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I felt sorry for him. I used to take him for walks, and when I was sure no one was around I'd let him run free in the field down the road from our house. But I never was able to work with him or get him used to a leash. We bought him dog toys and things to chew on. I tried to play fetch, but he never got the hang of that either. He'd get the tennis ball, but he wouldn't bring it back. Or if he did, he wouldn't let go of it, so fetch turned into "This is my ball and if you try to get it I'm going to bite your arm off." I never really liked that game.
So Thungnun died at about age 6 or 7. We felt sad at our lack of ability to sort him out, and I felt sorry for the neighbors, who had to spend years avoiding our street and years of endless nighttime barking. Now, Jintana's mom has a tiny little dog who seems quite happy and sane.
My history with pets wasn't that good. When we were little kids in Detroit, Michigan, my sister Nancy and I begged for a puppy. Finally we got one, a cocker spaniel puppy, and we promised to feed him and take care of him. This lasted about a week because we were little kids and soon the care of our dog fell mostly upon our mother. One day, a few months later, we came home from school and our cocker spaniel was gone. It was explained to us that he had to go because we didn't take care of it. Looking back, this seems borderline brutal to me, but I'm sure there's more to the story. I hope so.
There is more to the story. Nancy read this chapter and her memory is better. Here's her version:
I have read part of your book and can tell you what I remember about the dog. We had made friends with a large, mellow, lovely stray mutt and probably pestered the parents to keep him. Instead, Mom decided we could have a dog, so she went and picked a registered blond cocker spaniel. We had no say in the matter. She even named it for us. "Ginger", if I remember right. The dog arrived, all hyper, and I remember climbing on the piano stool to get away from this barking maniac of a bitch. It may be my fault that they got rid of it. I'm sure I didn't take care of that dog. I did not like it. Mom did that a lot, I think. It was all about what she wanted.
A few years later we moved to Grosse Ile, Michigan and my folks bought a big old house with a garage that looked like a small barn. A couple of cats lived in the garage and in our yard and they were a part of life there but they had kittens and soon we had six or eight cats. One day, mom took us for a walk and tried to explain we had to get rid of the cats. There was a lot of crying, and when we got back, the cats were gone. All of them.
Years later in Monterey I met my first wife, Leilani, and we got married. This is a long story and I'll just get to the pet part of that disaster. Leilani wanted a