Another Day in the Country
Eating from the dog’s dish
© Another Day in the Country
Maybe it was just my mother, but she was fussy about the dog’s dish.
Once an old bowl, a bent pan, an odd dish was designated “the dog’s dish,” it was never ever used by a human being for eating purposes.
Dog dishes were the lowest level of receptacles in the house, and dogs ate scraps from whatever the humans in residence ate, supplemented by cheap canned dog food — “horse meat,” my father called it, and I cringed because I loved horses.
Somewhere around the time I got out of college, got married, and established my own home, dog dishes became a commercial commodity.
If you were really fashionable, you bought matching dishes for your dog. But that wasn’t something that I was accustomed to, so I never indulged my dogs in that way.
There were enough expenses owning a dog — a collar, chain, commercial food, shots, dog tags — that we weren’t getting fancy with nonessentials like food dishes.
When my children were small, and we were living in California, we inherited a German shepherd.
Sam’s owner lived in a basement apartment of a house we were renting. He was moving and couldn’t take the dog along.
So, he said, “you guys like him. He gets along with your kids. Why don’t you take him?”
So, we did. It was our early version of what is so popular now. We rescued a dog.
Sam had a tin basin for a dish and, for a water dish, a bucket under an outside faucet that leaked.
He liked the arrangement — fresh water constantly and readily available.
When Sam became ours, a 50-pound bag of dog food got added to the grocery list regularly.
Rescue animals became a theme in our family long before it was a trend. Someone would find a stray or give a dog away, and we ended up with them at our house.
They were pretty much outdoor dogs. Sam eventually slept in the house on a rug by the front door — in fact, in the very house where I’m now struggling to write my column on my grandson’s unfamiliar computer.
For dogs that live in this house now, it’s a very different origin story and a very different life.
Ollie and Pippa don’t really think they are a different species from the humans who pay the bills.
They are part of the family. They are the children who will never grow up and go away to college. They sleep in bed with their “parents.” They sit on family furniture and eat from the family’s dishes.
On one of my visits to California, I found some plain, white, square dishes at a sidewalk sale and bought them for my daughter.
Jana enjoys setting a pretty table and plating food like a chef, so I thought she’d like them.
Whenever I visited, I enjoyed eating my egg McMuffin or a piece of cake from those trendy little square plates.
The first morning I was here visiting this time, I smelled something cooking and thought maybe Jana was fixing breakfast as she often did as a treat. We’d sit at the table and eat together before she headed off for work.
So, I got up, and sure enough, something was ready, beautifully plated on those little pristine dishes, ready for serving.
It was breakfast for the dogs!
That’s when I discovered that my kids cook more for the dogs than they do for themselves. And, by and large, the dogs eat healthier food.
The dogs drink bottled water; we drink straight out of the faucet. The dogs have meat, vegetables, brown rice, and blueberries for their meal; we order in pizza. Go figure.
And the dogs eat on those cute little square plates. Even though the dishwasher does a commendable job of cleaning, there’s just something about the dogs eating off those dishes that’s ruined the experience for me. Call me old-fashioned.
Often, when my father would leave for work in the morning when I was a child, he’d look over at our family dog lolling on the grass and say, “Oh, to live a dog’s life.”
Dogs got to play all day. Dogs didn’t have a schedule. Dogs weren’t problem solvers, didn’t have to go to the office. He envied that freedom.
I’m beginning to agree with him. A dog’s life, at my family’s house, is a pretty cushy existence. You’re fixed gourmet meals morning and evening, are served in a china dish on a placemat, get to go outside every few hours, can sleep as long as you like on the bed, and get petted and praised just for sitting and lying down.
When your family comes home, you are so glad to see them. After they serve you dinner, they’ll play with you and cuddle you on the couch.
At least at our house in California, a dog’s life is pretty much the perfect life, on another day in the country.