Your black lab is your finest writing dog. That’s because that’s the dog I own.
If I owned a chihuahua or French bulldog, then that would be your finest writing dog. When it comes to dogs, objectivity goes out the window.
Writing dogs don’t write, of course. They can’t even speak. Yes they can, but are limited to one word, or bark, if you will. Translated, a bark means hey. So when you hear a dog go bark! bark! bark!, they’re saying hey! hey! hey!
Just to fill you in on canine linguistics. I’m good for something.
A writing dog is a dog who aids the writer. They do this simply by being there. They curl up at your feet, or on the couch, or on the bed. As you sit or stand at the keyboard, the dog watches. Sitting or standing you think, now what am I going to say? Good question. So you consult the dog.
No answer.
Which turns out to be the perfect answer. Writing has to come from inside. Ask your spouse, or a friend what you should write, and they’ll have all kinds of answers. I know, the family escapes in a hot air balloon! Or, the murderer chops the head off his probation officer and Fed Ex’s it to city hall! Ugh. There’s a reason I don’t write crime fiction.
But the writing dog has the right answer, and soon the gentle click click of fingers on keyboard lulls him or her into well-deserved sleep. Now her job is done. Or is it? Because simply by sleeping the dog performs an important function.
If you’re like me, there are a lot of things that need doing besides writing. Important chores and repairs, activities that add value. For most of us, writing doesn’t add value, or not very much. Not in the good old American cash-and-carry sense. I recall a scene from a book where the writer is berated by his girlfriend. My grandmother cashes bigger checks than you! she yells. This is painful to hear, and all the more painful if true.
This would not have happened if the author had a writing dog. Because the dog would be sound asleep, on the bed or at the foot of the writer. You might bother a writing writer. But you don’t bother a sleeping dog.
There are more contributions from a good writing dog. They sit up, stretch, shake, turn around and around, and continue their nap. This is a good reminder for all of us. At intervals we need to sit up, stretch, shake, turn around and around, and continue our work. Writing dogs are smart.
Eventually even the most dedicated writing dog leaves the room. They wake up and stare into space. They yawn and look out the window. Then you hear the click of nails as they wander down stairs and into the kitchen. They take a long drink, the lap-lap a soothing, somehow reassuring sound. Then the Bark! That single bark that says it all. Hey! Hey what? you think, busy with a paragraph. Well, of course they need to go outside and do their business.
Time for a break. I don’t know how she does it, but my writing dog knows when I need a break. Then a snack. She gets a Milk Bone, I get a banana. Her intense interest in Milk Bones got me thinking one day. I took a nip off the end of one. My god it was awful.
Some good writers owned writing dogs. Cheever had goldens. Hemingway owned a setter mix named Black Dog. Mary Oliver, the poet, thought so much of her bichon frisé, a sort of miniature poodle, she put him on the cover of one of her books. Poets lose all sense when it comes to dogs.
Hemingway’s dog came to a bad end. I guess all ends are bad but while Hemingway was away from Cuba, some political thugs broke into his home and, while ransacking the place, killed Black Dog.
He was heartbroken. “Now, how can I write,” he said, and I paraphrase from memory. “Without Black Dog in the room to help me?”
The answer was he couldn’t, and his own demise came not long after. Don’t tell me writing dogs aren’t important. And if political thugs come to my place, they’ll never get to my writing dog. They will have to go through me first.
Richard Donnelly lives in Minneapolis, Minnesota. Classic flyover land. Which makes us feel just a little… superior. He publishes a weekly column of essays on the writing life at richarddonnelly.substack.com