Dean Koontz: A Big Little Life: A Memoir of a Joyful Dog

Yet we were so convinced the praise we read for XXX could not be entirely half-baked that we sat through the whole dismal thing, expecting brilliance to burst from the screen at any moment, stunning us both emotionally and intellectually. Trix, head under her chair, must have been thinking, Do I know these people? What has happened to their judgment? What are they going to force me to watch next-Old Yeller, when the dog gets whacked?

In subsequent years, she never returned to a theater chair. When we watched a film, she sprawled on the floor and dozed. If we had not destroyed her love of movies by running XXX , perhaps she would have become a major director.

SOME OF THOSE experts who always make my brain itch tell us that dogs can’t see and/or make sense of images on a television or a movie screen because they haven’t the brain power to imagine the third dimension that is missing from a two-dimensional image.

In our previous house, we watched movies on the big-screen TV in our family room. Usually, I sat on the floor, with my back against the sectional sofa, so I could give Trixie a long tummy rub and ear scratch.

The screen was much smaller and the image less clear than what we would have eventually in our theater in the next house, but from time to time, Trix seemed to take an interest in the story. If she happened to be watching when a dog entered the frame, she stood and wagged her tail. It was the image that attracted her, because she reacted even when no bark or doggy panting alerted her to a canine presence in the film. Cat actors interested her more than canines. She had been raised with cats and liked them.

One evening, a character rolled into a scene in a wheelchair, which electrified Trixie. She stood and watched intently, and even approached the screen for a closer look. I’m sure she remembered a time when a person in a wheelchair needed her, and when she served ably.

She was not an assistance dog anymore, but a princess, and she wished to be treated as one. Even when watching a movie, I was expected to properly revere her.

I learned not to sit on that family-room floor in my bare feet. If Trixie thought I had gotten too interested in whatever was on the screen and that I was giving her less attention than she deserved, she slipped out from under my massaging hand and went to my feet to lick my toes and distract me from the movie. The first time she tried this, I was determined to tough it out, imagining that she would stop the tickling if I didn’t laugh, if I remained intent on the screen. Judging by how quickly she reduced me to giggling hysteria, I would not long resist spilling my guts if waterboarded.

LASSIE IS MORE famous than Trixie, but I must note that Lassie never wrote a book, whereas Trixie has now written three for adults and two for children. So there.

Kate Hartson, Trixie’s first publisher, likes dogs. She is nuts about dogs. As far as I can tell, she knows nothing about current events, and I suspect that if she caught a TV news report that Earth was on a collision course with a massive asteroid, she would say, “Yeah, all right, I’ll worry about that later, right now it’s time to run on the beach with the dogs!” She talks more about her dogs than she does about her husband, Bill, and he doesn’t seem to mind. “The dogs are more interesting than I am,” he once said. They have had a series of stunningly beautiful German shepherds bred and trained by the Monks of New Skete.

At one time, I worked with Kate when she was at Random House. She is charming, enthusiastic, and always full of ideas for new ways of publishing. Eventually she founded Yorkville Press, and while casting around for books to publish, she contacted me to ask if I had any ideas. I suggested a volume on Canine Companions for Independence and introduced Kate to the folks at the Oceanside campus. Eventually she published a beautiful book on CCI, Love Heels, that included a couple of hundred wonderful full-color photographs, and I wrote a foreword for the project.

With my encouragement, Trixie had been writing pieces for our snail-mail newsletter and Web site. Kate saw these and suggested that we do a book by Trix, with lots of photographs, with her humorous observations about life, in her doggy voice. Following is one of the pieces that inspired Kate to think Trixie could be a successful author.

My Summer

by Trixie Koontz, Dog

Dad teaches me to type. Hold pencil in mouth and type. At first is fun. Then is not fun. He says to me, “Write, Trixie, write. Write essay for Web site.” Being good dog, I write. Not fun, but I write. Expect treat for writing. Get no treat. Stop writing. Get treat. Carob biscuit. Good, good, good. Okay, so I write some more.

Dad promises Web site visitors my essay end of July. Must give up important ball chasing, important napping, important sniffing-all to write. Work hard. Writing hard. So many words. Stupid punctuation rules. Hate semicolons. Hate; hate; hate. Chew up many pencils in frustration.

Finish article. Give to Dad. Then I rip guts out of duck. Duck is not real. Is Booda duck, stuffed toy. I am gentle dog. Cannot hurt real duck or even cat. But am hell on stuffed toys. Work off tension. Rip, rip, rip. Feel pretty good. Cough up soggy wad of Booda-duck stuffing. Feel even better.

Dad gives editorial suggestions. Stupid suggestions.

Stupid, stupid, stupid! He is not editor, is writer. Like me, Trixie Koontz, who is dog. I pretend to listen.

Am actually thinking about bacon. Bacon is good. Bacon is very good. I am good, too. People call me “good dog, good, very good.” Bacon is very good. I am very good. But I am not bacon. Why not? Mysterious.

Then I think about cats. What is wrong with them? Who do they think they are? What do they want? Who invented them, anyway? Not God, surely. Maybe Satan? So nervous writing about cats, I use too many italics. Then I hit hateful semicolon key; don’t know why; but I do it again; and whimper.

Dogs are not born to write essays. Maybe fiction. Maybe poetry. Not essays. Maybe advertising copy.

Here is my advertising copy: BACON IS VERY GOOD. BUY BACON. BUY LOTS OF BACON. GIVE TO ME. THANK YOU.

Dad gives me editorial notes for study. Eight pages. I pee on them. He gets message.

Dad says will give my essay to webmaster as is. Webmaster is nice person, nice. She will know good writing when she sees it.

Days pass. Weeks. Chase ball. Chase rabbits. Chase butterfly. Chase Frisbee. Begin to notice sameness in leisure-time activities. Pull tug-toy snake. Pull, pull, pull. Pull tug-toy bone. Pull, pull, pull tug-toy rope. Lick forepaw. Lick other forepaw. Lick a more private place. Still do not taste like bacon. Get belly rub from Mom. Get belly rub from Dad. Mom. Dad. Mom. Dad. Get belly rub from Linda. Get belly rub from Elaine. From housekeeper Elisa. Belly rub, belly rub. Read Bleak House by Mr. Charles Dickens, study brilliant characterizations, ponder tragedy of human condition. New tennis ball. Chase, chase, chase! Suddenly is September.

Webmaster asks where is Trixie essay? Where? Dad lost. Dad got busy working on new book, got busy, forgot fabulous Trixie essay, and lost it. My human ate my homework. Sort of.

All my hard word, my struggle, so many hateful semicolons. All for what? All for nothing. Essay lost. All for nothing. Feel like character in Bleak House.

Think about getting attorney. Get literary agent instead. Writing fiction. Novel. Maybe knock Dad off best-seller list. Teach him lesson. Writing novel called My Bacon by Trixie Koontz, Dog. Already have invitation from Larry King, David Letterman, be on shows, do publicity, sell book, get belly rub from Dave. Maybe get limo for media tour. Ride around in limo, chasing cats. Life is good when you’re a dog.