Murphy is surprisingly adaptable and smart.

When I get myself out of bed, I make my way into the kitchen and turn the coffee maker on. It’s actually a Brew Station rather than a coffee maker. Nothing is what it used to be anymore. From the kitchen to the bathroom, I pass my computer and turn that on, as well. In the bathroom, I relieve myself, and brush my teeth. Sometimes I floss, but hardly ever first thing in the morning. I floss three or four times a week usually before I go to bed. I’m a shoddy flosser. I often skip my back teeth. By the time I’m done my bathroom business, there’s enough coffee made to let it out of the Brew Station.

With my coffee, I sit on the couch. Murphy will make her way out, usually from her opened kennel to sit beside me. I like that moment of the day best of all. Murphy, morning light, silence, and a fresh cup of coffee. About half way through my coffee I will make my way to my computer and light a fag and check my email.

When I’ve finished with my coffee, my cigarette, and my email – which usually all finishes nicely together I will get up from my desk. The moment I stand up Murph will wag her tail in anticipation. I pull on some jeans. I find a shirt. I get a grocery bag or two. I squeeze all the air out of the bags and loop them through the back and middle belt loop of my pants or shorts. In a travel mug, I prepare a second coffee. I go to the front hall and grab the leash. We walk down the stairs. I hate the elevators in my building. On the last flight of stairs, just before we get to the door outside, Murphy stops. I walk down a step or two. And put her leash on.

Outside, I usually let her off her leash. Of course we’re not supposed to. But Murph is so gentle and she loves to run. She gallops even. There are a few haughty neighbors – haughty perhaps only because they obey the rules – who keep their dogs on leashes. If any of these people are already in the backyard, I will leave Murph on the leash. Mercifully, this hardly ever happens. I will sit down on the stone benches, untop my coffee, and sit and drink it as Murphy runs around destroying sticks, looking for tennis balls, and, if she’s lucky, waiting to torment an unlucky squirrel.

There used to be a lot more tennis balls than there seem to be now. And when she found one, we would play fetch. Well, no, that’s not entirely right. She would bring me the ball and let me take it or drop it by my feet and I would throw it. And she would retrieve of course. But when she brings it back, she won’t let go. It’s tug of war where she expects me to wrench it out of her capable teeth. This is much less fun for me than it is for her. As with Barney, she loves tug of war, but with a ball it’s much harder, and a little dangerous. At the end of this time, my coffee finished, her business removed and properly disposed of (actually, most people will advise that you should collect your dog’s leavings and flush them down a toilet, but who, I ask, does this? That’s just way too much work, and, besides, gross. And walking around carrying little packages of dog droppings is just so not sexy), well, nearly properly disposed of, if Murph has a ball she will come to me and drop the ball by a specific tree. I stick the ball up in this specific tree, wedged between the trunk and a sturdy branch. This worked out well for months. But Murph, at the start of every backyard walk, would run to that tree and stand up against its trunk. Clearly, she gave away our secret too many times to too many dog owners, and after a month or two, balls I left in the tree would never stay there. Sometimes, still, the first thing she will do is run to the tree and leap up looking for a ball.

Murph collects tennis balls. She has about 50 balls I keep on the balcony. I don’t usually let her keep them. Occasionally she will bring a ball to the door when we are headed back in and she will look at me for approval. Almost always, she will understand my face, and without any complaint, she will drop the ball immediately by the door. Sometimes, if the ball is new or clean, I will let her keep it. And she will understand my face then too and run into the apartment building hiding the ball in her mouth and keeping her head down as if I didn’t notice she still has it. When we get up to our floor, she bolts to the apartment door as if she were afraid someone was going to remove the ball from her before she gets it home.

Murphy adapts herself to my time. It’s adorable and apparently doesn’t do her any harm. I get myself into cycles of staying up way too late and getting up too late, too. She follows my body clock with ease. On the rare occasion that I have neglected her too long, usually when I am working at the computer she will come up beside me. My desk chair has arm supports and, if I’ve really been delinquent she will side up beside me and stick her head through the arm support to plant it firmly and unmistakably on my lap. There is no mistaking what this means. Hello, it’s time. Did you forget about me? And even if I am really busy or trying to concentrate, it’s impossible to get mad or irritated and it always works. And what’s beautiful about it, she never abuses it.

Murphy is my first dog. I’m quite sure that dog-lovers fawning over the cute things their dogs do is about as interesting to onlookers and eavesdroppers as the cute things other people’s children do, and about as interesting as the details of other people’s dreams which is to say, not much at all. I don’t care.

SS