A Dog, a Wheelchair, and a Story of Dedication and Redemption

A black lab named Lex not only came to John Clark’s rescue physically, but also helped him triumph creatively.

“On either side of the driveway out there we’ve got shag bark hickory trees. If you’re a baseball player, or you know baseball players, hickory is a hard wood and that’s what they make baseball bats out of. Well, those nuts are very hard. There was a nut lodged between two of the flagstones in the walkway and I didn’t see it,” says Clark, a Scarsdale resident who was diagnosed with progressive spinal muscular atrophy, type 3 and is in a wheelchair. 

“So I ran over it and it should have split. It should have smashed and there should have been no more to say about it. But it didn’t and it sent me into an uncontrolled spin where I wound up wedged against the stucco wall, hanging out of the wheelchair. With three right wheels off the ground. I’m hanging there over the precipice of this driveway and [Lex] went into action without being told.”

The dog moved from the right to left side of the chair, pushing it until it was straight, according to Clark.

“So, I figured extra kibble and extra kudos would not be enough. I had to do something to acknowledge what Lexie had done,” he says. “I hadn’t written any poetry in a long, long time. But now it was the time to do so.”

Clark began working on a series of sonnets that would eventually become The Joy of Lex: Life With a Service Dog, a 125-page book that includes 56 poems and photos. 

He was inspired to write about other topics as well, including growing up in the Bronx and even NASA, according to Clark. 

“All this as a result of what he had done for me. I was writing positive things and it felt good,” he says.

Clark was diagnosed with progressive spinal muscular atrophy in the mid-70s, although he had been experiencing symptoms for years.

“[It’s] a diminution of the nerve messages to the muscles. And what happens is, since the messages don’t get through to the muscles, the muscles shut down and stop working,” he says, describing the disease.

It eventually became tough for the Bronx native to continue teaching 6^th grade, his career for two decades.

But retiring from teaching didn’t mean he left academics behind. Soon, Clark, who has an undergraduate degree from Fordham and a masters degree from City College, enrolled in a home-based program at Queens College, where he eventually earned a masters in creative writing and English.

After taking an Irish poetry course, he was encouraged to continue taking classes in the genre. 

“I found that I couldn’t write about sunsets and dewdrops and bluebells. They tell you to write what you know, so I started writing about being disabled,” he says.

His poetry of choice? The sonnet.

“It’s a challenge to get in there, do my thing, and get out in 14 lines. That’s one of the reasons why I love it so much,” he says.

In 1998, Clark, who types using a mouth stick, had the first of his poems published in The Recorder, of the American-Irish Historical Society. A few years later, more were published.

And then he says, “I really didn’t do much for a long time until I met Lexie.”

Clark’s brother-in-law was the first to suggest he apply for a service dog. While Clark was receptive to the idea, he says, “…I didn’t think I’d get accepted because I didn’t know—as I said, I thought there were folks who needed the dog more than I did.”

Clark did apply, through a program called Canine Companions for Independence, a California-based non-profit.

Six years ago, Clark was accepted into the training program and was eventually paired with Lex, his first choice pup.

For his family, including his wife Ginny and two children, Christine and John, Lex has had a positive effect on Clark.

“I think he’s much happier. And not only is he a service dog, he’s a good companion. Because if I’m out during the day or when I go to work in the morning, then he has someone,” says Ginny.

“Our daughter Chris once said, ‘Dad this dog has got the magic stuff because I’ve never seen you smile so much.’ That’s in the book somewhere,” says Clark.

The book, The Joy of Lex, which was published by Clark’s Black Lab Books, includes an introduction by best-selling author Dean Koontz, who is an “honorary” board member at CCI and had a dog named Trixie. 

“Trixie is rather literary and wrote a book called Life is Good,” says Clark. “So my literary-minded lab here wrote to Trixie and sent a couple poems and asked Trixie where we might get these published. And so a conversation ensued with Dean and Dean said he’d be glad to write the introduction to the book.”

Clark says that while the book is chronological, it also “ just shows you what this dog can do. The work that he does. The work that he does picking up my mouth stick if I drop it, turning on lights, that sort of thing. It also shows that he’s got a sense of humor. It shows his marvelous personality.”

The Joy of Lex isn’t the only book Clark has written. He penned a 500-page book called The Chronicles of Saint Patrick: The Captivity—which he spent over two years researching—and another 150 sonnets called Othering. And now, he is currently working on a sequel to the book about St. Patrick.

And what does Clark hope people know about his relationship with Lex?

“Well, I hope at one level they can understand that dogs and animals are a lot smarter than we think they are. This dog knows 70 commands, has a vocabulary of probably 125 words or more, on the one level,” he says. “On another level, I would hope that individuals who are disabled would contact CCI or other organizations like that to see if they qualify to have a dog like this because they’re certainly going…these dogs are going to enrich their lives.”

"The Joy of Lex" is available on the Black Lab Books website,  Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Borders and Atlas Books.  Signed, inscribed copies are available by emailng John Clark at j.t.clark@verizon.net.