The Story of Brown Dog</HEAD>
This page last updated February 28, 1999 using CuteFTP
The Story of Brown Dog by Erika Hahn
Eight years ago our hellion of a canine Paws, named after the Jaws movie in 1975, was in
his dottage. He was a 3-time loser with the law and had to be walked on a leash or tied
to a tree with a strong chain for all his mischievous (nee evil) ways. One day I was
home from college and there was a dog playing with our dog in the yard. He was a 9 month
old puppy, long cocoa-brown fur, feathers on his legs and tail, folded over short ears,
and a heart-shaped patch of white on his chest. We called him Brown Dog since we had
no way of knowing his real name.
Paw's time was up and we had himput to sleep after his last summer. He had been diagnosed
with internal cancers and there was nothing more to do. Brown Dog came up the next day
to play with Paws and he looked all around and could not find him. One morning my sister
was sleeping and she felt a dog clamer up on the bed. She woke up and thought it was Paws.
and she looks up and sees this Brown furry face and screams AAAAHAHAHAHAAAAAAAAAAAH! The
dog jumps down and grabs one of her socks from the floor on his way out. That was my
sister's first encounter with Brown Dog. He still has a foot fetish to this day.
My first encounter with him was made into a little historical vignette I enjoy telling
to people. It goes: Well the first day my mother said "Don't you let that dog on this
property." The second day my mother said "Don't you let that dog in the house". The
third day my mother said "Don't you let the dog on the couch". The fourth day my mother said
"Don't you feed that dog". The fifth day my mother said to the dog "What do you want for
dinner?"
Brown Dog had in effect adopted us. He has always been a smart dog. Very playful and
innocent. I called him the original communist because he had no concept of the ownership
of property. Everything was his to have on a whim but he left it behind just as easily
as he had taken it up. His owner called him Joe and one day came to see if we would
take care of him while he went to Maine since the dog got horribly car sick. The man
never returned. His sister cleaned out his apartment and tried to keep brown dog tied
to a tree all day but everytime my sister and I would go for a walk he would strain
against the tree barking frantically and we'd untie him and he'd happily follow
us at our heels without a leash. And he still does that to this day.
Brown Dog loved to go to the neighbor's house and steal socks, gloves, shoes. He would
wander in anywhere if the people had left the door open (during the summer) and case
the joint. I called him "shawnodese" for the coyote trickster animal. We could return
home to things scattered all over the front yard, including one year a plate and at
halloween an entire pumpkin carved he'd carried off from someone's front porch.
No one ever came to claim the items except once a man with ripped jeans came up to
the house furious that bd had killed one of his chickens and if he came near the
house again he threatened to kill Brown Dog. A fact I find very disturbing.
Brown Dog loved to nose into pockets of jackets and if he found a tissue he would pull
it out and put his paws on it and rip pieces of it off until their were little
pieces all over. Occasionally he stil does this to pieces of plastic trash in playful
moments while we are out walking (one of his favorite activities).
Brown Dog is a survivor. He has had more issues with his health. He had to be neutered when he developed butt tumors (all better now). Currently he is doing fine at 12 years old and on about 5000 pills a day. We highly recommend Fresh Factors supplements by Springtime Co in Cockeysville, MD. BD went on a cross country odyssey with me in 1995-96 out to Los Angeles by car up to Oregon,
back down the coast and then finally home. He really didn't enjoy that trip and developed some interesting diarrhea episodes. I leave him home now on my long trips but he loves to go ridey rides just not to California.