Dog

Plenty of people have done writings, drawings, and art of various kinds about the animals in their lives – dogs specifically. I haven’t paid much attention in my adult years to these things since I’ve been mostly with cats. However, now I am with dog. Big. Black. Flat-coat retriever dog. He is named Dempsey. He likes food.

He will eat anything – including lettuce and sticks. One time he ate about a dozen maple bacon biscuits in less than an hour. Another time he climbed up onto the dinner table to get at a higher spot in order to eat four sticks of butter (those came back up). Food must be kept at a safe distance.

After I had been living with this dog for a month or so, I became aware of the musings on dog companionship when a friend forwarded the link to The Oatmeal’s amazing and hilarious “My dog: the paradox.” Here are the first two panels:

I highly recommend you read the entire cartoon, particularly if you have dog experience – it rings true and elicits chuckles.

I also heard recently on one of my new favorite podcasts – Bad or Not Bad – that George W. Bush has become an artist and one of his favorite subjects is his dog. On the podcast, I think the verdict was “bad” on this topic because, well, it’s George W. Bush…but here’s what W’s dog looks like painted by W:

Though I have a canine around regularly as a subject, I have no artistic endeavors outside of knitting. And I’m not knitting a big doggie sweater (how embarrassing for Dempsey that would be) and I’m not knitting his likeness onto any article of yarn (mostly because that would be weird). What I have done is take photos of the sweet and needy beast. I have even arranged them in frames:

I have Instagrammed photos of the tennis ball-loving creature:

We have used Dempsey as a model for my ski helmet:

But mostly, I just enjoy having such a loveable though stinky-breathed being in my life – and I mean Dempsey.