During the period covered by my book (1958-1962), we owned a black shaggy dog named Tigo. I left Tigo out of A LOVELY GIRL not because I loved him less than our other pets, but because with Cinderella the cat’s unexpected demise in the back yard “under mysterious circumstances” in chapter one, and our parakeets Chirpy and Tweety, both suffering violent deaths in chapters eight and twenty-six, it all seemed a little much. Tigo’s scenes had to go. But Tigo, a very good boy, is still fondly remembered here in one of my father’s columns from sixty-two years ago.
An item on the editorial page of this newspaper last week stated that there are 28 million pet dogs in this country, and I don’t see how their owners are keeping all of them alive.
Our house is a place tinged with sadness because our dog, Tiger, or as he came to be called, Tigo, has been struck and killed by a car on the busy 101 highway.
Tigo came to us from Bud Point’s animal academy at El Rio, a mongrel replacement for a thoroughbred Bedlington terrier, Bonnie, who perished under the wheels of a pickup truck right in front of the house, just as he was setting out to chase a cat.
I suppose that there are those who will say that we ought to have kept these dogs penned up in the backyard, or on a leash at all times, but I cannot agree. Our street is a free and easy place for both children and dogs, and in spite of what has happened, I think that is still the best way.
A splendid example of what I mean is Rocky, a large, red setter who belongs to the Glenn Grosnickle’s down the street.
Rocky’s attitude put me in mind of the slogan of a taxi company I used to know about, which was: “We meet all planes and trains.”
No activity on the street is too small to escape Rocky’s friendly, tail-wagging notice, by day or by night.
He sees the children off to school in the morning, and has welcomed us home from a vacation trip at 3 a.m. When there is nothing to oversee, he sleeps under Myron Smith’s tree, but he is ever ready to spring into action should his talents be needed.
Our Tigo was a black, shaggy dog of medium size with amber eyes and a tail which was on crooked. We picked him out of the pound lineup, I believe, because he wriggled more appealingly. He seemed part French poodle, part Scotty, and from his stubbornness, part mule. But he loved his family dearly.
Once, when on a vacation trip, we left him at a boarding kennel. On returning, he didn’t know us immediately; he had turned off his mind against the horrors of imprisonment.
The Bedlington had been highly nervous, as thoroughbreds are supposed to be. But after we got Tiger, it was different. He was calm. It was me who was nervous.
Although I do not have any first-hand knowledge of the circumstances of how he met his death, I believe I can reconstruct what happened.
For some time, I know, dogs in our community have been wriggling under the highway barricade and crossing the busy 101 highway to explore the fields along the Santa Clara River, and perhaps chase a rabbit or two near the Ventura Municipal Golf Course.
I believe the little dog perished when he was returning from such a nocturnal adventure.
Most nights, Tigo slept in the house, but occasionally he would turn up missing at bedtime, and no amount of calling at the front door could summon him. These were the nights, I suppose, when he went abroad on the journeys that I have just described.
However, around the house, these absences were set down to “dog duty.”
This was a fancy woven by our oldest daughter, Debby. According to her version, one community dog patrolled the street each night. Tigo’s night was Thursday.
When he turned up missing on other nights, her explanation was that he was a young dog who didn’t know one night from another, and the older dogs had conned him into thinking this was a Thursday.
With the dog absent, we had to fall back on the family cat, Old Yowler, as the first line of defense against the unknowns of the night. He sleeps in the house, too.
How Yowler would react to dire emergency was the subject of a family wrangle. Debby claimed he would faint, while her younger sister, Betsey, predicted he would live up to the highest tradition of feline heroism if only he were given a chance to show his stuff.
Maybe we will know now.
And as for Tigo, I can only hope his last romp was a happy one.
