Truffle and the Baby Bjorn

For the twelve months that Truffle has been with us, I have resisted the impulse to treat him like a baby. This has not been easy, given his small size, domed head, tiny muzzle, and shy demeanor, not to mention toothless gums. I’m not the only one to respond this way—ninety percent of the people we come across speak to him in the high-pitched tones usually reserved for infants. This used to never happen back in the days when I walked my German Shepherds.

Especially when I first got Truffle, everything in me wanted to baby him, to relive in a small way those long-gone days of early motherhood, minus the sleep deprivation. It wasn’t just his looks—his pathetic history in the puppy mill cage and his shut-down affect aroused floods of  protectiveness and pity. I wanted to hold him and kiss him and croon lullabies. I wanted to carry him with me everywhere. I wanted to….

But I didn’t. Through the possible intervention of Saint Roch, patron saint of the canine tribe, I managed to remember that, as a primate, my ways of expressing affection don’t all translate well to a dog. The gestures that come spontaneously to me —the hugging, the kissing, the baby talk—would not be understood by Truffle, and would probably freak him out. Unfortunately, one of the signs of affection that is perfectly understood by both species, food, is severely limited  for us, since Truffle only eats four ounces of food per day.

Not only do I try to remember that Truffle is a dog, not a baby, but he is not a puppy. In fact, he is a middle-aged gentleman with a fund of sexual experience—in the puppy mill he earned his kibble as a stud—that leaves both Don Juan and Casanova in the dust. So out of respect for him I make myself treat him as much like a grown-up as I can stand.

But we’re having a cold, snowy winter. The streets where Truffle and I walk are covered with salt. This is nice for me because it keeps me from crashing to the ground, but it hurts Truffle’s paws. Halfway through our walks he will suddenly lie down, looking martyred, and there’s nothing for it but for me to pick him up, tuck him under my arm, and carry him home. I could get him booties, but my experience with booties on dogs big and small has been that it takes ten minutes to get them on and two minutes for the dog to fling them off. Besides, Truffle’s paws are half the size of a cat’s, and I can’t imagine that they make booties that small.

There remains…the baby bjorn. I’m talking about those baby carriers that you strap to your chest, but for dogs. There are dozens of models of canine baby bjorns on the market. There are also slings designed for dogs, similar to the arrangements in which women in the developing world carry their infants. I am tempted to get a bjorn or a sling for Truffle. It would save his paws and get him out into the fresh (extremely fresh) air. But while that would make my walks easier, what would it do for Truffle? The point of a walk as far as he is concerned is to sniff the visible and invisible marks left by animals wild and domestic and cover them with his own urine. I have to turn away so he won’t see me laugh as he struggles to reach the golden sprinklings left high on a snow bank by the neighborhood Lab.

Truffle is the proud descendant of the Spitz-type sled dogs of Lapland and Greenland.  He has already been castrated and de-fanged. Would being strapped to my chest in a baby bjorn or in a sling heap one more indignity on his innocent head?  And I must confess that I’m not just concerned about Truffle’s pride, but about my own. I don’t want to be perceived as a little old lady with her spoiled little old dog—which is what I am, of course, but then appearances are everything.

So for now, for the sake of Truffle’s dignity as well as mine, we will forego booties, slings, and baby bjorns, and will brave the winter and the salt like the intrepid souls that we are, and hope for an early spring.