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Becoming a New Mexican has not been easy. But, I’d finally got to where I could wear my Tony Lama’s two hours at a time without wincing. I’d traded my car on a used compact truck, which I sort of regarded as training wheels until I got enough confidence to move up to a big job, the kind that makes you think of mud bogs. Even with a small truck, details are important. I had a Lota Burger wrapper lying in the cab and a flattened Tecate can in the truck bed. (You are what you drive around with.)
For the next, and also mandatory, accessory to the truck, I had to have a dog, one that would stand in the truck bed and stretch its neck full length to snap at the ears of elderly shoppers loading groceries into their cars in Albertson’s parking lot; a dog that would pace the bed stiff-legged at 65 MPH ready to repel all invaders, that would interact loudly and aggressively with other dogs riding in the backs of other pickups.
Since the pickup pup seemed to need attributes you just don’t find in an ordinary mutt, I sought an expert. In our part of the world, that’s Harry, on the other side of Arenas Valley.
Harry withdrew his head and shoulders from under the hood of an old GMC and straightened up, wiping his hands on an oil-stained cloth and moving his mouth as though he might be talking. The truck radio blared, “Looking for Love in All the Wrong Places,” and a large dog, probably bred from stock that collaborated with Hitler’s SS-troops, leaned far out of the GMC truck bed snarling and yelping in accelerating fury. From the beat-up trucks scattered around Harry’s small lot, dogs of various voices added to the cacophony.
“Shut up, y’all. Jes shut up, I say.” Harry’s voice changed pitch and finally settled on a frequency the dogs were tuned to. The yelping stopped, Harry turned down the radio and the only noise was the passing swish of heavy traffic on US 180.
“Help ya, ma’am?” Harry asked.
“Uh, I need a dog for my pickup and someone said . . .”
“Right. Ya come to the right place. Some people, they jes’ think ya can go to the dog pound or a kennel and jes’ get any old dog and put ‘em in the back and that’ll do it. But you need a special dog with special training.”
He glanced over at my truck and then over me and knew me for a tenderfoot before his eyes reached my Tony Lama’s. “Gotcha one of them Tinker Toy trucks, huh?” he said teasingly. “Well, don’t worry, I can still fit ya out with the right kinda animal.” His face got serious as he considered the art of his occupation. “Ya gotta fit size to size, ya know. Gotta get ya an animal to go with the truck, see. Now, ya don’t want nothing as big as Baron here,” he said, flipping a thumb towards the brute in the GMC. He led me tentatively towards a smaller truck where a smaller dog, sort of Dobermannish, leaped to attention, its neck and head stretched toward me with teeth and gums bared.
“Settle down, Diablo,” Harry said and Diablo went into “at ease” but still watched me. I slowly stretched my hand towards his head but jerked it back when Harry cried, “Don’t do that. Fer godsakes, don’t touch him. These dogs aren’t trained for that. Ya want a petting dog, ya go get a poodle or something.”
Harry edged close to Diablo and threw a hammerlock on him. Grabbing a leg, Harry turned over the paw and held it for me to see. “Now, look, looky here. See these suction cups. These dogs are bred with them so’s they can walk in the bed of the truck and not lose their grip.”
Letting go of Diablo, he continued, “Why, I tried to take ole Baron over there rabbit hunting once. ‘Bout drove that ole dog crazy. Rabbit jumped up under his nose and Baron was dying to take off after him, but he jes’ couldn’t get his feet unstuck and into running. No, ma’am, these dogs are good for just one thing and that’s being your pickup dog. And for that, they’re the best you can find.”
Harry steered me around to look at his smaller models. After we had considered Attila, Brutus, Nero, and Nixon, he finally allowed me to buy Lizzie B, a short white female with a long snout and eyes a few degrees less crazed than the other animals. Cautiously, he lifted her into the back of my pickup and I paid him a sum of money sufficient to buy the new shocks my truck needs.
Lizzie started pacing, lifting her suction-cupped paws carefully as she got the feel of her new home. As I drove away, I saw her in the side-view mirror as she lunged at Baron, baring her white teeth and black gums.
I was happy. I was almost a New Mexican. All that remained was learning how to swallow five-alarm chili stew without bringing on a five-tissue flood of tears.
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