On Pugs

My mother's parents once had a chihuahua named Kissy, a fat little thing that joined the family just a year or so before my papaw passed away from lung cancer.   Kissy was my Papaw's constant companion before his illness, riding with him in the car and climbing onto his shoulder as he watched tv at night. Kissy used to steal Papaw's cigars from the cracks of his red corduroy chair, so she often smelled like tobacco.  And my grandmother, a genteel southern lady, used to take Kissy on walks so that the dog could "stinky," a euphemism that simultaneously delighted and annoyed me. Although I had never thought of my grandmother as a dog person, Kissy brought much joy to my Mimi, particularly in the year or so immediately following my papaw's death. Having enjoyed a traditional, 1950s marriage, I suppose Mimi was used to taking care of her husband, and Kissy helped fill the spot in her heart, however incompletely, that cancer had left there.

The summer I turned 17 - the same summer that I moved back in with my dad full time - Kissy died unexpectedly from some now-forgotten illness.  Mimi was, of course, devastated that her little charge had died so young, and only two years after her husband had passed away.  I don't know that we ever talked outright about finding a replacement for Kissy, but one day my dad came home with a tiny puppy in the pouch of his hoodie.  It was a pugdog, the first of its kind that I had ever seen up close.  And it was the cutest, snortiest thing I had ever seen.  Upon first seeing the precious little beast being pulled out of dad's hoodie, my whole body began to tingle. THIS DOG WILL BE MINE, I thought.  Despite my desperate pleading, however, my dad said, "No, the pug's for Mimi!"  And we drove the puppy to my grandmother's house, my heart heavy as a stone.

When we got there, Mimi was not altogether happy to see the pug.  "She'll get under my feet," Mimi said, looking worried as the snotty little creature explored the kitchen.  "She'll get under her feet," I said to my dad, shrugging my shoulders. 

We left the pug at her house, anyway. 

That night, I held on to the hope that Mimi would reject the dog, but she called the next day to tell us that she had named the puppy "Panda," a sign of attachment that left me feeling totally defeated. After about a week, I gradually came to terms with the fact that the little dog would not be mine, so imagine my astonishment one day when dad brought the pug back to us!  Mimi had decided she was getting older and couldn't take care of another puppy, so the pug was ours!!  I was waxing sentimental about this glorious moment with dad just a few months ago, telling him how glad I was that he had decided I could have Peng, as she would come to be known.   Dad laughed in this grudging way that he has and said, "I actually tried to take her back to the breeder, but the lady wouldn't take her!"  

Though dad reluctantly brought Peng into our lives, he was one of her greatest admirers.  He praised her smooshed fawn features, calling her "classically beautiful," and gave her a piece of processed cheese each time he walked in the door after work.   Dad loved Peng without judgment, giving her food and affection even after she systematically destroyed all of his possessions (she once dug a hole in our living room couch, for example).  Weirdly, Peng developed an attachment to a stuffed basketball we had around the house and would clamp her jaws onto it, sucking heavily, during times of crisis.  Dad, Craig, and I regularly speculated on the nature of Peng's obession, coming up with pseudo-gothic tales that are too nonsensical to reveal.  Peng was scared of just about any unfamiliar object (you could hold up the tv remote control and wave it at her menacingly, and she would plead for her life with a pathetic tail wag).  Dad used to take pleasure in chasing her with the electric drill (without a bit), which made her insane.  

A few years later, after our own sweet chihuahua Prancie had died, dad decided to bring another pug into the fold, a little black beast dog named Win Lee (Winnie to her friends).  I went with dad to acquire this pug, and Winnie, to steal a word from my Mimi, "stinkied" in the backseat of dad's volvo as we drove her home.  Winnie wore an adorable little Christmas bandana that day, and I think she was still wearing it when we plopped her in the grass of the backyard, giving peng the opportunity to make her first inspection.  Winnie was acquired immediately before my dad went on his first date with my stepmom (on New Year's Eve ten years ago), so Peng and Winnie's first meeting was one of the first images of my family that Lisa ever saw.

I couldn't find the picture of their first meeting, but here are the pugs, Winnie and Peng!

Dad had always been a lover of smoosh-faced animals: he had a bulldog named George when he was a kid, as well as a pug (or series of pugs) that I can't name.  But having two pugs only made dad an even more zealous pug fan, and pugs became an important feature of our family. We talked about pugs with some frequency, pondering their neuroticism, and we noted pug sightings everywhere (for example, the stone creatures outside of china inn have a striking resemblance to pugs). Dad eventually took our obsession online and started discovering interesting pug photos and videos, emailing them to me for my enjoyment.  Back when I was working at the hospital, he sent me a pug coat of arms, onto which he had photoshopped my (former) last name:

Dad also started buying pug memorabilia for me off Ebay.  In fact, for my last birthday, he sent me a pug salt shaker set in which one pug, dressed as a green chile, is kissing another pug, dressed as a red chile, on the cheek.

Dad loved pugs generally, but he truly adored HIS pugs.  He would often pronounce,  "Largest of the toy dogs!" when he addressed the pugs, and he took them on short walks to get the newspaper every saturday and sunday.  And, of course, he continued to feed them each a slice of cheese each day after work.  In their earlier days, dad also encouraged Peng and Winnie to play fight, a curious battle that looks like two snoutless bears gobbling at each other.  Although they are lovable, pugs are slightly dimwitted, and dad also enjoyed tormenting them. He used to walk after the pugs, saying, "Slowly I turn.... step by step... inch by inch!"  He said this v.e.r.y. s.l.o.w.l.y and then lunged as the final word was spoken, causing the pugs to scatter. I do this now with my dog, Dodie, who is part pug.  And Marshall knows the phrase by heart.

When dad came home for the hospital, less than a week before he died, I was relieved for a number of reasons, one of them being that he would get to see the pugs again.  I know that this was not the reason dad wanted to return home, but the pugs brought so much joy to his life, I wanted them to be there with him until the end.  Now that he is gone, I think of them often.  Of course, Lisa and Craig are caring for them lovingly, just as they always have.  But I can't help wonder if the pugs miss him, his loving back rubs and his slices of cheese.  Probably, because they are dogs, they don't really understand the sudden change in their lives, or what exactly it is they are missing.  I guess that's the privilege of being a human: to remember the good times we've had and the people with whom we've shared them.