A Dog's Life: Never Forgotten

A Dog’s Life: Never Forgotten

By Gail Isaacson

My husbandand I have no children. Our shiny black Lab named Samba was our baby, our sweet song. Samba wagged to her own music, her tail conducting a symphony of wiggles and panting—even at the simple act of us bending down to stroke her finely shaped head.

Samba was born with perfect manners and barked only as a last resort. Her attitude seemed to say, “You make the rules, I follow.”

She was only 11 years old when Dr. Rubin found the mass on her belly. Within a month came seizures and frantic trips to the emergency animal hospital. Last Thanksgiving I watched her stumble around our kitchen, her beautiful dark eyes asking, “What’s happening to me? Can’t you do something?” The next day, we took her to see Dr. Rubin for the very last time.

She left us alone in our creaky old house. We saw her in every shadow, chased her ‘round every corner. A dog’s life is like a movie, edited down to its highlights. Each stage overacted, heedless of the time limit: look-at-me youth, know-it-all adolescence, talk-it-over maturity, aged-dignity dozing.

The winter was long and lonesome, passing without a wag. But then Maggie May came with the spring and reversed our clock. She is Samba’s great niece, a yellow Lab puppy, and a ring toss back to childhood–the baby face, the goofy smile, tartar-less teeth, perfectly pink tongue, eyes wide with the wonder of it all. Last autumn, we bought a home in Michigan, hoping Samba would make it through the summer. Instead, Maggie May is the country dog, chasing after birds, hopping with rabbits, watching trees grow, dancing with prairie grass in the breeze. In Michigan, lake and sky want to know us better. They introduce us to harvest sunsets and waves crashing on the beach. Maggie laps up life like Lake Michigan’s water.

Samba is in Michigan too. We sprinkled her ashes on the grounds of our house and hung her picture in the kitchen. The photo is from our 2001 holiday card, taken in my mother-inlaw’s backyard. Samba holds her favorite blue Frisbee in her mouth. A sign taped to it reads “Peace on earth.”

I try not to hold Maggie up to Samba’s ideal. Maggie is more impetuous; a drama queen—more like me. Some days I feel Samba watching Maggie and listening to her shrill little barks. “Be patient, child,” Samba says. “The world is yours to discover— don’t be in such a hurry. Life flies like a Frisbee in the wind. Tomorrow morning’s haze is a scrim curtain. It will lift to reveal an audience of creatures waiting for you, the star of the play.”