I’ve never considered myself a dog person. As a matter of fact, in time I came to view dogs with indifference: I could live with them, but even more easily, I could live without them. In retrospect, that attitude may seem ironic because, throughout my very early years, I was around or cared for dozens of dogs, of various breeds such as Basset Hounds, Toy Poodles, and Irish Setters. Growing up, my family had indoor dogs and outdoor dogs. Some of the dogs were pets, some were raised to be sold, and some didn’t even belong to us. I interacted with dogs in my youth more than I did with some of my siblings. One would think that I would have gained appreciation, or even love, for all those wonderful creatures.

Instead, I just got exhausted.

I remember a Toy Poodle we once owned named Fifi. She was tiny–no bigger than a two-pound sack of flour–black and cute enough. But she was also kind of daft. We lived on thirteen acres of land in Southwest Louisiana. We fondly called the place, “The Country.” The property was remote, some miles outside of the little town where we lived. Access to our property was via a dirt road. Down the road from our lot was a wood farm. Big trucks would barrel up and down the dusty road to extract tall pine trees. It never failed, whenever one of the big rigs came through, if Fifi were outside, she would try to catch it. Out to the road she would dart as fast as her little legs would carry her. There were a few times that she nearly caught up to one, but there were also a few times when she was nearly run over. We never knew what she would do if she ever did catch one, and I doubt she knew either, but that never stopped her from trying.

We also owned a Basset Hound; T-Bones was his name. He had a great demeanor, just as sweet and gentle as they come. He was brown and black with white patches. He was long and thick in stature, with short, stubby legs, a long waggy tail, and of course his ears were longer than his head. His ears literally dragged the ground. The tips of his ears were callused, and we were sure it was from all the dragging. But we were also convinced the calluses were from something else. T-Bones had a ferocious appetite; food placed before him had no chance of lasting longer than turkey at a Thanksgiving feast. He typically attacked a meal with gusto. This, however, was a problem with long ears, especially those that got in the way. Occasionally, we would lay down a bowl of food. A few seconds would pass, and we would hear a yelp. He would mistakenly bite one of his own ears and then jump back away from the bowl, shaking his head vigorously. After a few seconds of calm, he would eagerly continue eating. While those occasions weren’t supposed to be funny, at least not to him, my siblings and I often found them quite comical.

Those experiences represented the pleasant side of life with dogs. I still hold fond memories of authentically good times. If I could have stopped there, I wouldn’t have become so apathetic about the animals. However, as my early years progressed, having and raising dogs became less a source of amusement and more a constant responsibility.

At that time in my life, my natural father and mother had divorced, and my mother was in her second marriage. Our stepfather was a quail hunter and accordingly he owned multiple Irish Setters. At some point after their marriage, the family moved to the aforementioned country home. With all the space and our stepfather’s enthusiasm for Irish Setters, the idea of breeding them for sale soon took hold. He acquired a few female Setters and began the process. There was a time when two of the dogs had litters at the same time, each having more than ten pups. The care and feeding of all those animals fell entirely on us children.

Our stepfather also got it in his head to build a commercial dog boarding kennel. The concrete pad was laid, the fencing went up, the roof went on, and Oak Haven Kennels was born. In no time we were getting requests for housing and maintaining other people’s dogs. The grueling maintenance of the kennel also fell to us kids. With our Poodle, the Basset Hound, our many Irish Setters, and now other people’s dogs, there was a point in time we were tending more than forty canines at once.

All this took place prior to my finishing high school and reaching the legal age of adulthood. By the time I finally arrived at my taking off point, I can easily say I had interacted with hundreds of dogs. Some were pleasant enough, some were not. When I finally left the nest, I was, as I like to say, “Dogged Out.” I didn’t hate dogs, nor did I begrudge anyone else owning a dog, but any desire on my part to possess one, in any capacity, was long gone.

Given my overexposure to dogs in my youth, it was no surprise that canines were nowhere in the picture when I started my own family. Strictly speaking, I was not a dog person. That is not to say that my own family didn’t have pets, because we did. They were all cats, which is where the irony comes in. At that time, I could say with ease that I was even less a cat person. While dogs impacted my childhood and shaped my overall emotions relative to pets in general, cats would leave a notable impression on those feelings throughout my adult life.

This writing is about them, the Ghosts of Kittens Passed.

Continued...

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