Pancho and Lefty
Nature or nurture? The moms controlled half the nature, but all the nurture. Whatever the explanation, these stepbrothers of the same father but different mothers sure turned out different.
After the death of our nonagenarian cat, we decided to buy a dog. Since kittenhood, my wife had received all the cat’s love and affection. If such aloof and independent creatures are really capable of love and affection. He would only acknowledge my existence with her gone and him hungry.
I longed for a puppy. My wife’s sister had a little dog who lived happily in a Las Vegas apartment, trained to go on a puppy pad. But big city condo living with both of us working would still pose problems. Should we look into doggy day care?
After research and discussion with the vet’s staff, old friends after many visits with the cat, we decided to adopt a Mi-Ki, a mostly-Maltese toy breed created as a calm and healthy companion dog. In a life-altering moment, our breeder said, “Why not take two? They can keep each other company.” We named them Pancho and Lefty after the Willie Nelson song about the assassination of Pancho Villa by a made-up character called Lefty. Our Lefty bore no resemblance to the scoundrel of the song.
Our nicknames for them reflected their personalities. Pancho became the Terrorist, the Miscreant, the Little Criminal. We called Lefty Zen Master and Sweetheart.
Pancho, agile and athletic, raced about and leapt on and off the furniture. Lefty, overweight, a trencherman, plodded around. The sound of the refrigerator door opening would bring them both running. Precious, pleading black eyes often defeated our resolve to keep Lefty on a diet.
Pancho had a mean streak and sharp teeth he did not hesitate to use. He sometimes assaulted Lefty with no provocation, like a little black Ninja, a canine hitman. Amiable blond Lefty never bit anybody, except Pancho when defending himself.
Despite his aggressiveness, Pancho was a coward, easily spooked. Lefty knew no fear. Encountering a bigger, barking dog out on a walk, Lefty confronted, Pancho ran. At the sound of thunder, Pancho would tremble and try to hide. Lefty hardly noticed.
Pancho knew two notes: bark and growl. Lefty had a vocabulary. He would not only bark and growl, he purred when happy, whimpered when he needed something, huffed, snorted, and made a noise like an old door creaking when he was hungry.
A father of three, I used to laugh at people talking about their surrogate children, their fur babies. No more.
Several years on, as consoler-in-chief Joe Biden often said, when I walk by the mahogany boxes on the mantel containing their ashes it brings a smile to my lips rather than a tear to my eye.
