Barking Dogs

Barking, I hate barking. Dogs become self-righteous evangelists. Their owners enter my worst fantasies like bullies in steroid suits, Brown Shirted Droogs. But perhaps it’s all seasoned by my recent refusal to take my psych drugs. I've been constant for over 15 years. If they were going to help, it would have happened before now. I’m here at this laptop looking vaguely at the monitor’s Word document but from across the street a dog is barking. Again. It’s always again. If there is no again, the pain of barking might just disappear, but there’s always again.

Tillimore Street, where I live, is typical East Hollywood. It doesn’t know if it wants to be a full blown slum, or rob a bank and renovate into a cute retro neighborhood. So, for the time being, it keeps its rents high and its urban amenities low. Tillimore Street: half of it single residences dating from the 1930’s; the other half over-populated apartment buildings built in the 1970’s when style was exemplified by strip malls and razor-wire encrusted freeway signs. Stucco apartments mostly: a tiny swimming pool, underground parking with a sliding, wrought-iron gate bashed by bumpers from late night drunks into something almost artistic. Of course one could argue that anything is almost artistic: city jail; current cineplex comedies; women in hats.

The loud dog wasn’t always here. Or if he was, someone kept him in a trunk. Whatever the back story may be, his raucous non-language insults only began last week. It came from the swimming pool across the street. An odd corner lot surrounded by chain link fence and backed by pine green rubberized canvas. No-one can see in. No-one can see out. But there’s a swimming pool there. I know. I’ve climbed the fence and peeked. At night. Alone.

It’s not adjacent to the apartment building exactly, the chlorine-hungry residents have to walk past the security entrance, past the crooked parking gate tines, then open a chained and padlocked fence door. The pool may have been an after thought, dug years later when a bordering small lot came on the market--a real small lot. Although when the heat is upon us here in Los Angeles to a figure above the 110 degree mark, I’ve envied those tenants their cool dipping ability. But why a yappy hound?

Maybe he’s new, the jerk with the incessantly rat-a-tat-tat yelping mutt. He may have showed up around the beginning of the month. Rent time: first, last, security deposit, animal cleaning deposit, parking fee, phone activation fee, utilities installation fees, furniture mover charges, cable turn-on fee, key deposit, internet cable hook-up assessment, parking ticket fine for not reading the available hours sign properly one night in the first week, maybe wondering in a fleeting moment why no-one else was parking on the street in such a congested neighborhood--accepting good luck, forgetting there is no such thing. Yeah, probably new.

Reminds me I’d better write a check for the parking ticket I’ve got jammed in the glove compartment of my car, if it isn’t too late. So, the barking had been getting under my skin. Other people’s too, I imagine. And then yesterday, when the monster inside his vocal chords had been untethered, the dog was at it again. Screaming at some invisible daylight burglar. Again.

Since I’ve been known to exhibit an anger issue at times, and don't need dump trucks of drama to regurgitate each night while trying to grab hold of sleep's brass ring, I checked myself to find any tell-tale signs of unusual irritation. All seemed okay as far as I could ascertain. My blood didn’t feel like every cell had been smoking crank, that’s a good sign. I hadn’t been screaming at anyone yet in that hyperventilated, staccato, monosyllabic delivery which becomes so very embarrassing that I have to smash something to divert everyone's attention. Nope, hadn’t done that yet. My psyche wasn’t hell-bent on fantasies of doing grave bodily harm to some imagined authority figure. You know, yanking the cop’s baton away from him and beating his hat senseless, or unearthing my Mike Tyson consciousness and imagining what it would taste like to bite off some stranger’s ear. No, none of the usual tip-off signs were present. Of course these checks don’t always work. It’s a little like making sure you can swim before jumping off the Golden Gate Bridge. But all the guys in prison anger management workshops would be proud of me for trying.

I followed the sound of the dog. A magnetic pull it seemed, across Tillimore Street, past the unkempt corner, Date Palm trees, past the green fence and finally to the gate. I’d been walking slow, trying to step like a Vietnamese Buddhist. Even had my hands held behind my back in ice skater sangfroid. The door in the fence had no green covering and I could see some aluminum lounge chairs with towels over the back, then as I craned round for a better view I saw the culprit. Barking like only brain-damaged, undisciplined, half-Jack Russell terriers can learn to bark. Especially when the other 180 degrees of his jumbled genetic code is comprised of dog pound pit bull. He didn’t even use me as an excuse to rush the gate and add new snarls to his repertoire. I didn’t present a problem to the dog. He was angry at the world at large and didn’t need any convenient excuse.

Two feet from the canine tenor was a guy, maybe sixty. If I looked in the mirror more often, I'd probably recognize that he's my age. Bald, big round chest and gut, the type of guy once seriously athletic, now grown old. “How’s about shutting that dog up?” I queried in my best calm voice. I could have been asking a deacon to pass the hymnal. He was looking in the other direction at a like-aged woman in a mu-mu who was filling a sizeable bowl of water from a garden hose. Next to her was a mature brindled Great Dane waiting patiently to begin his slurping. I had a slight pang, since anyone who knows dogs knows that Great Danes are the sweetest of breeds, and though built just a tad smaller than a racehorse, are perfect for apartment dwellers due to their calm attributes and quiet loyalties. If they bark its not repeated. The bark will start somewhere near Central Swabia and build until it hits East Hollywood with the force of a hurricane that gets its own name. But it’s rare that they bark and they never need to bark more than once. I had no problem with the Great Dane. Fact, if things were slightly different, I’d like to pet him and scratch behind his ears. They like that sort of thing.

I could tell that the hairless guy owned the other yapping curr, but he didn’t hear my polite request due to the scarcity of air in the pool yard which wasn’t already filled with barking from Fido number one. “Hey, Old Man. Shut that fuckin’ dog up.” Was my second attempt to drill past the wall of sound. Maybe the dog took a breath at just that instant because I must admit that my question sounded kind of loud. The lady in the alcoholic dress was startled, her brindled canine buddy just looked over at me benignly as if offering congratulations to me for my trying to bring some tranquility to the day. We had a connection. The terrier-pit bull continued his high tonal recitation of drill sergeant commands. The owner was up in a heartbeat, but a long heartbeat. Just a tad comical in his flip-flops, tight trunks and slathered north to south with tanning oil. “What did you say?” He asked, low in the throat and kinda mean. He was standing now, kinda troll-like. When he was younger someone might have referred to his body style as a fireplug. Probably just past two hundred pounds. “I said your dog’s always barking and I'm sick of it, so shut him up . . . please.” My voice had come down in register a hair, I suppose I realized that my previous appeal may have sounded immodest. “For days that fucking mutt has been yelping and you never stop him. Shut him the fuck up!” It was obvious that neither of us would have a chance of yelling at each other properly if the dog was to continue his barking, so the man picked the dog up and gave it to the woman. He stopped his yapping, content to be recognized and coddled, giving us a wide quiet field within which we could conduct our human communication.

“Where do you live?” He groused. “I nodded in the direction of my place, “Across the street, and your dog is real loud there.” He took a few steps toward the gate, “If you don’t live here, get lost,” ending his curt last word with something like a snicker only a little less kind. “Look dude, every day the neighborhood has to put up with that fuckin’ noise and maybe you should think about training it.” Sounded reasonable to me.

“If you don’t get out of here I’m going to come out there and put you in the hospital.” Wow. So I guess my gruff talk hadn’t exactly frightened the guy. I reassessed him and thought he may have spent his working years in the construction trade, or been a salesman who had kept his membership at the gym current for the last 30 years. He wasn’t trim, but he looked strong. Once upon a time his buddies at the gym may have called his biceps “guns.” I took stock a second: I’m a terrible fighter and hospital bills either mine from being hurt, or his, in the unlikely outcome of my inflicting enough damage to send him in need of medical aid, could be expensive. I hadn’t worked in 5 months and counted the days for unemployment extension checks to arrive. Big bills were to be avoided. Another thing was my dental situation. Genetics and a sweet tooth had rendered my teeth very close to being totally constructed of bridges, crowns and gaps. One good shot to my mouth and it was dentures. Top and bottom.


“Look fatty, keep the tough stuff for your ugly girlfriend. I want the dog quiet, that’s all. And no, I don’t want to go to the hospital, it’s too expensive.” All this was said in my Buddha tongue. I was surprised at myself for being so calm. I was usually being pummeled by this time.

Then from the other end of the yard came a new voice, “Dogs . . . ya can’t tell em nothin'. They only do what the want to.” I stepped further along for a better angle to see where the gifted rhetorician’s comment had emanated from. At the far end of the pool was a portable white tent, the type vendors use at flea markets. Inside on a raised bed was a curly-headed guy in his early twenties in cut-off jeans and a few spurious tattoos. My first and second guess would be that he was stoned. “Who’s the fucking genius?” I inquired of anyone within earshot. “You’re an asshole,” the fireplug spat. “Get the fuck out of here, asshole.”

There are formulae in men’s conversations when tempers flair. One quantity is swearing. It’s used to boil the potion of possible violence. Another is the threat. A threat is like a chess move. It cannot be undone. When one guy says “I’m gonna kill you, rape your wife and burn your house down.” It’s actually code. It means “I want my way and am willing to go to prison for a long, long time in order to get my way.” Another ingredient in the recipe of manly talk is the art of disrespect. To refer to an overly plump opponent as “you big fat fuck,” would be an example. Marlon Brando saying “Get up you big tub of guts,” in ONE EYED JACKS would be another example. I remember a guy in an auto parts store parking lot once call me a “father fucker.” It took the wind out of my sails, it was just too bizarre. There I was thinking of my dad: drug-addled from trying to kick lung cancer, his tiny bobble head propped on a dirty pillow. There are people with bad tempers, mean people, angry ones, violent ones, frightened ones and so on. But when the mentally ill or severely retarded are involved all bets are off. Gotta draw the line somewhere.

Now, the interpretation of our proprieties went something like this: if I had wanted to fight this guy with the now silent dog, I would have invited him to come outside and attempt to put me in the emergency ward. I would use a trigger old as the school yard, “Oh yeah, try it.” Or perhaps feigned incredulousness, “You, put me in the hospital? That ugly woman looks tougher than you.” You may also throw in a kicker to seal the deal. “Fact she looks like she might have a dick bigger than yours too.” Here I've introduced another few plums into the pie: insulting the man’s wife or children, and especially casting aspersions upon the size or functionality of his cock.” Both are reserved for serious confrontation, not to be used unless you’re absolutely sure you will dismember your opponent, or if your adrenaline has bypassed all rational thought.

“You’re an asshole, you know that.” He reiterated. “I don’t think so, dude. Just a guy who doesn’t like jerks who can’t train their dogs to be quiet.” Was my fairly weak retort. One can tell when the possibility of a bloodletting is becoming very improbable. In the case of wolves, hackles will begin falling down again, snarls may be loud, but the ferocity of their barred fangs will be less intense. If we were both drunks outside a bar, someone who “only has a couple,” would now stand between us and fairly easily keep us apart. There will be a few parting shots of venom, but no-one need call the cops.

I walked back home feeling mortified for not getting into a fight and killing him. For hours I imagined a real struggle where I hacked him with a kitchen knife, or beat him unconscious with my fists then tore the ligaments from his dogs jaws. Like Samson in the Bible, real badass stuff. Luckily, after some hours had ensued during which I viewed an hour or so of an old Mexican musical about cockfighting on my VHS, I fell asleep and began to calm down. My guess is that the other guy talked big to his friends or neighbors, whoever the spectators actually were. And that he felt decrepit for not slaughtering me in front of the woman and younger boy. And finally he too watched a Mexican musical about cockfighting and took a nap.

All that occurred yesterday, then a little while ago the barking started again. Luckily and quickly someone muffled him, but for how long? I’m pretty sure I won’t confront the owner again. I’m actually a wimp, a weakling and a coward raised on John Wayne, Faust and Darth Vader. It's not really fear of getting hurt though, or even of being humiliated by my lack of pugilistic prowess. It's my noggin. You know, where the bad stuff is kept. That’s why I drank. Same with meeting women and initiating sex. Perhaps I really wanted to tell that old guy, “I sure would like to get naked with you, kiss your stubbly cheeks and suck your dick.” Maybe that’s what it really means, fighting and barking and growing old.

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