed her back to her starting place.
Oh, now my eyes are wet—remembering ‘Mutt’, a huge golden Lab who lived under our house for awhile before we found him, and despite many attempts to dissuade him staying, wormed into our hearts. We’d catch him sleeping on my convertible’s roof—it was black, and probably was really warm. He ran free, and one time he was gone for over a week. When he showed up, he was very thin, and two front toes were cut badly. We decided he got caught in an illegal beaver trap along the creek that bounds part of our land. He stayed close to home for awhile after that, but left one day, and never came back….
The pawprints on my heart, and yours, will never go away. It hurts to lose them, but the memories……
Others have already said it better than I could. So sorry for your loss.
A wonderful tribute to a beautiful dog. Just remember this: while he was with you he was happy in the life you provided. All dogs die, but not all were well-loved.
So sorry for your family’s loss, James.
D@mn, this is not the way this story should have ended. Great remembrance of a special beast.
Condolences. What else can I say?
Sorry for your loss.
Kippling says it best in his poem The Power Of The Dog
“Buy a pup and your money will buy
Love unflinching that cannot lie-”
Brothers and Sisters, I bid you beware
Of giving your heart to a dog to tear.”
We had a cat that went out on his usual early morning sojourn last summer and never came home. We knew we were taking a chance letting him do this, but this was who he was. We did everything to try and find him, he was chipped, but it’s been over a year now. We figure a coyote or possibly even a mountain lion got him. We’ll never know. In a way, it’s kind of amazing Scout’s remains were located, and I think it’s better that you know. It’s very sad, and you have my deepest sympathies. Coming on the heels of Houston, too. I see all the dogs being rescued, but no cats, and I’ve seen pictures of horses standing in feet of water, it’s not good for them. Sigh. ?
They leave a hole in your heart when you lose them, these mysterious critters. We read what they give us as love, and we give it right back. Then they follow that scent and disappear or just can’t make our three score and ten cause they’re not one of us. Then we walk around with a hole in our heart that can’t be healed, only patched up, by the next mysterious creature. Life is cruel and beautiful that way.
I’m so sorry. He was a dog’s dog.
So sorry for your loss. This is a beautiful post and I feel like you captured his personality perfectly. RIP, Scout.
Tough to hear, just grim. At least you (we) now know.
I was there with you! Prayers for a happy issuance from your sadness for you all.
You think dogs will not be in heaven? I tell you, they will be there long before any of us. -Robert Louis Stevenson
I’ve got 4 waiting for me. I hope JoJo, Buffy, Sullivan, and Simon get a chance to play with Scout.
Still can’t think of what to say. So I’ll just give up. I hope Natalie and the Mrs find comfort in your words, and you found comfort in writing them.
I’m with you here. There are some waiting for me as well. I only hope that my life merits entry (so far, I can’t be sure). But I know theirs did and I can only hope they put in a good word for me.
So sorry James. Losing a dog is like losing a human friend and just as painful.
James, truly sorry for your loss. As a vet I know full well how devastating the loss of a beloved pet can be. If I may let me offer you and your family two bits of unsolicited advice.
First after a period of adjustment get another pet. This is doubly true if children are involved. This is not an attempt to replace the pet you lost, you can never replace Scout, but it does fill the void left when your pet is no longer there. It helps ease the pain and takes the child’s mind off the pet they lost.
Secondly never try to find another dog just like the one you lost. You will always be disappointed. Rather find one with a different look, a different personality and style. You can learn to love the new pet just as much, blemishes and all. I’ve offered this advice many times and been thanked for doing so. Good luck.
Scout’s photo shows him to be one handsome soulful fellow. Sorry for the pain and emptiness that losing him has caused. Your writing helped me feel I knew him too.
I can’t tell if I love or hate that I read this… both I guess.
They love us every day to make up for when they go. And we make every day as happy as we can, to be faithful to them. It doesn’t get easy, but it’s worth every second. God bless, James.