No Longer Pup, Molly Mellows in Dog Years

The Boston Herald

I should have taken her to the vet weeks ago. She's been dragging around for at least that long, her gait a little slower these days, her eyes a little less bright.

I notice these things, but I ignore them. I sit on the floor and scratch her ears and pat her head and say, "How's my puppy?" And she sighs and wags her tail, the way she has always done. I see that the hair under her chin is more white than black and that there are tufts of white under her belly and that even her paws have white in them now. I see how she has to push on her front legs to stand, how she limps and drags her back right leg, the leg with the pin in it, the leg that was crushed by a car when she was only 4 months old. And I see how some mornings she is so stiff and sore that she whimpers when she wakes.

But most days I still see the old Molly, which is really the young Molly, my indomitable, maniacal Labrador retriever, doing all the wild things that she has always done: racing across the floor to greet someone, her tail in overdrive, knocking things over, moaning her hellos, all noise and enthusiasm and energy and will; eating things she's not supposed to eat; begging; barking at the hose; barking at my neighbor, Mr. Merlin; trouncing through my flower garden being a pain in the neck.

"Get down," I still say as she attempts to hurl herself full force at whoever has rung the bell or simply walked into the room. I can see that she doesn't jump the way she used to. Not with the reckless abandon of a linebacker. But she tries. She still has that fire in her belly. And if her tackle isn't what it used to be, she's still playing the game.

I can see that she still needs her Prozac, too, a sure sign that there's life in the old girl. Last week she ran out of the pale blue pill that I have to coat with peanut butter and hide in her food, and I thought she doesn't need these pills anymore. She's older and wiser. She's learned that an ingested sock or towel means another operation.

But two days off the drug, I caught her in the garage with a golf ball in her mouth. Her eyes were bright, none of that tired old dog look in them now. "Drop it," I yelled, as I dropped what I was doing and set after her. She clenched her mouth, tucked her tail between her legs and skulked behind the lawnmower, playing the if-I-can't-see-you, then-you-can't-see-me game.

Old? Molly isn't old. Why if she were a person, she'd be coloring her hair and no one would even notice her age.

Except . . . when the refrigerator door squeaks open, she doesn't come running anymore. When the microwave buzzes, she isn't sitting right there. When paper crinkles, she doesn't come charging from another room, drooling in anticipation of cookies or chips.

She has trouble climbing stairs. You have to shake her awake and cajole her into going outside before bedtime. And in the morning, I've been finding her asleep in her bed on the floor, not on the couch, where she has always climbed up and slept.

She still sits under the cutting board waiting for something to fall. She still begs at the table. And she still comes running if I even whisper the word "walk."

She is beside me now, asleep and snoring. I kneel down beside her, stroke her fur, kiss her head, and say, "I'm taking you to the vet, today for a checkup."

She doesn't move. She just opens her eyes at looks at me. Then she closes her eyes and sighs.