Dogs

"Everybody thinks their ideas are perfect,
just like they think their dogs are perfect."

Frances Joy Hamilton, circa April 2010
Frances is your guide tonight.

I want to take every dog I see home from France. But not really the scary ones.

The scary ones are the pitbulls. But this one, above, was smiling and not scary!

This is the kind I want to take home.

I want to take all of them home, but this kind is my favorite.

My mom and dad call it the "Zoom-Zoom" dog.

When my dad was speed skiing,

there was a dog just like this in Vars.

Its name was Zumi.

I want a small dog. I want a small dog because big dogs just grow and then you know they’re going to die. Small dogs stay small so you think they won’t die.

These are the skinny dogs that have ties around their necks about to go to their tea-party.

 

We asked the owner if we could take a picture of the dog.

And she said, "Oui."

And she made the dog look at us by saying,

"Turn around, turn around," but in French.

Here's another Zoom-Zoom.

This dog looked like a clown because it had one color of fur on its nose

and another color for its wig.

This dog looks like a dog in one of my Puppy Place books. His name is Patches.

When my grandma was here we slept together.

When I fell asleep at night, my grandma would sneak my book to read it

because she loved it so much.

My dad says:

This is for you cat-lovers.

I don't know why dogs lick their noses. You can admit it's kind of gross.

This dog looks like it's going to jump on my camera.

My mom says:

"Frances bought a tiny model dog the other day at the bric-a-brac (another one).

It looks like this one, only it's all white.

It sits in its miniature whicker bed on a miniature gingham pillow. 

The ensemble sits on her piano.

She named her Bach because her music teacher

asked her to get a bust of Bach for her piano.

We made a pun about that: this dog doesn't say 'BARK BARK;' it says, 'BACH BACH.'

Every morning the little doggy greets her with a whispery, loving voice, telling her how excited she is to hear her play yet another great Bach song.

(Frances is learning so many that little Bachy is one proud doggy!)"

You know how pretty much every dog look like their owners?

Well, I wonder what this owner looks like.

This one looks like a poor old scraggily white fuzzy ball.

But actually, I might still take this one home.

We mostly see dogs on the streets with their owners....

...and their poo.

Dog poop is everywhere.

Sometimes, when we're walking,

we look up for a second to see something

and then we quickly look back down to see if we stepped in dog poop.

And when it rains, that goes to a whole different level.

My mom says:

"Last winter, when Frances and I took Tikvah to Meadow Park,

I asked her to scoop up her poop.

Well, it turns out, Frances LOVES scooping all the poop in the park!

Not in France.

Not even those cool doggy-poop bags that fit over your hands

could entice her to pick up all this poop!"

This is the typical French dog. It has one triangle eye and it's frowning.

Maybe it needs a cigarette. Almost everybody we see here smokes. 

Ughhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh.

 

It's not a really good picture, but he's pretty cute.

Oh! Hi turtle. You didn't want to be left out, did you?

My mom says:

"This is not the dog that bit me today.

Mine was bigger, sneakier and had an owner who forgot to say sorry.

I have been so happy running here because there's no threat of mountain lions. Ummmmmm....well then.

So, after the bite and after the owner said his last "ca va?"

I stood on the trail alone and cried ...

for just long enough to decide that I was too far away from home

and too UNfinished with my run, to quit.

Nothing like a little Dave Matthews to relieve the throbbing pain.

Oh: my music teacher asked what I had said to the owner.

I said that I'd been way too polite because my inner-polite-little-girl took over and;

I didn't quite know how to swear well in french.

Marc said, 'That's when you use the NEANDERTHAL language.'

True. Like a caveman -- or a good dog for that matter--I need to work on my growls. 

For now, long live Neosporin

Eleanore says, "this dog is what we call The Cute Dog. 

They live in a little shop a few streets from here.

the first time I saw them is when I was shopping with my grandma and we went into this store. They started running up to me and barking and jumping up on me. It was so cute. Frances and I go so often that we feel we need to buy something at the store."

This is a dog...

What...is...this?

My mom says:

This dog looks so precious--so Truckee, really.

But let me tell you, he had the whole beach smiling, then scowling then screaming.

He'd slip into the cold Calanques water, sit there, unassuming, then

walk onto the beach, roll around in the sand, and THEN shake.

Back into the water, out, roll, shake.

Over and over and over and over and over again.

Finally, right before the tantruming one-year-old bit the daylights out of his pregnant, British Mum,

the owner of this dog tried to bring tranquility

to the beach by putting him on a leash

(not the one-year-old...the DOG, silly)."

He looks like a goat.

But at least he has a home...

This dog doesn't.

Today, we went to Refuge des Garrigues, which is kind of like a Humane Society.

Except it had a big yard full of "runs" with 150 dogs.

Some were quiet (like this one)

and some were loud as can be.

They were barking at the cats that were walking around following us.

I feel really sad for this one. I saw it when I was way far away and I ran to the cage.

This dog's face looks like our dog's face.

Eleanore says:

"The SPA wouldn't let us walk the dogs because we needed longer training,

so we walked around.  I wished I could walk the dogs, so they could be loved a little bit more. And I think it would be good for them to be around kids.  

 I wished I could take all of them home."

My mom says:

This woman does walk the dogs.

In fact, when I stopped her

to ask her how many she walks each day,

she said in french, 'As many as I can.'

She went on to say that even though these dogs are never euthanized, 

they live in small spaces and need walking

(the "dog-catcher" branch next door does euthanizes many dogs every Friday).

 She called their lives a misery. 

It seems that way, as caring as this place is. 

Run after run after run.

It seems to never end.

And then horses. And then goats.

All homeless animals. 

The light is people like her.

She was dirty, sweaty and lit up with passion.

I didn't understand everything she said,

but one word was exceptionally easy:

Conscience."

This blog was brought to you by Frances,

dog-lover, cat-lover, goat-lover, animal-lover.

She fell asleep on my lap during that last "My Mom Says"

or she would say goodnight herself.