A Dog Named Whitey by George Zidbeck

A strong word, sorrow. Who hasn’t experienced that emotion? And yet does that word alone trigger sadness? Even if not, it prompts me to tell you of my first major introduction to that state of mind. This story explains the life and times of a small, white-haired, mixed terrier. “Only a dog,” some might say. Only a dog? No. A frog is a frog; a rat is a rat. But Whitey became the Zidbeck family’s beloved pet.

His story began before Pearl Harbor in the American Canal Zone that split the isthmus of the Republic of Panama. Daddy worked as a machinist in Balboa’s Mechanical Division on the Pacific side. A co-worker had brought in a boxful of puppies, and my father thought it a good idea to take one home for the kids. At shift’s end, he entered the rear door leading to the kitchen where Mom had started supper. She quickly determined his mission and with verbal vigor refused to harbor the animal. Too bad, Mom. Her ten-year and eight-year old sons joined the pleading of the six-year-old daughter. Following a barrage of “Please Mommy, please, please…,” she relented. Okay, we could keep the puppy if we children fed and watered the animal, and house broke it, and exercised it, and did whatever needed doing to care for the dog. Sure Mom, sure.

Dad worked. We children went to school. Mom soon realized that the majority of time to care for the pup required her to undertake most of the necessary rearing and training chores. Whitey rewarded her by giving her alpha status. Mom ruled the roost so to speak so why not. Still, when he played outdoors with his animal kin, he simultaneously became the neighborhood pet – the only dog in our block.

Our block meant five three-story, concrete buildings, each building holding four family apartments atop an extended basement where tenants might park their cars, and where the ladies did the washing. Also in the basement were four garbage cans, two at each end. At the rear of the basement section, doorways at each end opened into a vast space containing clotheslines along with a mix of vegetation. In short, ample playing space for youngsters.

On many weekends, Daddy drove the family to Far Fan Beach on the eastern side of the Canal. In those years, we had to take a ferry across the Pacific inlet, then drive into the interior about four miles before turning to the coast where a sheltered bay awaited. Whitey sat in the back seat of our 1937 Chevrolet with his young family members. Even before hitting the parking area above the beach with its recognizable odors, he yipped and yapped and woofed until allowed to scurry to the ocean’s edge. I sometimes took him a short distance into the salty water, but he quickly paw-paddled to shore.

At this point, I must confess that my father tippled to excess. No need now to detour into the many family problems that condition created. Just know that one night he came home quite late, decided to sit on a day bed at one end of an extended porch and have a final cigarette. When he passed out, the cigarette fell on the mattress that soon smoldered. Even without flaming, the smoke alarmed Whitey whose barking awakened my mother and me. My younger brother and sister somehow slept through the bedlam. When I stepped out of the bedroom shared with my brother, I saw my mother dragging my father from the couch, where he remained motionless when she dropped him to the floor.

Seeing me, she said, “Your father must have lit a cigarette before he passed out. Thank God Whitey awakened me. Here, take this mattress out onto the front lawn and them come back to help me fill some pots with water for you to pour over the smoking spots.”

A dutiful son followed a mother’s command. The sleeping pad soon stopped smoking. When I returned inside, my father’s prone form remained where Mom had dropped him. I asked her, “What do we do now?”

“We go back to bed.”

“But, what about Daddy?”

“He’s in the bed he made for himself. Go on now; go to bed.” She turned to the master bedroom, her sleeping gown barely off the floor. Whitey softly padded his paws behind her.

Not that Whitey saved our concrete structure from certain conflagration, but he very well prevented my father from some serious 2nd degree burns.

For anyone who benefited from a loyal pet, such a person eventually faced the ending of that animal’s life. No need for an extended narration here. Whitey did not fade gently into the good night. The family had taken another trip to Far Fan Beach. However, a portly male guest filled up the front seat. With Mom sitting in the back with her three offspring, she didn’t think Whitey should come along. He barked for her to reconsider, but no, he’d have to make do with the neighborhood kids during our absence.

The beach jaunt finished, we headed home. As soon as we turned onto our street and approached our home, we spotted Whitey lying still on our front lawn — not on his feet barking a welcome home. “Oh no,” my mother moaned, her voice barely audible as we exited the car and surrounded our dead pet.

We lived in the lower right apartment, and our adjoining neighbor, Mrs. Perry, walked down her steps to explain: “I heard a screech of tires and looked out a porch window. A taxi driver had run over your dog, but he quickly drove off. I’m so sorry. All I could think of doing was getting him off the street and putting him on your lawn.”

“Thank you,” Mom said with a whispery sadness.

That’s when Daddy cut in and told us all to go in the house, adding, “I’ll take care of Whitey.”

Mother and children, all in tears and choking sobs, single filed up the stairs to the front door. At the top landing, we all stopped to watch over the banister and see our father carry Whitey’s limp body into the basement. It didn’t seem right to have him dumped into a garbage can, but I had no counter to my father’s action. And that’s my final sighting of Whitey – a sight as visual today as nearly 75 years ago.