Random Toby Memories

I keep getting kind of sidelined by grief. I'll be okay for a couple hours and then I'll remember something, or do something without thinking, like (huge mistake, this was) drive by the vet's office, and the grief comes out of hiding and slams me again. Everyone is being so sweet and my house is full of beautiful flowers. Thanks y'all, I read your comments, they are totally kind, I can't reply because I get all verklempt (if that means teary eyed and snuffling, which I've always thought it did, but I could be wrong, there is that) and can't type. And also thanks to everyone who responded to my emailed eulogy; it was so good to hear from y'all and also to know how much that dog meant not just to me but to many many other people. And everyone who checked out Toby's memorial flickr site - hell, the Tobester is famous now, this is a good thing. So anyway I thought I would just type up a few random Tobe-meister memories and see if that helps.

Starting with the name: Toby, the Tobe-meister, Tobester, Hoagie, Toooooby, Dog of the Streets, Chiiiiild of Dog, Tobe-a-loney, and so on. Tobias Q. Dogge, the dignified. He came from a no-kill animal shelter in Phoenix, Maryland; he and his littermates had been found in a cardboard box at a supermarket parking lot. He had one ear that stood up and one that fell down - and those mismatched ears were one of the reasons he went home with us that day. I was reading Shirley Jackson at the time and she had a dog named Toby; then so did I.

As a puppy Toby had stuff; he used to take all his toys, one by one, and put them next to him on the stair landing where he slept every night. All his life Toby slept between me and the front door; he chose that. When we lived in houses with two floors he slept on the stairs. In this house he slept in the hallway, or right next to my bed. When we went camping he slept right outside the door of the tent, or right at the head, his furry self pushing in the side, or if I slept outside without a tent he slept right against my back. It is true though that the one time we were broken into, back in Baltimore, Toby slept right through it, but he was on the stairs, and maybe they would have come upstairs if he hadn't been there. If they saw him, that is. Or stumbled over him. Of course, in those days, all anyone had to do was open the front door for a fraction of a second and Toby was gone - on his way to the park and to do his rounds of the neighborhood.

Once he ate all the books on the bottom shelf of the bookcase. He was jealous of the time I spent reading, or maybe he wanted to become more literate. That was at the same age that he jumped the 10 foot stockade fence, and around the time that he disappeared for half a day and came home with a nasty cut on his nose, which would remain as a scar for the rest of his life, and a hatred of young black guys. He was a racist for a while after that, which was embarrassing and awful, but eventually he mellowed out. He hated mailmen, too, and anyone in a uniform; he hated Halloween and the Fourth of July and New Years Eve.

In the woods he coursed back and forth in front of me on the trail but always circled back by, and although in town he wasn't so good about coming when you called him, in the woods he always came immediately. Toby knew when it was important to listen and when it really didn't matter: I used to get furious and frustrated when I would call him in the park and he would show up - just out of reach - nod at me, and leave again. He could climb or jump anything; he was faster than squirrels, and he used to dispose of them, and the rats in the backyard, with one quick shake, and then toss the bodies aside. He loved the woods & the country & road trips; he'd sleep happily in the back seat but the minute we got onto a dirt road he'd wake up and bounce with excitement. He loved to swim; he liked to chase huge giant sticks in the water that my ex would throw to him: saplings, really, not sticks, and Toby would push them up current, growling fiercely all the way.

He had lots of dog friends and rarely fought. Once he took a strong dislike to a small dog in the park and attacked it; that was very bad, since the dog was attached to a small Polish woman who started cursing us both in Polish and hitting us with her umbrella. Mostly though Toby got along with all other dogs, and suffered cats, although he considered himself in charge of them, and would snap at the ones who didn't obey.

Ah. More of this another time I guess. I'm getting all verklempt again. He was a sweet, smart dog - smartest dog I ever met, smart enough to worry and get a little neurotic. And he was the dog Houdini: there was never a gate or door or fence made that Toby couldn't get out of somehow, even in his old age.