Doyel: After our 1st year together, my retired greyhound Cap can still take my breath away
Gregg DoyelThe most recent time my Cap took my breath away? Well, this is me sitting here, thinking. Happened today, of course. Happens every day. Several times, at that. The most recent? Well…
Well, I guess that was a few minutes ago when I spotted him on our recliner, not exactly curled up, but folded up. He’s a greyhound, see, with legs like a poker table, and he’d folded himself onto my reclining chair, this great big dog, into the size of a briefcase.
The first time he took my breath away? That’s easier. This was a little more than a year ago when he wasn’t my dog yet, just a picture in my head. He was at Greyt Angels, a rescue group in Goshen, Ind., and I’d applied to adopt him and the wait was horrible. Reminds me of applying for a job years ago. There have been several applications over the years, but just one – the Miami Herald – that had me in emotional distress until they said: yes.
That’s how it was with Cap, before he became my Cap. I wanted this dog the way I wanted that job in 1995, knowing it would set my life on a whole new, wonderful course.
But the folks at Greyt Angels, they’re not just handing over their dogs willy-nilly. Their capacity to rescue and provide for these dogs is always stretched thin, but their capacity to love knows no bounds, so they’d dig into their own savings before sending a dog like Cap – before sending any dog – to an unprepared owner.
To prepare me for a dog as unique as this, they suggested I read a book: “Retired Racing Greyhounds for Dummies.”
Really.
I bought a copy, started reading – and here it comes, the first moment Cap took my breath away. It’s on page 8 of Chapter 1: The History of Greyhounds:
“The origin of the name Greyhound is unknown, but it could be derived from the Saxon words Grech or Greg, meaning ‘Greek,’ because they thought the breed originated in Greece.”
Wait a minute.
This dog I’ve wanted since the first time I laid eyes on it, this beautiful breed, might be named after my name?
That’s the first time my Cap took my breath away. Hard to breathe when you’re sobbing.
You fill up my senses like a night in a forest
Like the mountains in springtime, like a walk in the rain
Like a storm in the desert, like a sleepy blue ocean
You fill up my senses, come fill me again
This is my Cap’s birthday, or my birthday, or maybe it’s our anniversary. Whatever you want to call it, it’s been one year since I drove home from Goshen with this beautiful dog in the back seat. The exact date is Dec. 5, really, and ... hang on. Cap’s still on the La-Z-Boy, and he’s dreaming or something because he just grumped. Is that what you call it? Not mumbling, not growling. More like … grumping.
And like that, my breath is gone.
Doyel in 2022: My greyhound Cap is nearly 7 years, and learning how to be a dog
A dog like this, a friendship like ours, fills me with paradoxical joy. The paradox starts here, with what experts say about retired greyhounds like mine, this perfect creature who is gentle, docile, loyal and companionable:
They’re not the same as a greyhound from a breeder.
Look, someday I’ll probably find out the differences for myself. As long as I’m breathing, there will be a greyhound breathing as close to me as possible. But for now, what I know about the breed comes from other owners – you become part of a club, when you get a dog like Cap – and they tell me a bred greyhound is more active, a little rougher, a little more demanding. Nothing problematic, they say, but a clear difference from a retired racer. Again, someday I’ll see.
Unless there’s enough retired greyhounds to go around.
Here’s the paradoxical part of loving my Cap, the rhetorical question I ask: What if he’s this special, this docile and gentle and laid back, not in spite of the life he'd lived before – but because of it?
Dog racing is endangered, legal now in just eight states and active only in one: West Virginia. Animal lovers are mostly united in their opposition to dog racing. Greyhound advocates say the dogs race twice a week but spend the rest of their time in a kennel, a nice word for cage.
It sounds cruel, but having lived a year with my Cap, I can tell you this: He sleeps almost all day. If he’s not walking or eating, he’s sleeping somewhere as close to me as possible. So maybe all that time in the cage – a mean word for kennel – isn’t so bad. Because this is the question I grapple with daily, one that comforts me as I consider my Cap’s first 6½ years:
How bad can the life of a racing greyhound be, if this is the result?
Which leads to another question, one that troubles me:
Is eliminating greyhound racing – which would eliminate the retired greyhound racer – really what this world needs?
Come, let me love you
Let me give my life to you
Let me drown in your laughter
Let me die in your arms
You have no idea how many words I could write about my Cap.
Like, the way he lunges at me at night. Seriously, he does that. It’s called “sleep startle,” and greyhound experts think it comes from leaving their life in a kennel, where sleep is uninterrupted, to life with a companion like me. I’ll roll over, and sometimes Cap growls. I’ll get up, and he’ll growl louder.
I’ll get back into bed, and unless I turn on the light to wake him fully, sometimes he’ll lunge at me. Yes, I’m being serious.
The last time he lunged, he misjudged the distance and actually hit my ear with his bared teeth – not biting me, just smacking me – and it caused a minor cut. Here’s what I did:
Scolded myself for not turning on the light, put on a bandage, went back to bed and whispered into his ear: You’re my Cap.
How many times to do I have to tell you I’m serious?
Why tell you this? Because maybe you’re considering a greyhound of your own. Technically my Cap is a “lurcher” – a retired hunting dog, not a racer – but the lifestyles are similar. Out of the kennel a few times a week for work, then back inside you go.
If you're considering a greyhound or lurcher, you should know about the sleep startle for its sake as much as yours. They're perfect, these babies, and deserve our best, and that includes understanding who they are. As author Suzanne Clothier says in her book “Bones Would Rain from the Sky:”
“A dog will never lie to you.”
Dogs deserve every consideration, which is why the best rejection of my life came not from a newspaper – 20 years ago in Albany, N.Y., and Jacksonville, Fla. – but from Indianapolis-based Prison Greyhounds, which got its start rescuing retired greyhounds and pairing them with offenders at Putnamville Correctional Facility. All part of the dog’s training, and the prisoner’s rehabilitation.
Yes, I’m being … you know.
Anyway, after Prison Greyhounds put 215 greyhounds through Putnamville from 2012-21, the scarcity of dog tracks led to a scarcity of retired racers. Prison Greyhounds is more of a conventional rescue group now, and it had a dog I wanted a few months ago. The adoption process was going great until they learned I lived in an apartment, and they said: No.
Prison Greyhounds will send a dog only to a home with a yard. The rescue group knew about my Cap, knew about my references, knew about me … but said no.
To which I said: If you love these dogs that much, God bless you.
Could I go on about my Cap? You have no idea. I’ve not told you about the gentle way he lets me brush his teeth. Or how he runs, those four long legs windmilling in different directions but propelling him forward at speeds approaching 40 mph. Or the way we sing on our walks, “Annie’s Song” by John Denver. The first stanza, about filling up my senses? I’m singing to him, because that’s what he does for me.
The second stanza? In my heart, he’s singing to me. Because this is all he wants:
Let me lay down beside you
Let me always be with you
Come, let me love you
Come love me again
Find IndyStar columnist Gregg Doyel on Twitter at @GreggDoyelStar or at www.facebook.com/greggdoyelstar.