A loving tribute to my best friend
CHIEF
I adopted Chief on November 17, 1996 from the New Rochelle Humane Society, which had held him since March 23. He was picked up while roaming. Apparently he was adopted once during this period, but was returned to the humane society after he ate his foster parent’s wallet. I never knew how old he was. The humane society people thought he was three. I guessed that he was two for selfish reasons, hoping to have him longer. He was probably born in 1993 or 1994, making him eleven or twelve this year. Whatever age, he always appreciated being saved and let me know it. On the day I adopted him, I was going to run with Chui and Zogo, the family’s other two dogs, in Franklin D. Roosevelt State Park in northern Westchester County, New York. I stopped by a dog adoption fair, and Chief selected me. I was smitten from the first. He went with us on the run, and was a perfect runner from the first day until the last.
One of the first nights at home, I awoke in the middle of the night. Chief had his two paws on the bed and was looking down upon me as if he were assessing my suitability as a companion. In those first days, he had a habit, when we roughhoused, of nipping at my stomach. It quite tickled, and in all the years of our play, he never hurt me. He liked to crouch when you approached, ears up and alert for the hunt and charge. Although he was a magnificent animal, there was something about his look that was always slightly goofy—as if he knew it was all a game. I always congratulated him after a successful charge.
His canine companion was Zogo, another German Shepherd. She was born in 1990, and was not entirely happy when Chief came on the scene. He wanted to play, and she was mature enough by that time to prefer peace and quiet. I always thought she should put him in his place just once and be done with his antics for good, but she was such a lady she never did.
In Beloit, the three of us enjoyed walking around town and along the Rock River—and sometimes the dogs would get in the river, against regulations, just as they did in the lake at FDR Park. There was another park in Beloit that we ran to from my house. Sometimes, if I wanted to exercise the dogs but did not have time to run, I would take them to the park in the Cadillac, put them out, and then drive around with them chasing the car. Two beautiful shepherds at the height of their power, running in the breeze, was a sight to behold.
When I was making the move from Wisconsin to New Mexico, I had the dogs in the Jeep and, having just arrived in Santa Fe, I arranged to meet some friends at Maria’s, a prominent Mexican food restaurant. It is in an old adobe structure, a warren of rooms. I was dining with my friends in a secluded inner section, when in comes Chief—he had jumped out the window that I had left partly open, found his way into the crowded restaurant and located me, hostess trailing right behind him.
In Santa Fe, we would walk around the plaza, the dogs cutting quite a swath. People, adults and children alike, would stop me and ask to pet them. They were always well behaved and accepted the attention from strangers as if their due. We also ran along rural the trails near Santa Fe. They participated in my training when I prepared for my walk along the Jornada del Muerto of the El Camino Real. I took Chief to work and he met my colleagues at the Museum of New Mexico. Martha came into our lives in Santa Fe and she came to love Zogo and Chief as much as I did. She was always very tender in her care of both of them.
When we would visit my mother’s home in Alamogordo, Chief loved to run in the front door and search until he found her. She got the greatest enjoyment from Chief’s habit of placing one paw on a leg until the owner petted him, then replacing it with the other paw and so on.
Chief loved to ride in the Jeep. He preferred to ride with his two forepaws on the console between the front seats, head lowered under the rear view mirror, looking at the future coming his way. He and Zogo rode across the country with me, from New York to Chicago in the Cadillac, and from Chicago to Santa Fe in the Jeep. Chief had a wide vocabulary, and knew the word cows, for example, when we spotted them on trips.
He loved to rub his sides on walls, beds or other available objects. I think this was a habit from his internment. He also leaned against you at every opportunity—did it make him feel secure, or was it a way of keeping track of you without looking? He always wanted to walk ahead of you, but then would stop in his tracks, also stopping you, to determine which way to go. When we would run in a park near our home in Mesa, Chief would try to anticipate which way I would angle. Running ahead of me, he would turn the way I was going, but then I would switch directions behind him and he would respond. He would often playfully growl as part of these antics. And so we went. We put hundreds of miles on those paws together, and in the end his legs just wore out.
Sometimes when I got up in the morning he would hop on the bed and roll around in my place, making himself quite at home. He also liked to sleep in the shower, preferring it perhaps for its cave-like qualities and cool porcelain—although we usually had to warn guests they might encounter him there in the middle of the night. In Arizona, he decided he liked to swim in the pool. He would get in the shallow end, survey the scene, and then step off into the deeper water, swim in a little circle or two, and then get out, refreshed and pleased with himself.
Last summer, Chief, with Martha as his handler, began volunteering as a therapy dog at one of the large local medical centers. He brought comfort and joy to patients young and old and to the hospital staff. He knew where the treats were at every nurse’s station, and the nurses showered him with goodies. He always knew how to get another one out of them. In March, he attended a photo shoot to put his picture on the hospital calendar featuring therapy dogs.
Chief made
friends wherever he went, and many still ask about him. He displayed a
wonderfully calm and peaceful disposition—I never saw him growl seriously in
anger, nor was he ever in a fight. He loved to help Martha clean, cook and
create graphic arts, never away from her side. Recently, he liked to lie on the
couch between us, as if he were getting away with something, looking quite
contented. Chief had the most beautiful expressive face, wonderful soft coat, a
distinctive grey and black, and always had a pleasing scent about him. In his
prime he weighed a little over 90 pounds. He lost a lot of weight in his last
days, but to the end he was a magnificent dog. He was my best friend, and I love
him very much. I believe that adopting Chief was the best decision that I have
ever made.
Chief lost
his battle with a chronic disease, probably cancer, that he fought for about
three months. After a valiant fight, he was not able to beat age and infirmity,
in spite of his and our best efforts. He passed away at home on July 6, 2005 as
we held him and told him we loved him. He was a wonderful animal, a champion of
dogs.
Last weekend I wrote the New Rochelle Humane Society to thank them
for bringing Chief into my life and giving him the opportunity to make me a
better person, which he did.
Tom Wilson
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