Taffy Tales

By Charles Valier

March, 2025. Suddenly, I am confronted with a crisis while sitting in a podiatrist’s examining room. Eight weeks of care for a diabetic ulcer on my heel had failed. I was advised to enter the hospital immediately for testing circulation in my right foot. My only question, “Can Taffy go with me?” Taffy, my three-year-old Golden Retriever, is sitting on the floor with her head on my knee. She travels everywhere with me. After consultation with the hospital staff, the answer is “No.” I drive home and pack my nightclothes. Taffy stays home. My wife, Patsy, visited me. After the first day, she said, “Taffy is at the front door waiting for you. She won’t come up to bed!” For six days and nights, Taffy remained at the front door waiting for my return! I cried.

Taffy was adopted by us when she was eight weeks old, one of nine in her litter. Wisely, her breeder decided the destination for each puppy, after a behaviorist determined the traits of each. My request, embodied only three words: “biddable, calm and sociable.” Nine bundles of fur, only demarked by a different colored yarn on their necks, were doled out to those of us on the waiting list. Thus, purple became Taffy. For two months, she slept in a small crate beside our bed, shuttled downstairs every two hours when she whimpered to be dropped in the grass to “potty,” and then carried back upstairs to bed. My memory is being licked, kissed in the face going upstairs in the middle of the night. Slowly, the interim widened and she learned how to walk up the stairs. For the first year, she lived in two rooms with hard, impregnable floors that seemed to always have a puddle on them. Outside she played with a “jolly ball” meant for horses. She would climb up on top of it and then roll off. I consulted a trainer in “puppy class” to learn how to train her. Positive patience works best.

Taffy is the sixth Golden we’ve owned. Four in the last 40 years have all been girls. The unpleasant truth is that Goldens, all dogs, live a short life. In my experience, the range has been 4½ to 13 years each. In each case, we’ve had to carry them into a veterinarian’s office to be “put down,” a pleasant term for execution, a sad time for us. Each time that act has been followed by a dull pain, sometimes lasting for several years until we shed our sense of guilt and acquired another one. I was 81 when Taffy came into our home, after Tigger died of cancer at the premature age of 4½. Our friends wondered how we could raise a puppy at our age. The answer is how could we resist the vibrancy she brought with her?

Sticking to one breed, my wife and I, after each death adopt another that looks exactly like the predecessor. Each time I am smitten by their affectionate manner, but each time, while they look alike we find a very different soul, very different quirks, very different habits, and that’s the fun part. Katy, the alpha dog, always bolted out the front door if given the opportunity and loved to swim. Pumpkin, the sweetheart, raided the laundry hamper nightly for one of my socks that she then carefully laid out on her bed and slept on. Tigger, the fearless one, loved to chase the family of redheaded cranes that migrated to our northern Michigan summer home and was my walking companion. Taffy regularly performs acts of love that startle me and make me weep.

A few months ago, when I drove home from a regular visit to my physical therapist, I parked in front of our house and took a phone call. After 15 minutes on the phone I looked up, startled to see Patsy and Taffy outside the car door. Taffy had been watching the car from our front door. When I failed to come inside, as usual, she became concerned, went to the kitchen in the back of the house, herded Patsy to the front door and then convinced her to go out and check on me. All because I had stayed in the car too long!

Dogs are creatures of habit. They insist on routine. It is their need for certainty. There are four inviolable rules in our house: 6:30 a.m.; 4:30 p.m.; 6:00 p.m.; and 9:00 p.m. No need for me to check my watch, hers registers each one. Her stare or wagging tail tells me that it is time. The first is waking up time. The next is Taffy’s dinner time. The third is “treat” time. And the last is bedtime. While there are exceptions, those are only excusable events. A week ago before going to bed I slipped in the bathroom, fell and hit a glancing blow to my head on the bath tub. After checking myself out, finding nothing amiss we decided to go to our local hospital ER to get a CAT scan to assuage us that I was not bleeding internally. In our small community, the local hospital is a short drive away on Lake Michigan. Before we left, I briefed Taffy on what was happening, a routine practice for me. After the ER doctor determined all was well we returned home at 2:00 a.m.in the morning to a happy dog, barking and wagging her tail. The next morning we slept to 9:30 without the usual baying and whining at our bedside. Taffy had decided we needed more sleep!

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