In Praise Of Older Women

December 18, 2013

     One week to Christmas, five days from Beau's last vaccination and the end of his quarantine.

     I have been wresting him from our connubial bed every morning at about 6:40 a.m. to get him downstairs while his bladder is full, that he might enjoy emptying it outside.  Pisser c'est la jouissance du chaste, Louis Jouvet, the storied French actor said once: Pissing is the pleasure of the chaste.  If that is so, dogs must be near sainthood.

     I rise, dress, forego washing and take Beau downstairs in my arms, only releasing him after our morning doorman has opened the door to the exterior world.  Minutes later Beau releases his brimming bladder.  I praise him elaborately, he recognizes how special I think what he has done is, and we return home so I can make myself a cup of tea, feed him and go out once more.

     We walk to Riverside Park and there he must restrain himself: he cannot meet another dog yet.  Monday he will receive the second round of "canine distemper" shots and be free to trawl dogdom.  Until then, he must be monk-like.  (The only exceptions are dogs I am certain have been fully inoculated.)

      Our walk is necessarily abbreviated, but with the snow roundabout, it makes for exciting climbing up and down snowdrifts.  Home again, he settles into our routine, which involves me "bribing" him with treats in the form of extra beads of "kibble" throughout the day.  I have to try to restore some sense of order to the home I unpacked two weeks ago, with my computer equipment taking up digs in a large closet.

       It takes all day to complete the task, between conversations with the Internet service provider, the printer manufacturer and the router company.  By day's end, I have managed to empty the apartment of a good bit of paper and created a makeshift office, from which I write now.  It is much nicer than writing from the living room rug, and less unsightly.

       A neighbor, the owner of a dog boarding and walking enterprise, comes over for dinner at seven, bringing with her her fully-inoculated, eleven-year old Beagle, "Sadie".   And here, I get my reward for the day's hard work: Beau is besotted with her.  He follows her around, allows her to nestle in his crate, tries to kiss her: "Yes!" he puts his mouth to her lips, which looks like a kiss to me.  My more canine-saavy friend says he's probably just trying to figure out what she had for dinner, but I like to think both may be true. --If he didn't think it was worth eating, he would not have put his mouth where he did.

        I am very pleased at Beau's unbounded interest in his first female.  Being a "grand dame", she is, naturally, protective of her amour propre, and corrects any inappropriateness of Beau's with a Beagle's sonorous bay.  She is, still , a lovely Beagle, with enormous pools for eyes and high cheekbones, and quite active.  Beau seems oblivious to the age difference.

        Sadie is unflappable, and Beau's instincts are to be gentle.  It might be the Marschalin and the Rosenkavalier.  The liaison won't last: Beau will meet other bitches starting Monday, and Sadie may not hold Beau's interest.  Tonight, however, their love is as pungent as eiswein, wine made of grapes frozen by the first frost, but still sweet.