“You are Bob, untamed and undaunted,” said Ivan, and he chomped off a hunk of banana. He offered the rest to me, but I shook my head. I wasn’t feeling hungry.
Also, it was mostly just peel.
“That’s just my shtick. My routine.” I hesitated. “I mean, sure, I’m tough, compared to, say, Eek. But that’s setting the bar pretty low.”
“You’re too hard on yourself sometimes, Bob.”
I met his eyes. He has these dark brown, deep-set eyes, really kind ones. Eyes that make you wanna admit things. Confess to your failures.
“Once when I was little. Just a pup. I did something . . .”
Ivan waited patiently. Ivan is the king of patience.
I felt myself dashing into a dead-end tunnel I couldn’t escape. I didn’t want to go there. Not even with Ivan.
“Never mind.” I yawned. I do that when I’m anxious. “I’m rambling.”
“Bob?” Ivan said. “You okay?”
“You know me, Ivan. I’m always okay. Always.”
I slipped away before he could ask me anything more.
ruby
“Uncle Bob!”
Ruby races over—galomph, galomph—across the broad field that’s part of the elephant domain. She’s so cute when she runs, like she’s determined not to trip on her trunk.
Ruby adores me. I make her laugh, I read the room, I lighten the mood.
I gotta admit, I am kind of adorable.
When I’m with Ivan, I think: Pal, we’ve been through a lot, you and me. We are survivors.
When I’m with little Ruby, I think: Girl, look at you! Hard-luck past, and here you are, so much happier. So loved.
Ruby, like Ivan, was plucked from Africa as a baby. She ended up in a circus that went bankrupt, then got shipped off to Mack’s mall.
Ruby was taken in by dear old Stella. When Stella passed away, Ivan stepped in to play . . . well, elephant dad, I guess.
I did my part, too. Not ’cause I felt like I had to.
It just made life easier. Elephant toddlers are a handful.
You think humans are bad? Try putting a two-hundred-pound baby elephant in time-out.
ruby’s family
Little Ruby seems much more content at the park, surrounded by her new herd. Old and young and in between, they spoil that adorable pachyderm like you wouldn’t believe.
She deserves every minute of it. Kid had a rough start.
Seems elephants hang out in packs of females. Now that she’s at the park, Ruby has adoptive sisters and aunts and grandmothers galore. (In the wild, the elephant guys head off, once they’re old enough, and do their own thing.)
Sometimes I lose track of who’s who among the elephants, because they’re always taking mud baths, scrambling their smells.
By the way, what kind of animal actually likes baths?
Mud, sure.
ivan’s art
“How’s it going, girl?” I call to Ruby as she stops near the moat edging the wall.
“I had cantaloupe for breakfast, Uncle Bob! And it was yummy! And then I took a mud bath!” She pauses to take a breath. “Do you want to hear a new dog riddle, Uncle Bob?”
“Of course I do,” I say, and I catch Ivan’s amused glance.
“What kind of dog is always on time?” asks Ruby.
“Hmm. You got me, Ruby. I’m totally baffled. Befuddled. Bewildered. What kind of dog?”
“A watchdog!” Ruby exclaims. “Watchdog! Get it, Uncle Bob?”
“Not bad, Ruby. Not bad at all,” I say.
“Ivan says it’s going to rain buckets,” says Ruby. She dips her trunk in the moat and blows bubbles.
“I think Ivan is onto something there.”
“Did he show you his new picture?” Ruby asks. She grabs a tuft of grass and tosses it in the air. “I wish I could see it, but I can’t ’cause of that silly wall. But he told me all about it.”
My pal Ivan is quite the artist, just like Julia.
Ivan sits up and nods toward a spot on the wall.
“Another mud mural?” I ask.
As any good dog knows, dirt plus water equals mud, and mud means mess, and mess means let’s roll in this stuff and maybe dig a hole or two or ten.
But for Ivan, mud plus a flat surface equals a waiting canvas.
I crane my neck, edging a bit farther down the top of the wall. Don’t want to draw attention to myself.
“Hey, nice,” I say.
I mean, I’m not an art guy. To me, art is a glop of spray cheese on a cheese dog with extra grated cheese on top.
Still, I’ve always admired Ivan’s work.
“It’s—” Ivan begins.
“No,” I say. “Don’t tell me. Lemme guess.”
“You always guess wrong,” Ivan says.
“Not always.”
“You thought my palm tree was a dandelion.”
“Art is in the eye of the beholder,” I say.
“You thought my blackberries were giant ants.”
Kinyani ambles up to join in the conversation. “And need I remind you that you thought his portrait of me was a chimpanzee with gas?”
“The resemblance was striking,” I say.
Kinyani glares at me.
She glares at me a lot.
on the subject of chimps
Probably I shouldn’t have mentioned the chimp angle.
Gorillas aren’t as open-minded as dogs. A lot of them have a thing about chimps. Think they’re clowns. But when I look at apes and gorillas, seems to me they have a lot more in common than they admit to.
Dogs ain’t perfect. But I’ll tell you one thing where we rule: tolerance.
For us, a dog is a dog is a dog. I see a Great Dane, I say howdy. I run into a puggle, it’s Glad to meet ya, how’s it goin’, smelled any good pee lately?
Go to a dog park and you’ll see. We are equal opportunity playful. You sniff my rear, I sniff yours.
You don’t see that with humans, obviously. Constantly seeing differences where none exist. All those things like skin color? Dogs could care less. You think I won’t hang with a dalmatian ’cause he’s spotted? Or a shar-pei ’cause she’s wrinkled?
I’m not saying I love every dog I meet. (Snickers comes to mind.)
But I’ll always give a dog the benefit of the doubt. Life is short. Play is good. And there are plenty of tennis balls to go around.
a very handsome dog
“Hi, Aunt Kinyani!” Ruby calls.
“Once again, Ruby,” says Kinyani, “I am not your aunt. I am a primate. And you, my dear, are not. More’s the pity.”
“But if Ivan is my uncle, then you have to be my aunt,” Ruby declares.
“Ahem,” says Ivan, pointing to the wall. “My painting, Bob?”
I consider. “It looks like . . . like a dog?”
Ruby flaps her ears. I can tell she is trying very hard to stay quiet.
“A very handsome dog,” I add. “Is it—”
“It is!” Ruby exclaims. “It’s you, Uncle Bob! Uncle Ivan told me!”
“But who’s that?” I ask, pointing to another set of mud strokes.