crackle

because we're living in a place where there are folks living right down under our floor, we've been trying to rethink our whole approach to dog toys. dogs need toys. well, domesticated ones do. regular wild dogs don't so much because they're out in the world earning a living and all. but tame dogs get slow witted and fat if they lie around all day. their coats get dull and they begin to smell like dust, like the inside of a vacuum cleaner. unfortunately, any toy strong enough to survive five minutes with a dachshund is also heavy enough to sound like the end of the world if it hits a floor or wall. still, we went to the dog store and rooted around among all the beautiful squeaking and mooing and howling toys, pawed through bouncy rubber toys dense enough to go right through a wall if thrown even a little bit hard. and there was nothing. nothing that wouldn't bring our neighbors screaming to our door howling about noise. nothing for guthrie.

then, on our way out, we walked past a basket on the floor and saw a stuffed toy that looked a lot like a rolled up newspaper. when i picked it up, it crackled. guthrie's whole brain nearly exploded. he sat back low on his tail and his ears crawled right up to the top of his head. years ago he had a crackle skunk, a stuffed toy with the very same crackliness inside it, a soft sound like someone rustling through leaves or in a pile of newspaper. a sound that somehow short circuits all a dog's natural instincts except the one to carry the crackly thing around. and so we took it home.

guthrie and i walk every day after school for half an hour or so. he carries his crackle paper in his mouth the whole walk and this seriously limits his interest in barking or snarling at other dogs. and although i know that guthrie walking down the street is cute cute cute, i have learned that guthrie walking down the street carrying his crackle paper is so overwhelming some people simply squeal or point or, in the case of small children, fling themselves on guthrie. and i don't mean just dog lovers. i mean somewhere near 95% of all people we walk past. i have seen cyclists and skateboarders nearly run into poles because they turn and watch him as they walk past. people on cellphones try to explain him to someone somewhere else. teenage girls in clumps squeal and point and clutch at each other because the sight of guthrie renders them unable to stand up on their own. mothers strolling along with children point him out and encourage lengthy discussions with their toddlers on how much responsibility guthrie has taken on, how he does his chores and is still adorable. old guys with golf hats and canes speak directly to guthrie, ask him loud, gravelly questions about the paper, what the news of they day is. small children lose absolute control of their limbs and blow like mad tumbleweeds straight toward guthrie, absolutely unable to do anything but beg to pet his speckled fur. but the oddest by far are the teenage boys who roam the sidewalk outside the park in the afterschool sunlight. like the girls they travel in clusters, usually three or four, all dressed similarly, all trying very much to look whatever sort of nonchalant and fierce they can manage. and they look at guthrie from a distance, narrow their eyes suspiciously, set their mouths straight all at the same time. then one of them will drawl low, "man, check out that dog!" and the others, who were already looking anyway, will pretend to notice for the first time and all those slack faces twist up into little boy smiles.

and i have been telling the sweetie this for weeks, telling him how guthrie with the crackle paper seems to transform people so it feels like we're walking in a little bubble of happy. each time he'd mutter something about knowing, about walking guthrie in the morning, about how people stop and say he's cute. "you have no idea," i kept saying. he was thinking snowflake and i was thinking blizzard. but today, our first sunday in the neighborhood, we took ourselves a little family walk. we took a right out our front door and guthrie, crackle paper clutched firmly in fierce jaws, led the way. for nearly four miles of sunny, warm, late fall sunday afternoon the sweetie and i wandered through old neighborhoods and waded through adoring coos and squeals.

and while we were looking at all the prettiness and oldness and ramshackleness of the dreamiest borough in all new york, everyone else in the dreamiest borough was looking at our small dog trotting along. and as we walked in the middle of all the swooning the sweetie looked over at me. i nodded. see. but what amazed him most, i think, wasn't how vocal total strangers were about the preciousness of a little dog carrying a fake newspaper. it was the inability of surly new yorkers to maintain their new yorkerly facade. guthrie plowed through people and left them changed, a rippling wake of fools grinning without even thinking about it, without even meaning to.