For the Love of Dog

His sisters were bashful and a little afraid of men for some reason. One in particular, the thinner of the two, wasn't overly excited about anything. But she kept following me each time I walked away, a fact my friend Dani noticed.

"She picked you," Dani said.

I named her Talula Luca Copacabana Lola Liliuokalani Wise -- a.k.a. Looly. (The dogs that win the Westminster Dog Show always have six or seven snooty names, so why not my mix-breed dog?) In a year's time, the shy, gangly girl became more outgoing and grew into a robust 65-pound beast.

At the back of my 2007 calendar, under goals, one of my listings included using my vacation to take a cross-country trip with Looly so we could "further bond." I actually wrote that about a dog. In my experience, animals had yet to let me down the way people had. They just craved affection and care and feeding. And they reciprocated with an unconditional love -- a trust and loyalty I once had trouble finding in myself.

Looly and I headed west late last June. We took the northern route, through South Dakota, Wyoming, Montana, Idaho, Nevada and, finally, Woodland, Calif., where she would meet Jasper, my brother-in-law's black Lab mix, who showed Looly how to perform a squeaker-ectomy on a toy squirrel.

As a puppy, she had been frightened of the water in the canal when we ran, and watched longingly as a trio of Labs swan-dived into the gunk every Saturday. But now, as we rolled through Montana, she jumped into the Powder River without a care. She leapt into the Yellowstone during a fishing trip, and the roiling Gallatin the next day, fighting the current to work her way across the body of water and fetch the stick I had thrown. A quarter-mile downstream, she would fight to get to the side, shake herself off and want more.

She grew bolder in Idaho, jumping into the east fork of the fast and furious Snake River on the Fourth of July, encouraging me to throw large sticks out as far as I could. New friends, worried for her safety, suggested I stop before she tired and got caught in the current, but she kept going, undaunted.

In the Colorado River during our trip back, Looly had tried to swim upstream to where I was standing and had gotten caught in a slow, steady riffle, unable to make progress. After two minutes, I started to worry and rushed down the side of a hill to get closer to where she was. She abandoned the quest and swam to the bank, shaking every droplet off her and onto me.

I had felt a rush of panic for a few fleeting moments. But she wanted to go back out immediately. She was no longer a timid girl. The summer had made her courageous.

"Come on, baby! Come on!"

I kept yelling, running along the bank frantically as Looly flailed her legs in the freezing water. The C&O Canal, I would later learn, is about 60 feet across at that point -- and Looly was out at least 30 feet, past dead center.

She worked hard to get her forelegs onto a sheet of ice able to support her weight, but her paws kept sliding off. Once. Twice. Three times. Maybe four. The more determined her effort, the more violently Looly plunged beneath the surface in a series of loud splashes. She began whimpering, looking at me helplessly before she went under once more.