The Dog
by Sally Payson Hays

My son and I watched the golden retriever as I ordered my latte and stood waiting by the espresso bar. The dog had escaped; you could tell by the jaunty flag of his tail, by the way he peed on the fire hydrant as if to say: "Bliss! Abandon!" Still watching, I held onto my son's hand and awkwardly grasped the paper cup and our bag of muffins so that I could push the handle of the stroller out through the cafe door. The dog was headed our way, and reaching us, he shimmied joyfully around the stroller, sniffing first the baby and then shooting out his tongue at my oldest child so that he giggled and pulled his hand from mine. Grabbing the red collar nestled in the dog's tawny fur, I stopped him short as a chicken bone would catch in his throat. This dog was not cautious: minutes earlier I had seen him veer into mild afternoon traffic, sniff and reject the street car tracks as curious but not worth marking, and avoiding horns' minor, blaring, annoyances.

Now here I was: a dog collar in one hand and a stroller and a cup of coffee and muffins balanced in the other, my four year old son demanding, "Aren't we going to eat our muffins? Is this our dog now?"

Commanding my boy to take hold of the stroller and not move, I read the dog's tag: Church Street, a few blocks away. Dialing the phone number on my cell phone, I left a message. The owner of the coffee shop gave me a length of twine so we could tie the dog to a parking meter while we ate. Sitting at our feet on the sidewalk, every once and awhile the dog looked at us as if to acknowledge temporary ownership. He was subdued, but did not appear desolate, nor eager to be on his way. And even when his owner, a little breathless, hurried up to scold the dog and ruffle his ears, the dog remained enthusiastically joyful. Tripping the man briefly in a happy circle, the dog sniffed and trotted off, tail a banner behind him.

Despite the owner's thanks and a surety that it was for his own good, it depressed me to see that dog back in captivity. Still seated in the sun at the cafe, my oldest son spilled some sugar in a swathe across the table. Immediately, the baby splayed his hands into it as if into a white sandbox. Grabbing his hands and sweeping away the sugar, I wondered at the ease with which I had recognized (and so immediately curtailed) freedom. Is this, I wondered, what it means to be a parent?

When I was young, I was brash and obnoxious, gold hair waving a challenge to anyone and everyone. I wasn't calm or happy in captivity, but bold in a defensive sort of way, as if to prove my right to grow up, to escape forward. What a surprise it was to learn later how few people were actually paying attention, and if so (like the passersby only half-noticing the dog) with only a mild sense of disapproval.

Straining to fit my strong baby's squirming feet into the stroller straps so I could bind him fast, I pondered the memory of abandon. There is no way now to escape so freely, not since my life has been so completely redefined.

That dog would invariably make his leap to freedom again (as often before according to his owner), enthusiasm undimmed by each subsequent recapture. That is, until the day his fence becomes too high to scale, his joints more content to rest on the rug by the bay window, tail a tap tap at the sound of his owner's returning feet.

We are not like this dog, content at almost every stage. My job now is to restrain self and others, weighted by the burden of social education. My role is as a witness to my sons' leap into the world, as they pee off the sides of dark roads after parties, bounding into the twin threats of joy and destruction.

Just as that dog can never imagine his hearth until the time comes to curl beside it, my sons have no recognition yet of their own hands in the ones that collar them. They see only the fence, the street car tracks that lead down over the hill and out of sight, and all the enticements beckoning: "Bliss! Abandon!" while we whistle both encouragement and caution, and as necessary, haul them up short in loving capture.