In Praise of Cookie

When I was a very little kid, my brother had a dog named Cookie.  My brother would call Cookie, "Precious".  My mom got mad at him for using such language for a dog. My brother soon left for boarding academy and I assumed the role as Cookie's owner.  Cookie was a mutt.  She was the best of what muttness is.  She was a medium size dog, black with a white stripe down her nose. She was as smart as a dog can get. If she were any smarter she would become a human and cease being a dog. When I was about two years old I noticed that when Cookie had to go she would just squat and let it loose.  That seemed to be a better method than holding the mess in a diaper.  I copied her style but it didn't go over with my mother.

When I was older I would take her with me when I was given an errand to go to the corner store and pick up some food item.  The corner store's real name was Meese's Market but we never called it that.  Anyway, Cookie would walk with me down Palm Avenue always staying by my side.  We didn't use a leash in those days.  When I would get to the store, Cookie would sit at the entrance and wait.  She never would come in the store because I told her not to.  Often the butcher would give me a knuckle bone for her and when we would get back home, Cookie would spend hours gnawing on the bone until it was clean. The other dog we had was Candy.  Candy was a purebred cocker spaniel.  Candy liked to sleep in the road which wasn't healthy.  Candy was stupid and didn't care.  Palm Avenue didn't have sidewalks in those days and the side of our home was lined with olive trees.  Candy loved the dirt under the trees. I think she liked the mess the olives made as they rotted in the dirt.  Cookie would never allow Candy to have her knuckle bone.  Even if all the meat were cleaned off and the bone had no value, Candy was not allowed to touch it.  If she dared, she paid for it.  Cookie didn't put up with any guff. Occasionally the butcher would give me two knuckle bones and Candy would get her own. That didn't happen too often as I didn't want to appear greedy.  Knuckle bones didn't costs anything in those days.  Sometimes if I were lucky, I would have a dime to buy a pack of Hostess Twinkies.  They tasted better back then.  I can't say for sure if they were better, but the Twinkies I have eaten today don't seem to taste like what I remember.

Sometimes one of my father's patients would come to our home to get some medicine.  I remember this one patient who had a sore toe and was in need of some opiate to take the pain away.  He opened the gate and limped up to our porch.  He had a real exaggerated limp as to emphasis the dire pain he had in his toe. As he neared the porch, Cookie came out of nowhere and suddenly the sore toe was cured and the man galloped out of the yard. He had no limp at all. We all had a great laugh of how Cookie cured the toe.  Cookie loved to chase cats. That was one of her great joys.  Once she took after a cat but the cat didn't run.  The cat was a lean tom that didn't see the need to flee the oncoming dog. Cookie walked away from that encounter with a scratch down her nose.

My father always wanted a Saint Bernard so he bought one.  Cookie had a hard time playing second fiddle to the big dog and soon started wasting away.  When Cookie died, I dug a hole in the back yard and buried her with full honors. I wonder if the current owners know they have a pet cemetery on the property. When my brother got married he called his wife "Precious". My mom got upset because she remembered he called his dog that.