The Loyalty of Dogs

I am an ardent dog lover, even though I sadly do not have one at the moment. I grew up with dogs as brothers and sisters, even though I had human siblings too. I vividly remember their names – Savage, Soft, Dissident, Winds, and after the first Winds died, we had yet another Winds, who I loved dearly.

In the run-up to the commemoration of the 9/11 attacks, there were numerous documentaries, which I avidly followed. Of the many moving accounts I listened to, I was particularly drawn to the one about Salty, a Labrador Retriever.  He was a guide dog that guided his visually challenged owner, Omar Rivera, who worked on the 71^st floor of Tower 1 of the World Trade Center to safety. Also playing hero at the time of the attacks was Roselle, another Labrador Retriever who also led her owner, Michael Hingson, to safety. Read here for detailed accounts of the dogs’ heroic antics.

There are countless stories of dogs doing awesome things that will just bedazzle you. Because I love canines so much, their stories always catch my attention. I recently read about the tear-jerking story of a pregnant dog in Chile breastfeeding a starving 2-year-old, and another dog rescuing a newborn baby that had been dumped in a bin. In light of all the wonderful things that dogs do, I don’t understand it when people describe things that have  deteriorated as having “gone to the dogs”. Going to the dogs should actually be a good thing as there is a lot to be emulated from these four-legged friends. People also describe misery as “a dog’s life”, and a messy situation is described as looking like “a dog’s breakfast”. In my mother-tongue, among the worst insults you can ever get from anyone is to be called “Imbwa yemunhu!”

Let me get back to my own dog story. On the days I came back home from university after a long time, Winds would run for me and fall short of tripping me with joy. He would then gently take my wrist between his jaws and walk with me to the house. This he did to avoid any of my parents’ lodgers shaking my hand in greeting. If anybody dared, woe betides! When I was heavily pregnant and had to go home to visit my hospitalized mother, I was sure winds would not remember me, but lo and behold he was still madly excited to see me. Winds was the epitome of home. If any of my sisters went home, we would all ask after Winds’ health. He was a crucial part of the family. At around the age of three or four, my son, Victor, was a cry baby. If I sneezed, sometimes he would start crying in annoyance and if we asked what he was crying for, he would say, “Ndiri kuchemera madzihwa.” Loosely translated it means I’m crying for your mucous, but he actually meant he was annoyed or upset about my sneezing. One day he sneezed and I started imitating his wailing. Winds was sitting next to me, and immediately started howling with me in the same manner. It was the most mind-blowing moment of my relationship with the dog.  My mother was sitting with us and was equally tickled by Winds’ behaviour. Funny as it was, it just showed me Winds’ empathetic side, something I have failed to get from some human beings I’ve met in the walk of life.

Winds’ compassion didn’t end there. About two years after the crying incident, my mother took ill and could not get out of her room for some days. Winds was very perceptive and knew this was unheard of. Mum was always hustling and bustling around the yard and never went down with anything. Dogs in our household were not allowed to come and sit in the house, but Winds too his chances. He would make his way to mum’s room and just sit on the floor, watching her. No one chased him away because they could all feel his pain. Another time when exceptions had to be made was during the festive season when fire crackers would go off during the night. He would get into the house, tail between his legs like a new son-in-law and curl into a miserable ball at our feet.  Winds would be so petrified it was sad to watch. Sometimes, however, we would find him sleeping on beds with his head on the pillow, like the pigs in George Orwell’s Animal Farm even though there were no firecrackers.

My son was a handful sometimes, and to get him to co-operate, I had to threaten him with a stick. Winds did not stand for that. As soon as he saw me with the stick, he would come for me guns blazing! He would bark angrily until I dropped the stick. One day I defied him and he bit me on the left foot. He was also very intolerant of people treading on his tail.  All hell would break loose. Unfortunately he liked sitting in the dark passageway where trampling his tail was inevitable.   

Winds was trained to go to the back of the house if he needed to relieve himself. Like any naughty child, however, sometimes he would just drop it at the front of the house where his little heap would be the first to greet visitors. My brother, upon seeing it, would ask, “Winds, chii icho?” (Winds, what is that?) Winds would melt away to the back of the house with the Greg Focker of Meet the Parents hangdog look after he was caught out on bringing home a fake Mr Jinx.

Everyone in my family has their own sweet Winds story. When my father called to let me know that Winds had died, I wept quietly. He was a part of our family and showed us that it’s quite possible to love another species more than members of your own. I prepared a good meal in his memory, and asked my husband and son to bow their head as we observed a moment of silence in respect of our dearly departed shaggy friend and almost brother.

This was a long and winding version of my supreme respect for dogs, which look out for the interest of humans, and my consummate revulsion of fellow human beings who torment both animals and those of their own ilk. I feel sick to the pit of my stomach when I see pictures of trophy hunters and hear news of senseless killings around the world. This past weekend Paris was attacked and at least 130 people were killed. Not too long ago, Garissa University in Nairobi was attacked and at least 147 students killed. It has become a daily occurrence. People get murdered, raped, and abused in all manner and former by fellow human beings. What happened to being your brother’s keeper? May God intervene.      

Furry Feral Frenemy

Not the culprit in the article. Pic by Susan

One day as I was coming down the stairs into the lounge, a black cat leaped from the room and dashed outside. It startled me out of my skin. I love animals a lot, but certainly not cats. I don’t like the creepy way they just sit there and watch you like they know your deepest, darkest secrets.I’m more of a dog person. When I was young, we used to have a cat called Pussy (back then minds were cleaner and that was the most popular name for cats). I used to share a bedroom with my sisters, and if one of them went out and left the door ajar, I would wake up to the purring of the cat as it rubbed itself on my head. Regardless of the years we spent with Pussy, I never really got used to it.

As days went by, I realised the black cat I saw in the house had become a permanent resident in our garden. It would just spend the whole day sitting there. We tried to shoo it away and it would snarl at us.That’s when I realised we had a feral cat in our midst. I called Randburg SPCA to come and get it because I was afraid it would hurt us one day as there was very little chance of it being vaccinated, and since it didn’t come into the house, it would die from exposure to the elements. The SPCA demanded an outrageous amount of money for the cat trap, which they would repossess after capturing the cat. I questioned why I had to pay to save a cat’s life. I actually assumed they would go out of their way to get the cat off my hands since they are in the business of taking care of unwanted animals. The person I spoke to actually arrogantly said they would be doing me a favour if they came to get that cat because I was the one who needed help getting rid of a problem. I was quite shocked to noted these animal welfare organisations aren’t really what they tout themselves to be.  I wasn’t prepared to part with any money, so I let the matter rest. But the cat was still there, and when my son tried to play with it or when I got too close to it, it just continued to snarl.

I couldn’t let it starve, so I started feeding it our leftovers. My son decided to call it Trixie from a puppet show on TV. Trixie and I would play a cat and mouse game when it came to feeding it. I would peep to see if he/she was anywhere near the place I placed the food first before venturing out. I was terrified of that cat. I am terrified of all cats. If Trixie wasn’t there, I’d quickly dash out, drop the bowl of food, and dash back into the house. We would always find the dish empty without ever seeing Trixie eat. I eventually discovered that Trixie used to watch me as I delivered food. No sooner had I closed the door than she would emerge from the overgrowth in the garden with the stealthiness of a cat and quickly devour the food. I felt a bit stupid knowing the cat had always been watching as I darted in and out of the house with its food.

With time, Trixie started coming to sit by the French door when hungry. We would immediately sort his food out. We never got close enough to the cat to see if it was male or female, but I will refer to Trixie as male. Just as we approached the door with the food, Trixie would sprint to a safe distance and would only run to the food bowl after the door was closed. One day as I was hanging the clothes on the washing line, Trixie came and sat next to my bucket, very close to me. I was heavily pregnant and afraid at first, wondering how I’d make my getaway if Trixie lost his cool. I considered leaving the hanging for later, but I realised Trixie meant no harm. He was just offering an olive branch in a cat kind of way.

Sometimes we would buy takeaways, like pizza, and there would be no leftovers for Trixie. I started buying cat food from the supermarket. Who would have thought! And when we went out to eat, we would never throw away our leftovers. We always asked for a doggy bag. Trixie was now like a child that I was responsible for. At first my husband wasn’t very receptive to the idea of feeding the cat, let alone buy food for it. He would always say, “Let that cat go and hunt for rats”.

I was pleasantly surprised one day when I came home late from work to find he had already fed the cat. During the course of my pregnancy, he continued feeding it.  I also found it hilarious that when my father visited, he also announced he had fed Trixie in my absence, even as he insisted there was nothing domestic about the cat. “I saw it in its eyes,” he said.

One day Trixie didn’t emerge from the bushes to eat. I only noticed it the next day. I put fresher food in the bowl. Still Trixie didn’t come to eat. I was really worried and knew something had happened. My husband said maybe the cat was eating somewhere else. I was afraid Trixie had been hit by a car or mauled by dogs. Them Trixie crawled home and sat behind a tree in the garden. His coat was dull and the eyes were sunken and gooey. That broke my heart. The cat was sick as a dog :(. I put some water and more food for it, and it didn’t even move. It just seemed to have come home to die. I kept monitoring it, and it just stayed in the same place.

Against my better judgment, I called SPCA again to let them know the cat was sick. They said I should take it to the vet. I had no way of taking it to the vet, because even though we had become friends, catching that cat was out of the question. It was still wild. So the SPCA said if they came to get it and got it treated by their own vet, then I would never get it back. They would give it up for adoption. They said that cat was my responsibility if I had spent more than a month feeding it; I was now its owner. With a lump in my throat I asked them to come and get it so it could be treated. I could not believe myself when I felt tears streaming down my face when I was telling my helper that we were losing the cat.

Trixie sick as a dog. I had to zoom in a lot as I was afraid to get too close

Two men came from SPCA, armed to the teeth with combat boots and a cat trap. Trixie was still lying in the same place, almost half dead, or so I thought. Upon seeing those men, he sprung and dashed out of the yard like a bat out of hell. “I thought you said the cat wasn’t moving?” said one of the men. I explained that he really hadn’t moved for days. The men waited for his return for about an hour but eventually gave up and left. We didn’t see Trixie for about three days after that. I resigned myself to the thought that he had gone somewhere else to die, and it made me sad that he would be all alone, far from family.

One morning as I drew the curtains, there he was sitting by the French door waiting for his food like he had never left. He looked fresh as a daisy. What elation I felt!! So we resumed our routine.

Shortly after that, we had to move to Swaziland. Apart from fear of the unknown and getting a good school for Victor, my biggest worry was Trixie. Taking a feral cat with us on such a long road trip would never work, not to mention the paperwork that would be required even if it had been a domesticated one. I had sleepless nights wondering what would happen to the cat, who would feed it. My heart bled thinking of Trixie coming to stand by the French door to wait for food, only to find hostile new residents who would chase him away. Then he would probably come a few more times expecting to see us, only to discover we would never be back. Then he would eventually slink away to die of hunger somewhere.

Fortunately, the people who took over the house, a young couple with two daughters, were cat lovers. I explained the cat situation to them and they said they would gladly feed it. I hear the father is always the first one to check if the cat has been fed :). The mother told me she suspected Trixie was pregnant at some point, but later noted that she or he had just gained weight. I sleep easy knowing Trixie is just fine. I still do not like cats.