Joe McAdory: Spend more time with your pet

He pranced from one side of the yard to the other, balancing a large two-by-four in his mouth. Prince firmly gripped the wood with his teeth and held his head high. It was obvious, that block of wood was pretty darn important to him and he wanted the world to know it.

For nearly an hour, my young white Labrador maintained his routine. Back-and-forth. Hope he didn’t get splinters in his gums.

Prince was the only boyhood dog I had for any measurable length of time. I got him as a puppy at the Halifax Humane Society, just west of Daytona Beach, and kept him until I went off to college. I look back at that era and remember all of the goofy things that animal did and perhaps some things I should have done.

The best ways I can define Prince are playful and hyperactive. He was like a child with ADHD, tongue hanging out, wanting to run, play, jump on you, whatever. He just wanted a friend, and he
demanded attention.

I can’t forget the night I went to bed, believing my puppy would be dead in the morning. Just a few weeks old, Prince contracted Parvo, a disease that frequents puppies. The local vet pretty much read him his last rites. Saturday night, we laid him in a box in the garage with a bowl of water and Puppy Chow. His fever was high. His chances were grim.

The next morning, Easter no less, I strolled into the garage to check on our patient. The box was empty. Prince was dead, so I thought. Beneath a work desk, there he sat, wagging his tail with a pair of gym socks in his mouth.

Prince had a knack for destroying things, mostly with his teeth. But what that animal did to a full-sized camper parked in our backyard defied logic. I never considered campers as tasty. Aluminum siding offers no appeal to me, nor do tires, paneling or fiberglass insulation. Evidently, these parts are doggie delicacies and must contain a full day’s supply of canine vitamins and minerals.

Prince ate the camper. Slowly. Surely. One day, one piece, one bite at a time. I’d come home from school and find Prince laying under a shade tree, gnawing away at a piece of aluminum. Maybe he was sharpening his fangs. Whatever it was, he repeated the process until that camper was fit for the county landfill.

He was a smart dog, but I never understood why he refused to go into the doghouse my dad built. We put food and water in that little wooden structure, but he wouldn’t go in. It was the only thing he ever feared.

I remember the night Prince decided to stick his head in a bait bucket. I’m not sure what time curiosity led him into the bucket, but once that head plopped in, it wasn’t about to plop out. Morning came and I went into the backyard to refill his water. There he stood. Buckethead, imprisoned in plastic.

As I grew older, I didn’t spend as much time with Prince as he deserved. He was confined in his final years behind a metal fence, making friends with a few squirrels, ducks and anything else he could fit into his jaws.

When I return home, I look into the old backyard and visualize the trails he cut in the grass and remember the two-by-four and unused doghouse.
Prince died in the spring of 1991 and is buried behind the tool shed — not far from that camper he digested.

Joe McAdory is editorial page editor for the Opelika-Auburn News. He can be reached at 737-2549 or jmcadory@oanow.com