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Authors: Merethe Lindstrom
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puppies. But he did not want to have a dog. It was the girls who pestered us toget Max. Simon repeatedly said he did not want a dog, they ought to have known that.
They went on and on about wanting a puppy. Every birthday, Christmas. Every time they spotted a dog they liked. He became furious, irritated by all the nagging, it was not until long after they were grown up, the girls came home and had bought it and gave it to us as a present. For company, they said. It was a poor show. Simon did not want Max. He said it was a living creature, that they should have asked him. They had wanted to please us, the girls said and were disappointed. It became my task to persuade him.
I tried to talk to him about it.
It’s only a dog. You can’t blame the dog.
I’ve given my opinion on it, Simon said.
But it’s hard for them to understand, I said, since you like dogs so much.
He did not relent, and I appreciated he had his reasons, the girls would have to look after the dog, they shared that duty for a while. In the end it landed at our house all the same. I went for walks on my own with it in the beginning. He disliked all the responsibility, he said. But after a period of time I noticed him talking to the dog, scratching behind its ears.
I knew that Simon had used to walk a neighbor’s dog for a spell as a child. He told me he took it with him on short strolls to earn a few coins. The dog of his childhood had adored Simon. It used to sit outside the door of Simon’shome and bark until he appeared, the owner told him it simply ran out into the hallway and sat in front of his door, it never showed such loyalty to anyone else. Everybody on that stairway heard the dog barking and whimpering outside the boy’s door. Simon at first did not like the smell of the dog on his hands, the excrement he had to whisk off the sidewalk with a stick. But after a few months of this work as a dog walker—this is how he recounted it to me—he nevertheless looked forward to going on walks with it, he felt more secure, it was far from being a small dog. And later he always connected this dog with his sense of freedom before the hiding place. The walks, the games on the grass. He was certain the dog in some way or other had protected him from danger, such as the neighborhood bullies, the Brown-shirts who turned up, that it led him safely from the street to the nearby playground. Its name was Kaiser. Whether it had been a tribute or a joke he did not know. But he remembered his own voice calling out: Fetch, Kaiser, come, Kaiser .
The dog we acquired had a quiet disposition, but nothing about it reminded him of that first dog; Max slept on his blanket, ate an incredible amount, defecated in the garden. Simon gradually became more enthusiastic about it, he went on the walks Max needed, patted the dog on the back while he himself was sitting in his chair reading in the evening. But it became evident only after the dog passed away, how attached he, we, had become to it. Simon told our grandchildren stories about a dog he had gone for walks with as a child, but I think these stories were set in a different place, achildhood location that did not resemble the city where he had grown up. In these new childhood depictions everything revolved around this tiresome mongrel he at first disliked, and that sank its teeth into the chain when he tried to lead it around, but later became his best friend. Kaiser. There was no war approaching, no problems.
Our dog, Max, lay beside the chair, stretched out on the blanket, begged in the kitchen, dug holes in the neighbor’s garden, disappeared to a place several miles away where a bitch was in heat. When Marija arrived, she complained that it molted, although I never noticed any hairs. The grandchildren called it Horridandstupid, sit, Horridandstupid, fetch, Horridandstupid, who is Horridandstupid . Horridandstupid, it answered delightedly to the name and probably forgot its own.
It grew old, its legs and paws
They went on and on about wanting a puppy. Every birthday, Christmas. Every time they spotted a dog they liked. He became furious, irritated by all the nagging, it was not until long after they were grown up, the girls came home and had bought it and gave it to us as a present. For company, they said. It was a poor show. Simon did not want Max. He said it was a living creature, that they should have asked him. They had wanted to please us, the girls said and were disappointed. It became my task to persuade him.
I tried to talk to him about it.
It’s only a dog. You can’t blame the dog.
I’ve given my opinion on it, Simon said.
But it’s hard for them to understand, I said, since you like dogs so much.
He did not relent, and I appreciated he had his reasons, the girls would have to look after the dog, they shared that duty for a while. In the end it landed at our house all the same. I went for walks on my own with it in the beginning. He disliked all the responsibility, he said. But after a period of time I noticed him talking to the dog, scratching behind its ears.
I knew that Simon had used to walk a neighbor’s dog for a spell as a child. He told me he took it with him on short strolls to earn a few coins. The dog of his childhood had adored Simon. It used to sit outside the door of Simon’shome and bark until he appeared, the owner told him it simply ran out into the hallway and sat in front of his door, it never showed such loyalty to anyone else. Everybody on that stairway heard the dog barking and whimpering outside the boy’s door. Simon at first did not like the smell of the dog on his hands, the excrement he had to whisk off the sidewalk with a stick. But after a few months of this work as a dog walker—this is how he recounted it to me—he nevertheless looked forward to going on walks with it, he felt more secure, it was far from being a small dog. And later he always connected this dog with his sense of freedom before the hiding place. The walks, the games on the grass. He was certain the dog in some way or other had protected him from danger, such as the neighborhood bullies, the Brown-shirts who turned up, that it led him safely from the street to the nearby playground. Its name was Kaiser. Whether it had been a tribute or a joke he did not know. But he remembered his own voice calling out: Fetch, Kaiser, come, Kaiser .
The dog we acquired had a quiet disposition, but nothing about it reminded him of that first dog; Max slept on his blanket, ate an incredible amount, defecated in the garden. Simon gradually became more enthusiastic about it, he went on the walks Max needed, patted the dog on the back while he himself was sitting in his chair reading in the evening. But it became evident only after the dog passed away, how attached he, we, had become to it. Simon told our grandchildren stories about a dog he had gone for walks with as a child, but I think these stories were set in a different place, achildhood location that did not resemble the city where he had grown up. In these new childhood depictions everything revolved around this tiresome mongrel he at first disliked, and that sank its teeth into the chain when he tried to lead it around, but later became his best friend. Kaiser. There was no war approaching, no problems.
Our dog, Max, lay beside the chair, stretched out on the blanket, begged in the kitchen, dug holes in the neighbor’s garden, disappeared to a place several miles away where a bitch was in heat. When Marija arrived, she complained that it molted, although I never noticed any hairs. The grandchildren called it Horridandstupid, sit, Horridandstupid, fetch, Horridandstupid, who is Horridandstupid . Horridandstupid, it answered delightedly to the name and probably forgot its own.
It grew old, its legs and paws
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