I enjoy the music of Rufus Wainwright, and from what I understand, I'm in good company. He's got his own style and approach to the melody and the lyrics that hit the spot perfectly sometimes. I'll readily admit that I am a relatively new listener, having only discovered his music in the last year or so. One of the things that intrigued me about him was the name: Rufus. It's not a name you hear very often these days, and it's a name I might not have ever heard at all if not for man's best friend.
Growing up, I spent more time with my father's family than my mother's, even living in my paternal grandparents' house for at least a year (and making a huge, 'adorable' flour mess at one point). Their dog was the first one I'd ever seen, a golden retriever named Rufus. (I never really questioned the name, but it didn't occur to me that it could be a people name until I found Wainwright's 2001 CD Poses.) Rufus was the first of many dogs I've come to call my own in eighteen years.
Rufus actually belonged to my dad's brother, who was in his last years of high school when we lived in the house. When my uncle moved out, the dog stayed at grandma's and each year as the cross-country road trip to visit the grandparents neared its end, I'd get excited about being reunited with the dog I'd spent so much time with as a toddler. Rufus had free run of the house most of the time, so he got in time as a pillow, a playmate, and a puppy. Rufus was a great dog, but by the time I was old enough to appreciate that, he was on his last legs. I think he was sixteen when he died a few years back. Poor dog.
When my family moved to Texas in the late '80s, we got our own golden retriever named Polly. Polly and I were tight growing up. I think there are some incriminating pictures of us in the bathtub together and others of me riding her like a horse. I was only three or four and an only child at the time, so Polly kept me company when my parents were too exasperated or annoyed to babysit me. Polly met her untimely demise a few years later on a family trip to visit another uncle in Kansas. Somehow, Polly got out of the enclosed backyard and ran out into traffic. I bawled like a baby. My dad said they had a dog funeral for her at the pet cemetery, but we didn't get to go to it. I think it was a day or two after we were supposed to head back home. I mostly remember the crying, though.
A few years after that, we made a family trip to the humane society and procured another golden. On the car ride home, we debated about what to name him and, after going through all six other dwarves, we settled on Doc. So, Dog with a 'c' instead of a 'g.' Doc was more of a family dog because I finally had siblings who were old enough to play along. I remember from early on that it was my job to feed Doc every day. The house we lived in when we had Doc was virtually surrounded by ravines, so he went along with us on many exploratory expeditions of our humongous backyard. Doc was healthy and young when we left for a weekend trip one August, entrusting our canine to some shifty-ass neighbors. When we came back, the dog was gone. The neighbors said he strangled himself in the chain links on his kennel and that they had taken the liberty of disposing of the body. Those neighbors always hated us and I don't believe their story to this day. I don't have a better one. I just don't believe theirs.
The most recent four-legged addition to the family was a purebred beagle, named Reveille due to my dad's fondness for the mascot of a certain Big XII team. Reveille moved in with us my eighth grade year. That dog and I watched a lot of television together. His favorite show was ER. He used to run up and down the basement stairs like...I don't know what. Something that ran really fast, I guess. I used to sing him lullabies. He would go sledding with us on the hill behind Old Man Vince's house in the winter. And he was there to comfort me when I found out we wouldn't be enjoying those basement stairs much longer. Sometimes an animal can have a soothing effect another human can't, and Reveille provided that effect for me during and after the move to Alabama. So profound was his influence on me that his nickname is the URL for this site and until recently his face was a part of the logo. The best news of all is that Reveille is still alive and kicking. Although he's been relegated to his screened-in back porch at the new house, he's having an awesome time sunning on the patio or plotting escapes into the neighborhood. It's a shame I couldn't bring him with me to college. Hopefully he'll be around for many holiday visits to come. I love that dog.
It's probably best that I'm petless, at least for the immediate future. I'm having quite a time just taking care of myself right now. But once I get settled in somewhere and I have a big, poorly kept backyard, I may just have to make my own trip to the humane society to pick out a dog of my very own. Man's best friend, indeed.
Someone got here by searching for: milk and cereal college guys Reading: Nothing. Listening to: Gin Blossoms Watching: The Practice. James Spader has saved this show. Eating: Subway.
