Stray Love

If you live in the country, stray dogs wash up in your yard like jetsam on a beach. One day, the coast is clear, and the next, a tan hound is lying on his side in the sun under your clothesline, as if that has always been his favorite place to nap. He’s a big dog with no body fat, ribs sticking up like the spacers on a British toast rack. His short hair has worn through in places from sleeping rough, and the pads on his toes are as gray as asphalt. Of course, he has no collar.

When he hears you standing over him, he opens one eye, rolls it up toward your face, and closes it again, thumping his tail on the grass to let you know it’s safe to lie down. He doesn’t even raise his head when you do that, just opens his eye again and pours himself into both of yours. When you hold out your hand, he sniffs it, then thumps his tail again as you run it down his bony chest. He would like to stay if you’ll have him.

Since he can’t remember his name, you name him Elvis (for Costello, not Presley), standing by while your two resident dogs arrive to commence their inspection. Though they are no bigger than he is, they are clearly better fed. He surrenders at first sight, falling to the ground and exposing his pink belly to them, complete with a drop of golden urine as his proof of authenticity.

It takes Elvis a while to trust his good luck. His past is transparent, just one abrupt gesture away from becoming present again. Bring your arm down too quickly toward his head, and he folds flat to dodge the blow. Throw a stick with force, and he runs the other way, his tail curled tight between his hind legs. Food will bring him back, especially if it comes in a can. He eats with such gusto that his teeth clank against the rim of the metal bowl, but there is one thing he wants more than being fed. Speak to him sweetly, and he will stop mid-bite, letting the food fall from his mouth as he turns to place the full weight of his head in your hands.

Elvis was not the first stray to stay, and he wasn’t the last. A black flat-haired retriever showed up one summer during a Lakota Sun Dance and answered to “Dancer” for the rest of his long life. Blonde, Labrador-like Chester was less lucky. He got so used to eating roadkill while he was on his own that he never lost his taste for it, and died one night of bone splinters no one knew were stuck inside him. Sadie is the latest in the lineage—a forty-pound Mountain Cur who showed up with so many ticks in her ears that she had to be sedated to treat them. She likes to round up the horses at night and can smell a bear from half a mile away.

Sometimes a dog comes to visit, not to stay. One morning, I woke up to the sound of a thunderstorm moving away and remembered I had left my car windows open. When I went outside to mop up the mess, there was a very alert German Shepherd sitting in the front seat on the passenger side who seemed very glad to see me. When I called the number on his tag, his nearby owner said he was terrified of thunder and thanked me for giving him shelter from the storm. I said it was no problem at all.

These dogs don’t mean more to me than the Jack Russell terriers I picked from their litters and paid four figures to raise, but they do touch a different part of me. Their odds of being chosen were even lower than their odds of surviving. They’d already been lost without a chip or collar, left behind when someone moved or died, or thrown away on purpose for some unforgivable sin. I didn’t find them in a shelter. They found me instead—whether by some divine canine calculus or plain old happy accident—reminding me over and over again how important it is to have a home, a name, and someone to call it with love. That’s more important than food, sometimes. That’s more important than anything.

My thanks to Elvis, Dancer, Chester, and Sadie for teaching me that, along with Chip, Sam, Hamilton, Josie, Blossom, and Canty. I keep all of your old tags in a drawer where I can hold them in my hand from time to time, weighing the wealth of what happens when you say yes to any love that strays your way.