I’ll just warn anyone, this isn’t funny. It’s not for laughs, it’s for me. I got a call in 2004 from my mom that they found a Golden Retriever wandering the neighborhood and wanted to know if I wanted to take in a dog. I somehow got convinced to do it and man, was he in bad shape. Fully grown, but under 50 pounds (supposed to weigh 85-90) – I could count every rib and vertebrate on him. So I named him Stringbean (obviously) Staley (after Layne from Alice in Chains – looked like a smack addict) Coen. He was scared of absolutely everything. I picked up a mop one day and he ran behind the couch and was shaking. It became pretty obvious that even though he was housebroken and never, I mean never barked, he had been abused. He was even scared of a new street sign they put up outside my condo for over a month and jumped in my bathtub during storms.
I got him fixed up and he finally started acting like a dog. Every day I came home he would tear ass from the door back to my bed and start flipping back and forth with excitement. Either he was happy to see me or he really had to piss, not sure. We would run almost every day for years together until some asshole turned me into the board for not having him on a leash. I hope Bean left a nice loaf on her porch. So we had to walk with a leash after that.
Bean was pretty simple too. His favorite game was to slap box then rub his ears and make some growling noise. I can’t tell you how many hours I passed slap boxing with the big dummy and telling him he better toughen up or get a job and help out with the bills. He ran into walls sometimes because he got so excited to play. I think I ended up calling him Dummy or Stupid more than Bean, but he didn’t seem to care. That dog followed me everywhere. If I went to the bathroom, he would come over and wait by the door. Clearly, his nose didn’t work well.
No person went on as many comedy road trips with me as that dog did (and parties too). He about got attacked by a white trash family’s pit bull at a show in Indiana (comedy hotels aren’t usually five star, thus the bringing of dogs), we stayed in a room that had carpet that looked like putt putt green in northern Michigan and I tried to sneak him into the Greenbriar Casino in West Virginia. Smartly, they didn’t let me stay there anyways, they were very perceptive putting me up in a Knights Inn nine miles away. Bean and I had some bones and Busch Lights and listened to Iron Maiden. Screw you, fancy hotel – you were right not to let me stay, but screw you.
Starting about two years ago, he really started showing signs of aging. He’s overcome a mast cell tumor, being bitten by a put bull mix, and even eating a special flea collar that I thought for sure was going to kill him the summer before our wedding. A girl at my first Halloween party in 2004 gave him four jello shots and I thought he was going to die that night. I tossed that dunce out my front door and threatened to burn down her apartment if my buddy didn’t make it. He never liked Halloween, but it may have been the costumes.
It’s been different lately though. It has been absolute hell, despite medicine and vet care, watching my dog that used to sprint out 100 yards in front of me fall down sideways trying to stand up to go outside. He still liked to play, but I had to pick him up off the ground a dozen times a day. He started falling down while going to the bathroom and the tops of his feet are cut from dragging his feet under him. I thought back to when I found him and he was abused. I know it’s not possible, but I would love to find the guy in Zanesville that was beating him in 2004 and take out every ounce of rage I’ve ever felt flow through my veins.
His decline and looming death have ravaged me like a cold fire. attacking me and leaving empty spaces. I would look out my window and see someone walking a young healthy dog and my whole body would slump. Someone at work would bring up their pets and my breath would get short. I started thinking constantly about if I did enough or was kind enough to my buddy. I couldn’t go an hour without the misery washing over me and I fought to supress it over and over. He would fall down in the back yard and I would beg him to get up, it was just a slip, not his hips. I knew it wasn’t though.
When I got Bean, I didn’t even have the internet at home; now I run a website. I had three grandparents and an uncle that have aren’t with us anymore. I hadn’t even met my wife and wouldn’t for six years. My car has almost 200,000 miles on it and I’ve had him over four years longer than that. I had only done standup one time at a restaurant for less than two minutes; now I’ve written a comedy book and traveled the country. Hell, he was even the star of some internet sketch videos. If you knew me, you knew my old pal Bean. That silent, skittish, loving and loyal red dog that everyone just loved to pieces. When I came home from funerals, bad days, lost jobs, or terrible shows, he was there. He never asked why I was the way I was or was unhappy to see me. Even at the end, when he couldn’t get up, he finally made noise. He would whine when I was out of sight, even in the other room, because he couldn’t see his old master. He couldn’t get up anymore to follow me around. It just broke my heart.
I’m not big on Rainbow Bridges or all dogs go to heaven, but if that makes people feel better, it’s a good thing. I just know this – when you pass away, some say the endorphins release into your brain and you relive the best moments of your life in that short time which feels like a lifetime all over again. I would get to hold my daughter for the first time again in that hospital room, wake up with my wife that first morning at the winery in San Gimignano, see my relatives and laugh on Christmas again and relive a couple nights sitting around a table with my buddies listening to the same music over and over, insulting the shit out of one another and telling the same stories we’ve told a million times. In those final moments, I know I’ll have a spot in my best memories for Bean, running once again out in front of me, rolling around and swatting at me or just sticking his head out of my window as I drive down the road. Or maybe at the end, when I read this to him and let him know it was OK. Today I have to say goodbye to him.
He loved peanut butter and bones and playing in the snow. He loved all people, familiar and strange. He shed like a yak and was clumsy as hell. He was a good rider in the car and was happiest with his head out of the window, no matter the temperature. Most of all, he loved following me everywhere like a bad fart and being petted or played with. He was my shadow. Your dad is very proud of you for trying to get up for me when you were weak and hanging on as long as you did. I will always love my sweet old Bean. You don’t have to hurt anymore, buddy, but this tired man sure is going to miss his friend.