07 February 2011

In Memorium: Jacob Elijah Stone (1999 – 2011), a Very Good Dog

"Well, at least we don't need to smuggle him into Hawaii now," I said. Or tried to say, as my voice cracked and a lump wedged itself in my throat.

See, I want to live in Hawaii. As an island, Hawaii does not suffer the scourge of rabies, and they believe their strict import regulations — requiring all incoming dogs be quarantined for a month — help protect them from the virus. A perfectly reasonable precaution, I'm sure. However Jake would never survived a month in isolation. And he'd been consistently inoculated against rabies, and thus wouldn't pose any threat. He simply couldn't be held to such draconian standards, so I'd hatched a plan: Ku and I would sail to the Big Island with Jake, then smuggle him ashore at night. With an aloha bandanna and a hibiscus blossom behind his ear, I'd pass him off as a native dog. Easy.

The first step in the plan was getting Ku certified as a sailor. I argued he couldn't leave the Navy without being able to sail a boat; to shut me up he began sailing lessons, which ended with a freak storm capsizing his rental craft in the Potomac River.

Also I'd need to buy a boat, something at least 40' and able to transverse the voyage from Santa Cruz to Hilo. Next I'd have to get Jake used to being on it, not an easy task given the innate hatred of water he'd inherited from his Basenji ancestors. (Not a dislike, a hatred. He'd never even had a bath, as my first and only attempt had left me literally scarred across the abdomen.)

So there were still challenges ahead, and other than taking sailing lessons Ku was less than helpful. He offered up useless trivia and pointless commentary: "It takes at least 20 days to sail from California to Hawaii, 40' sailboats go for 60 grand, and you get claustrophobic in Economy Class, let alone the hold of a sloop. Plus somebody's going to notice when a brand-new Basenji appears in Hilo. There's no way this can work."

But all my fanciful plans and far-flung dreams came crashing down in early October 2010. Jake had been putting on weight for a while, but in September, when he was getting his nails trimmed for a trip to Mendocino, the vet techs had noticed his abdomen had become pendulous in a way that suggested a number of possible chronic conditions. On that trip his bloating and lethargy were noticeable, as well as his nausea and vomiting. (Something he had in common with Ku, who got stomach flu on that trip. Good times.)

After the Mendocino trip I took him back to the vet for a battery of tests, including an ultrasound. The blood work was maddeningly inconclusive, but the ultrasound showed him to be filled with fluid, and the specter of dark spots on several internal organs — most likely cancer. The vet attempted a procedure to obtain and culture a bit from one of the masses, but there was too much fluid. The attempt left Jake weaker than ever and with a bruise covering a quarter of his body.

Ku's good friend Alice was visiting the second weekend of October, when Jake was scheduled to see a veterinary internist. So all three of us went with him to the specialist. Still bruised, he wasn't doing well, but the internist was upbeat and positive as she said she'd get a handle on the situation. She and her skilled radiology tech would get a sample to culture, and figure out how to drain the fluid. We'd should have a treatment plan soon, she said.

Her outlook was markedly different when she returned. The ultrasound revealed metastatic tumorous masses on his liver, kidneys, spleen, and encircling the vena cava, the major vein that empties into the heart. She said the prolonged bruising from the earlier procedure suggested his liver was already failing so he wouldn't well tolerate another surgery to drain the fluid, and the bloating was pressing on his lungs, making breathing difficult, and his stomach, so he couldn't eat more than a small amount. She prescribed diuretics, though she said they probably wouldn't help him expel the abdominal fluids, which she believed were blood by-products left over from the tumor scavenging nutrients directly from the vena cava.

In short, she said he was at the end stage of cancer and should be euthanized now.

Back home, Jake dozed on the couch as I wept inconsolably about all the things we'd never do. How he'd never be the farm dog on a coffee plantation in Hilo, how he'd never again visit my folks in Iowa, how he'd never again stroll through his beloved Lighthouse Field, marking every other tree. Ku tried gamely to comfort me, and Alice stoically pulled together a meal so we could think about something other than Jake.

I figured I'd wait a few days — until Ku and Alice left — to make any final decisions. In the meantime, I filled the prescriptions on the off chance they'd make a difference.

Though he was born 25 August 1999, Jake came into my life in early 2000. I'd decided to get a dog and had been enamored with Basenjis — a medium-sized African hunting hound, noted for howling and yodeling instead of barking. In addition to contacting local breeders, my brother Todd (who was living with me in Santa Cruz at the time) and I would stop by the local SPCA to see what kinds of dogs were available. My bungalow is too small for a large breed and I didn't want a toy dog, so I wasn't too enthusiastic about all the pit bull and chihuahua mixes that seem to overrun Santa Cruz County.

But one day we happened upon a cage labelled "M, Basenji mix" with nary a dog in sight. While all the other cages had irresistible puppy piles or older dogs at the gate with their best hey-come-spring-me prances, this pup was hidden in the crate, warily eyeing the people passing by. With some coaxing a small black puppy, with white feet and a chest blaze, crept cautiously out, and after a few minutes was playfully grabbing at the hat I'd pushed through the chain-link.

Apparently his first family had named him Pepper, which wouldn't do at all. I rechristened him Jake while filling out the SPCA paperwork; later he was given the full name Jacob Elijah Stone, as everyone needs a middle name so they know when they're in trouble.

Todd and I brought him home and showed him the bungalow and the back yard. He seemed pleased, though he was probably just glad to be out of the shelter cage. We played with him for a bit then I headed out to buy some dog food. Todd and Jake were playing in the living room when I opened the front door and Jake immediately made a break for it. I put out my foot to impede his path; he deftly leapt over it, bounded across the front yard, and was down the sidewalk in seconds flat. We ran after him, which he took to be an exciting new game. Jake ran down to the end of the block, turned left, and headed for downtown. We chased him to Cedar Street where he thankfully turned left again instead of crossing the busy street. We caught up to him in the parking lot of the dry cleaners, scooping him up before the car pulling out had a chance to run him down. He licked my face, as if to say we should play the chasing game some more.

Over time, Jake came to understand he had a home. And that everything in the home was his. Each bed and couch was fair game for napping, every part of the back yard was suitable for marking, and all items that came out of the refrigerator, off the stove, or out of the oven were to be inspected, preferably by sampling. Anyone entering the house with any sort of goods were sniffed in a way that would make the TSA proud.

In exchange for his dominion, Jake guarded the house diligently…unless, of course, he was napping. Naturally knocks at the door or peals of the doorbell were cause for barking and hullabaloo, but ultimately those were people and people were my responsibility.

Jake's full fury was reserved for the truly life-threatening menaces: squirrels, rats, opossums, and raccoons. Clearly these plague-bearing, food-stealing, couch-inhabiting monsters needed to be repelled virulently with the full range of Basenji howls and growls, especially at 03:00. The tree-shrouded fence on the North side of the house was a handy elevated transit line for these creatures on their way to and from downtown dumpster diving. Often Jake would spy them through the living room window, usually when I was on the couch next to the window, watching TV. He'd leap into my lap then up onto the couch arm to bellow at the creature, his head just inches from my right ear and back legs planted firmly in my crotch. Once the offending vermin moved out of view, Jake would leap off the couch, and — paws scrabbling for purchase on the wood floor — fishtail around the couch, dash through the kitchen and dining room, dive through the dog door, sail off the back porch, and bound halfway up the fence.

He was a brave dog. Truth be told, he was 25 pounds of totally-convinced-of-his-superiority…until he was in over his head and yelping for rescue. But 'til that tide turned, Jake was as brave and bold as any dog could be. He treed dozens of raccoons, frightened scores of opossums into motionlessness atop the fence (which always, eventually, fooled him), and chased off hundreds of squirrels. He even had a couple of standoffs in the back yard, which ended with him being carried back into the house with a let-me-at-'em attitude that would make Scrappy Doo proud.

Because of the regularity of these late-night adventures, I'd become habituated to waking when I heard the dog door flap, in much the same way mothers can sleep through a marching band but hear their baby whimpering. One night I heard the odd sound of the door tentatively flap, flap, flapping, which was unusual as Jake normally went out for a while before coming back in. Concerned, I sat up and noticed Jake was still in bed with me. The door flapped again and Jake and I exchanged a look. You could almost see the wheels turning in his mind: "Wait...if I'm here and you're here..." Before I could grab him he was out of the bed and running toward the door with an ominous growl. By the time I reached the back yard with flashlight in hand, there was no sign of the trespasser. But little paw prints on the porch suggested a raccoon kit was unwisely investigating the dog door. The barbarians were repelled because they didn't know how to work the gate.

As he got older, his fervor faded a bit, but his vigilance never dimmed. Back in September, while I was in Philadelphia, Jake was being watched by his favorite sitter, Heather. They were both asleep in the early hours of the morning, when some drunk came onto the porch, looking to duck the remainder of a fight that had left him bruised and bleeding. At the sound of an uninvited interloper, Jake went on full alert, hackles raised, barking and howling as Heather called the police. All the commotion, along with her asserting the authorities were on the way, convinced the stranger to depart quickly. Despite being riddled with as-yet-undiagnosed cancer, Jake guarded his house once again.

And bravely, stoically, Jake faced his cancer, too. I started him on the two prescribed diuretics and a low-dose of painkiller. And against all expectation, he rallied! Within two weeks of the specialist's dire prognosis Jake had lost six pounds of excess fluids, and with the bloating gone he could eat again, and breathe easier. He became more active and we resumed long walks along the river and out to Lighthouse Field. October turned into November, which gave way to December. I tried to fill our time together with walks and couch naps and afternoons on the porch.

But this was indeed borrowed time; the diuretics kept him from bloating back up but weren't impeding the cancer. He started refusing food, pushing me to find more enticing meal options for him. Thus it was that I — vegan for the last 6½ years and vegetarian for 11 years prior to that — discovered there is a whole section at Trader Joe's with prepared meats. I'd never paid attention to that wall before, and Jake was delighted to sample prosciutto.

Jake remained stable enough for me to dash back to Iowa for Christmas and then a family trip to Orlando the first week of January, though Heather noted he was starting to eschew any food with pills in it. As January went on, he became more suspicious of his food. Every ball of brie or nugget of liverwurst was examined for pills, and when he found them he stalked off in disgust. Without the painkiller he was slowing down, and without the diuretics the swelling returned, though not as bad as before. And he was rapidly losing muscle tone, a result of tumor growth.

On February 2nd I noticed he was starting to jaundice, a sign of liver failure, and was clearly in pain. By the 3rd even the whites of his eyes were yellow and he was shaking most of the time. He hadn't eaten in days, his fur reflecting his spine, his ribs, and his hips in drastic detail.

So here's the deal: he's totally there for me, every day, every time. He's totally devoted to me, without question. I am his provider, his master, his world.

And in exchange, I take care of him. I have to do right by him. I have to help him navigate a world he doesn't really understand, keep him safe from dangers he can't quite comprehend, make the calls that are above his pay grade. He shouldn't hunger on my watch, nor thirst. And he damned sure shouldn't suffer. Which means the time comes when I need to make a call that will spare him further pain. I have to work the morbid calculus that balances the plucky fighter with swollen abdomen against the organ failure and seizures that are on the way. And when the thought of euthanizing my faithful companion makes my tearful breaths as ragged and shallow as his, I need to steel myself; he lived his life for me, now I need to repay the debt.

So on Friday, 4 February 2011, at 16:30, the vet came to our house. Jake hadn't moved from the couch the entire day, until he saw that white coat come through the door. He went out back, patrolled the yard one last time, then came back in and put the cares of this world behind him.

I don't know if there's any more to Jake's journey, if there's a special realm where he chases gazelles all day then waits on the porch for me to join him. But I do know I'll keep his memories alive within me until the end of my days. And I ask anyone who knew him to remember him from time to time as well.