Poor Zar had dysplasia in his elbows that if left unchecked was going to have him not using his front legs and hopping around the yard like a bunny. Out on his walks he would go on a sit-down strike if his legs hurt him. (He also does that if he gets too hot, but that’s another story.) So he had surgery in both front legs—horrible that they have to cut the legs and let them grow back together. He was supposed to come home the next day—another German Shepherd had the same surgery and was released the next day—but the nurse called and asked whether they could keep Zar longer because he seemed to be in so much pain—howling night and day, the poor thing.  It was a zoo at my house already. “By all means, keep him longer,” I told her. You would not believe how crazy it gets around here when the dogs are under the weather. Zar will never swallow his pills no matter how I try to trick him—wrap pills in turkey lunch meat, tickle his throat, attempt to pry open his steel jaws to check—you have to carry him outside and he weighs 109 pounds and  I don’t get a second to write. Turns out it’s much cheaper to keep him at the pet hospital inpatient than put him in the Pet Palace, where they don’t do room service. He’s very smart and I’m sure he’s onto this and has been charming the ladies at the vet, looking at them in that very cute way that shows the whites of his eyes that always gets to me. OK, here I’m stealing material from my own novel, False Alarm. I’m reusing it—see, you can do this. Steal from yourself and save your cuts—there’s good stuff on the editing desk floor. No writing is ever wasted. The following came from my dog in the first place. The name was changed to protect his identity.

Stirling, wiped out from his decimation of their living room, lay peacefully in the corner, looking at Kate, showing the whites of his eyes in that very cute way that always got to her. He wason his dog pillow —something he turned up his nose at unless he knew he was in trouble. Part of it was her fault. The dog trainer had insisted that if they made “continual eye contact” with him, he wouldn’t be so naughty, sniffing crotches and snatching mozzarella sticks that Sandy planted on the arm of the sofa.

 Kate felt that continual eye contact with a 90-pound animal in a household with two small children was ambitious. Most mornings when Consuelo opened their front door, Stirling Moss did a nosedive for her crotch. But, now and then, without notice, Sandy would decide that Stirling needed discipline. Those times, Consuelo opened the front door to Sandy restraining

Stirling with a choke collar, shouting commands — down, boy; hurry up (in a tiny voice); goooood, Stirling — stuffing pepperoni treats into his mouth. “This is what we’re trying with Stirling today,” he’d tell Consuelo, never breaking eye contact with the dog.Kate guessed that Sandy took Stirling’s failures personally. Stirling was meek, neurotic as a show dog, afraid of the voice on the answering machine, and generally afraid — there were birds not hunted, things left undone. Sandy was certain that Stirling was only biding his time. Afterall, every evening Stirling would run out in the back yard and flush Mike the neighbor’s cat from the bushes — proof enough that an instinct was there, buried in the everyday burdens of a city dog.

Whenever I call the pet hospital and say it’s Zar’s mom, the nurse sighs, then, “Oh, Zar.” Last call it was, “He’s so handsome… and silly. The way he plays with his toys…” Have you ever had a dog that actually plays with his toys? Daisy won’t touch them. I had thought they were more for the pet owners. Twice the nurse called to keep him longer and it was a week before I got to pick him up.

So when I finally went to retrieve Zar at the pet hospital the nurse had written “Zar” on his bag of painkillers and drawn red hearts around his name.  Check out the Zar poster that John sent her—I suspect it’s hanging in the lobby or in her living room. Entering the clinic, I could hear a dog howling in the back and I knew it was mine,  but in the waiting room I tried to look as annoyed as everyone else did.  Zar hadn’t stopped his cries of evident pain while I met with the vet, who politely explained that the “male snow dogs” are very sensitive and howl the most of any dog. It was news to me that Zar is a “snow dog.” He hasn’t seen snow and I’m not sure he’d like it unless he wore booties.  A snow dog, please. Did I tell you he’s now on a duck and venison diet? I think the vet felt sorry for him that he was only getting white, hypoallergenic food. He has us all snowed.