A Little Girl's Best Friend

My older sister said the puppy followed her home. But we all knew that wasn’t true. She probably found some rope and dragged the thing back from nearby Sugar Creek where she found her.

Mom put up signs all around the area in our hometown of Normal, Illinois, saying we had found a lost dog; she even had it in the newspaper. But no one called, to her dismay. The dog was, by default, ours.

Taffy was obviously from some kind of breeder because she was a gorgeous Cocker Spaniel puppy. She had taffy-colored hair and my sister got to name her. That was fine with me as I was pretty much pre-verbal. I think I was maybe 2 years old at the time.

My sister Julie, who was six years older than me, probably thought that Taffy was her dog. My brother Jim, who was three years older than me, probably thought Taffy was his dog. But I KNEW Taffy was my dog.

The Three J’s: the perfect stepping stones to the 1950s family. Man, we had it all. I just wish kids today had as good a childhood as we did with parents willing to sacrifice nearly everything for our happiness.

No, mom did not especially want a dog, even though her father had had hunting dogs when she was young. And that is probably why Taffy lived outside year-round, except for the very coldest winter days. We made her a snug home in the foundation underneath the addition Dad had built so my sister wouldn’t have to share a room with me. Really; they built an addition on to our house because I was annoying. How great is that? Even on the coldest days, Taffy preferred her own spot; our house was just too warm for a shaggy-haired dog.

Every spring, mom would get the dog shaved. Then the neighborhood kids, not the brightest lot in the world, would exclaim “Gee, did you get a new dog?” Duh. No. Every year some dumb one would ask.

I made my own mistakes. We had this great fenced-in yard so Taffy could roam. But the poor little black and white rat terrier across the street wasn’t so lucky. All he had was a small dog run and he NEVER got to go inside and I never saw anyone walk him. Another original name: Spot. One day, I was maybe 3 or 4, I let Spot out of his run. I unlocked the gate! Everyone had to look for the poor thing. I had decided Spot was misused and would do better out in the world. Even back then I was quick to judge and slow to apologize. To this day I think belageured Spot deserved a better home.

Taffy was our hero. She barked and barked and barked one night and we found out that burglars had tried to break in the house behind us. Not on her watch!

Taffy and I would run down the small incline of our street and I would yell “Heigh-ho Taffy, away!” I was a lot like the Lone Ranger in those days.

Taffy slowed down as I grew up. One day, maybe when I was in the sixth grade, I came home and Taffy wasn’t there to greet me with the stub of her tail wagging her whole back end. Mom and Dad said she didn’t feel well and they took her to the vet. I anxiously asked them again and again as the days passed how Taffy was doing. When was she coming home?

Finally, a few days later, they told me they had put her to sleep. I was a little drama princess and I wept and wept and stormed. How could they? How could they put my pet to sleep? And she had been dead for days? How could they not tell me? What kind of horrid, evil people did I have for parents?

Taffy’s death affected me a great deal more than the death of my maternal grandfather or paternal grandparents. Their deaths were abstract. Taffy’s was real.

We never got another dog, even though I wanted one.

I always said I got married because then I could have a dog. My “ex” and I adopted a black cocker spaniel, a “used” dog who was about 8 at the time. That dog, Charcoal, was dumber than a box of rocks but oh, how Charcoal loved me. He was arthritic, deaf, nearly blind and plagued with a series of sebaceous cysts when I had him put down. He was maybe 14. I guess I learned to be a little more hard-hearted in the intervening years. I will never forget how he slipped away, how his eyes clouded over and he went limp as the drugs coursed through his veins. It is a very tough moment and I could not have handled that with Taffy.

Still, I never got to say good-bye. And of the two dogs, I dream much more about my childhood pet. Because she was really mine, no matter what my brother and sister say.

    Jan Larsen is the proud owner of two Siamese cats and a dog who will be a hero someday, Frosty the Snow Dog. She is an outreach coordinator at Joliet Job Corps and can be reached at janettellarsen@aol.com