Dogs cross my mind often. I don’t know why exactly, but of the hundreds, maybe thousands, of dogs I’ve been around, a few continually haunt me. Maybe it’s the imperfect nature of dogs, guns, and old trucks which make them so damned perfect and give you something to continually think about.
Mostly though, I think it’s simply because we don’t get enough time with them here on Earth.
So, if it’s true that all dogs go to Heaven, I’m in luck for the purposes of this article, because I’d like to think I’ll meet these dogs again. It’ll be out there on a prairie I’ve never seen before, hushed with the first snow of the season. I’ll be holding my father’s gun in my right hand, wondering just...exactly...how...I got here?
Rex and Lady. (Illustrations by Phil Juliano) Rex and Lady Walking down the first hedgerow, I’ll find Rex and Lady, my grandfather’s best dogs, locked up on a covey. Walking in, I’ll shoot a double on the rise, and each of them will bring a bird back to hand. They’ll then turn around and cut out for the next round. It’ll be just like I remembered: perfect.
Except I’ve never met those dogs. They were dead long before I was born.
I hunted over his other dogs, which were good dogs, but not his best. All my life, these two phantoms represented the dream of a better dog, the best dog, and what could be if the stars align, winter breaks, and we catch a mild spring.
A return to what once was.
Rex, Lady – It’s nice to meet you finally. Let’s check out that edge over there.
Dudley. (Illustrations by Phil Juliano) Dudley Loading up Rex and Lady in my old truck that is somehow waiting for me at the end of field, I’ll hear the bawl of an old walker dog rolling through the timber. Dudley...
When I was younger and couldn’t have dogs of my own, I walked dogs at the local shelter. It was a symbiotic relationship; I got a dog for an hour, and those dogs got a glimpse of freedom. Mostly it was your standard mutts, but one day I came in to find a pure Walker coonhound named Dudley. He had strength I didn’t think was possible from a dog. When I took him out, he had a singular focus: making game. My rotator cuff be damned.
He wasn’t a particularly warm or friendly dog, but that’s not why I was pulled to him. He was simply the rawest expression of a working dog I had ever seen, and him being in that shelter just never made sense to me. I hated the person who had been so careless as to lose him. I still wonder if I hated the person who turned him in even more.
When I finally catch up with him in the timber, I’d like to tell him it wasn’t his fault he ended up in that shelter. It’s just that sometimes there are few things as cruel as the world of man, and our misunderstanding of what’s right.
With that said, Dudley, if you drool on my seats, I swear to God, you’ll run beside the truck till we get home. Get in, bud.
Cookie playing dice. (Illustrations by Phil Juliano) Cookie Somewhere out there on a devil’s crossroad, I find Cookie, my wife’s dog, hustling a Labradoodle in a game of street dice. Cookie was born on the feral streets where nothing would’ve come easy for a dog who, full grown with a pair of brass knuckles, didn’t weigh more than 18 pounds. Nothing came easy, that is, until she met my wife. Those two were fast friends and never left each other’s side except when Cookie would feel the cold shackles of domestication and sprint out the door with me screaming behind her trying towrangle her before she got hit by a car (again).
Frankly, I hated that dog. But life has a funny way of showing you how wrong you were only when it’s too late. It’s strange to look back after some time has passed and point to the singular hardest moment of your life. That time came for us early in our marriage in such a way that I learned sometimes life isn’t lived a day at a time, sometimes you gotta live it an hour at a time.
Cookie was dying, though. Life’s not fair...but Cookie never played fair, so she took those brass knuckles and beat Death back long enough to get her person through their darkest hour. She was there for my wife, her person, when I didn’t know how to be, and for that, I will be eternally grateful.
In hindsight, I should have never expected Cookie to love me. Loving and being there for my wife was all she ever needed to do in life.
I’m sorry I didn’t understand that about you when you were with us. Now, get these other dogs in line and pick your seat.
Maud and Jessup If action hurts, inaction haunts.
Driving to the next spot on some non-descript dirt road, I’d run back into those two young black and tans I left on the side of the road that day while scouting for geese.
I don’t actually know their names because their collars didn’t have any identification tags, but I knew there was a kindness in their eyes even in hardship, confusion, and hunger that I’d never seen before. It was a heartbreaking tail wag from both of them, because they thought they were going home—not back to the home they came from, home with me. I’d never locked eyes with a dog, let alone two, and just known what was right.
However, in that moment I told myself it wasn’t a good time for whatever reason. The closest house I stopped to talk to said he’d ask around if anyone was missing some dogs, but people dump dogs around there all the time.
Driving away, I saw them trotting after in the rearview mirror. I knew what the right answer was, it was to help those dogs. I pretended I couldn’t have made it work all because I wanted to go kill some stupid geese. It’s a shame to be so focused on tomorrow, you miss your opportunity today.
What I had done ate at me all night. I woke early and drove around the next day trying to find them with no luck. I left a cup of food on the road where I last saw them, hoping it would get them a day further down the road.
I’ve always wondered what happened to them, and more importantly, what could’ve happened. I do take some comfort in knowing at least they had each other.
You may not have had names then, but you do now. Maud, Jessup, welcome to the family. Hop in, and don’t let Dudley’s drool get on you.
Georgia As we stop for lunch, Georgia, my buddy’s old chocolate Labrador, will trot up through the bluestem looking for the last bite of sandwich, which I’d freely give...this time.
She earned it. Georgia carried the water for us back when we didn’t have strings of dogs, nice shotguns or our lives figured out. We did have time and gas to burn, which fit her needs perfectly. Running sometimes four wide, she sparked the flame of working dog appreciation into many of our Minnesota crew who eventually got in the dog game because of her.
Maybe most importantly, I’d like to tell her that the bird she locked down on the side of the hill shot a hole in my long-standing belief that Labradors don’t point. I’m not sure what it was, but for all intents and purposes, technically, it was a point. I will also need to apologize for missing that bird.
No, Georgia, I don’t have any more of that sandwich, but if you’re not careful, I do have a kennel. Saddle up.
Sweet Anne I don’t know how it will happen exactly, if I’ll have to put her down or if time will just whisper in her ear, but when you read this, there’s a good chance my bird dog, Anne, will be gone.
It took my 75-year-old mother, who occasionally takes her so she can still hobble after the errant rabbit that dare give her an opportunity, to make me realize what was happening. In a rare moment of weakness and self-reflection, she admitted, “She’s getting old, Will...” My mother cast her gaze away from my own.
So out there, right at golden hour, for the last hunt of the day, I hope Anne will be there waiting for me, so we can finally catch up to all the birds that gave us the slip when we had our time.
I asked a friend once if he wanted me to get some pigeons for his dying dog. His response, “No, I’ve shot my last bird over her.” I know I’ve shot my last bird over Anne. It's strange, though. I don’t wish for more time now. We’ve had a good 12 years.
But is it wrong to say I wish for those moments of her youth in this magical place? Before the ACL surgeries and life slowed us down, back when there was the freshness of a new day and the opportunity to build something.
In my more honest moments, though, I admit that maybe it’s not her youth, but my own, that I wish for. I want to return to a time where the vulnerability and the freedom of a life yet lived was found on the far edge of a prairie at dawn.
Then I look at my daughter and remember, time—if we let it—unwraps gifts for us that we never knew we wanted or thought we’d be lucky enough to receive. And if we only lived in the past, we would have no memories at all.
So, against a sunset so beautiful it can’t be described but only dreamt, Anne will rest her head on my leg and let out one of her long, signature sighs, and I will know it’s time to go home.
A Heavenly Home I’ll pull into the driveway of our first little house with a truckload of dogs, shut the engine down and think, “It’s good to be home.”
Coming through the backdoor my wife will ask “Did you get anything?” as she watches our daughter from afar. “Hmmm...a couple...” I’ll say, realizing even in Heaven I’ll have to explain to my wife why we needed more dogs.
