Skidboot 'The Smartest Dog In The World' (17 page)

They'd stacked a small pyramid of luggage on the ground, and when David gave the ignition a final, angry twist, and the engine shockingly purred to life, they had to fling the bags back into the camper, Barbara desperately trying to shove them in while David shouted, "let's go, let's go!" then peeling away while Barbara struggled to secure the door. Luggage dropped around them like ripe fruit. Skidboot pasted himself to the front window with his usual bombardier focus, ears perked, stiff-legged with the careening momentum of the camper, as if flying a Spitfire mission.

David and Barbara yelled, argued, and pleaded with each other while dodging a flying phalanx of airborne work gloves,
Texas Monthly
magazines and a scatter of empty water bottles. A cabinet door sprang open, ejecting tuna cans, sponges, dog food and cleaning cloths, turning the camper into a comic road version of the sorcerer's apprentice, everything hellishly animated and airborne.

They squealed into long-term parking, the camper nearly upending as they torqued to a stop. David, horrified, realized that he'd driven to a place so distant from the terminal that he'd never be able to limp fast enough to cover the distance, two-miles away. The sky winked at them, as if this was the funniest thing to have come along all day.

"We need a shuttle bus!" They spotted one a few turnouts away, its yellow roof jaunty and inviting, and grabbing, dragging, limping and perspiring, they flagged it down. With relief, David and Barbara moved to board when:

"That dog cannot go on a shuttle." His accent, liltingly Indian, spoke of rules and regulations of a bygone era, the lingering aura of colonialism and its nascent delight in adhering to form, dotting the "I", keeping in step, and stiff upper lip, as he surveyed this ungainly, sweating crew of questionable people
and
their dog.

"What?" David felt like he would keel over.

"The dog, he must be in a crate. He cannot get on board my shuttle like that." Thin and dark, the shuttle raj drew out the last words with lingering satisfaction, the rule of the reign.

David pleaded, Barbara enjoined, they both demanded access, since
the dog had a first class ticket, better than most tickets, and would not be in a crate.
They shuffled the tickets in his face, fanned out like a poker hand, but he turned surly. "I don't care," and he moved to close the door.

Again, David yelled into a phone, calling the airport personnel as he checked his watch. The minutes did not lie—they would miss this plane, too. Another call, this time to the Leno people. The smooth, buttery voice of the Show Coordinator reassured him, with
don't worry, we'll get you from there to Los Angeles, we'll make the right calls. We are Jay Leno.”

As they stood fuming, flummoxed by events, with the Shuttle driver smirking as he drove away, a special van squealed up, doors flew open, and they were ushered in. "You're booked for a later flight," the attendant assured them, and for the distance of two miles—two blessedly calm, relief-filled miles—they kept the thought, "we are Jay Leno, we can make anything happen."

And just as they began to relax, the Dallas/Ft. Worth airport arranged another obstacle. The check-in line, merging with the boarding line, stretched in a serpentine curve nearly out the door.
A mile long and a day short,
David groaned, as he realized that they were never, ever, going to get to Los Angeles. And as if to underline this, a harried-looking official, pushing people out of her path to reach them, informed them that, because of the heat, the airline had an embargo on flying dogs.

Flying dogs?
For a brief second, his eyes sought the ceiling to see any floating by, then realized that she meant dogs in the cargo hold.

“Ma'am, I am so exhausted. This dog has a ticket in first class, He is flying to the Tonight Show with Jay Leno, he is
on the plane
and
not
in the cargo hold. She seemed surprised, peered down at Skidboot, as if seeking signs of celebrity in the Blue Heeler with the red kerchief, and David wondered if he should add the shades. Skidboot looked oddly like Bruce Willis with dark glasses, and David fretted, remembering the sage advice of an elder cowboy who approached him at the National Senior Pro rodeo. "David," he said, "you got a great act with your dog. I was an extra in the movie
Shane
, and I got a good taste of movie life. You are going to get more and more popular, don't ruin it by going all Hollywood. People love the real
you
, not the celebrity stuff." David reached down and took off the glasses. There. His old pal, Billy, would be proud.

The attendant hurried off, and returned waving a paper wildly, like a fly swatter, shouting "follow me, follow me!" as they queued after her, a wedge formation cutting through the crowd like a football play as she announced, "celebrity status, please clear the way." Like ducklings, they trailed her to the head of the line, straight into the boarding area, and were waved through. Heads turned, people murmured, as they tried to register who or what had just gone through on its way to the NBC studios in Burbank, California.

"Skidboot, " David said, while buckling into comfortable seats, "you order whatever you want to eat, buddy. You get yourself the best." And within half an hour, Skidboot sat politely, waiting for Barbara to feed him, one bite at a time, as they sped toward their first encounter with Jay Leno and
The Tonight Show.

By now, David and Skidboot had been on so many TV programs that the icy grip of fear had relaxed. David no longer felt dumbstruck, stomach-clutched and nerve wracked. He just tried to think sequentially, calmly, and identify the different performance segments. But first, he had to recover from the sight of Skidboot's dressing room, marked with a huge star and the words "SKIDBOOT."

The music rolled, the announcer announced, Jay Leno chuckled through a comic monologue, and then the guests popped in. He and Skidboot were number two, and they watched the action happen on the stage and overhead, onscreen.

I wonder if Skidboot knows what's going on? David thought. I hardly do.

They heard their names called, and suddenly, like magic, the two were cozily chatting with Jay Leno on the biggest talk show in America. David coolly gave Skidboot's lineage—Blue Heeler mother, scalawag father, address unknown. He told the audience how he'd threatened to get rid of the dog, he was such a miscreant, so badly behaved. How he'd finally trained Skidboot, even though he didn't know beans about dog training. Tonight, he threw in a segment about the truck.

"I have the drivers' license, not Skidboot. But the way he anticipates every move, it wouldn't surprise me if he drove off in it one of these mornings..."

Laughter. More laughter.

By now, Skidboot's performance path had veered from the usual Lion's Club or Kiwanis Club, from the rodeo circuit, from the church social and the school gym to venues of national dimensions. The first call from the Jay Leno show, although unnerving, kept pace with the rapidly accelerating pace of their lives. It was a magnificent success, far beyond anyone's imagining. And in later years, David had only one regret: that with Barbara in the audience, and the appearance happening on
her birthday
, that he'd never called her out, made national, televised mention of it. Nervous, he'd waited while the announcer panned through the opening credits, tapped his toes during the first monologue by Leno, smiled briefly at the comedy sketch and waited with trepidation for the first guest appearance—Skidboot. By then, the build-up of anxiety overflowed. He lacked the slick familiarity that show people develop in the camera's eye, the ability to chat, applaud and thank their sponsors. And no matter how many major appearances loomed, and how many precious people—including his wife on her birthday—that he failed to mention, he rationalized, thinking,
I'm just a horseshoer. But I'll learn how to do it better.

CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE

Cruelty or Control

Leno had loved Skidboot the first time around, and the staff couldn't wait to have him back. On the second appearance, Leno knew only what he'd known the year before. What he didn't know about Skidboot was the back story, how the dog had gone "sour," how David had cooked up a mock rodeo to get him back on course, how Skidboot had fallen into a flare-up of rule breaking and rude surprises in front of a large audience, and how David Hartwig ended up doing the dance while his dog called the tune.

Leno didn't know this. All he knew was, that at Skidboot's second appearance, the dog had gone national and even had his own fan club. However, David still had to take a hand—from time to time—in making sure that Skidboot remembered the rules.

There was a camera on every floor of the Universal Studio building, and one of them had filmed David, this long, tall cowboy from Texas, throwing himself flat on top of the dog, growling like a grizzly in heat, pulling the dog's ears and yelling into his face. Typical backstage behavior for
humans
, not humans with dogs.

"Now David," Leno grew thoughtful. "You've been on this show before. We all love Skidboot, and respect the two of you greatly."

Skidboot stared at Leno.
You do?
Did Skidboot remember his first time on Leno's show? He recognized the bright eyes and the crescent chin of the big-time talkshow host, the man David was so excited about. No one in the audience had seen David's vigorous ear tweaking, only Leno. But Jay Leno knew that the monitor fed live coverage into the blue room where the board members congregated, and that one of
them
might have seen it.

They'd been warming up backstage, with David talking to his dog in a low voice, earnest, letting him know that this was a big afternoon. Assistants with untucked shirts and narrow eyewear kept them comfortable with water, snacks, Pepsi, whatever they wanted. David had turned to the technicians, the assistants, the camera crew, just to explain the ear-pulling agenda.

"I'm gonna warm up this dog a little. That means I
might
pull his ear, just a little, just so he knows that he can't cheat." He'd seen their glances. "Now, he may squeal, but don't worry." Again, the worried glances.

David had bent down to Skidboot. "You better behave! This is a big one. No cheating."

Skidboot shivered, delicious with anticipation.
Yes, a big one, we're here!

But now came Leno, moving toward them, beckoning, smiling.

"Just a private word."

David bent his head to hear words that made no sense to him at first, in that they almost accused him of, what, mistreating Skidboot? He tried to fix on what Leno was saying. Bright lights nearly blinded him. A door slammed like a howitzer.

"…so please, David, don't intimidate the dog on stage."

The Jay Leno Show, America's favorite TV show, with America's favorite TV personality, bringing favorite segments to the American population, refused to associate with any kind of animal intimidation, even if it was "training."

David nodded,
now I get it
. They thought he was being cruel! Why, they didn't know about the long history of man and dog, the earth's first domesticated animal and its historic ascent to become man's almost-human companion. Both practical and familial, in Australia, the land of Skidboot's ancestry, the natives in the bush used dogs as blankets, burrowing beneath one, two, even three if the night was cold enough and giving rise to the term,
three dog night.
The bond of man and dog was longstanding, beginning with the dog's primary role up until the nineteenth century as a work beast, either hunting, herding or guarding. Cheerful empathy finally brought the dog inside the house as a tame family companion. As Susan Orleans writes, a wave of best-selling dog autobiographies were published in the 1800's, in which authors supposed what the dog thought and felt, giving the dog a voice in such bestsellers as
Memories of Bob or The Spotted Terrier:
Supposed to Be Written by Himself.
Here then were little quasi-humans even less powerful than their owners but compliant in every way, and besides, good company. Dogs, it was believed, had more empathy than people. Didn't they make incredible journeys to "find" a lost master or mistress? Didn't they mourn at a master's grave?

David and Skidboot had a working relationship. They understood each other. And no, he didn't favor the dog the way Barbara did, always trying to protect it, keep it comfy, see that it had treats and a lap to sit on. His relationship was more dominant: the big dog telling the little dog what for. David tried to convey it to Jay Leno, tried to reassure him, no ear-pulling, no human growling, nothing that might look like bully behavior on national television. Leno smiled, ever the host.

In all their career together, man and dog, David looked back on the Leno show as one of the two times the issue had come up.

The other happened half a year earlier, when he'd popped Skidboot with the piggin' string publicly to the horror of the rodeo committee. The gesture, as quick and surprising as a locker room towel snap, paralyzed Skidboot. He froze while licking his coat, stopped with his tongue halfway up his back. He eyed his own tail, then swiveled around and pointed his sleek head at the toy, eyes fixed, the mischief drained right out of him.

The rodeo committee knew that any roper worth his rawhide always carried his piggin' string, the most essential part of the roper's tool kit. This whip like leather thong up to 7-feet long, would tie the cattle's feet after roping. Some cowboys tie the string to a D-ring off the saddle, some tie it to their chaps, but wherever it lies, it's roped and ready. Work wise, the piggin' string comes in handy to as a slip knot around a gatepost to hold closed a wire gate if you can't make the latch fit. It doubles as a bridle rein, can hobble a horse and tie up a dog. The string, both ceremonial and useful, marked the owner, like Merlin's wand, as having power.
One pop with the piggin',
said David, and Skidboot would behave. In fact, usually just the sight of the piggin' was enough to settle him into the routine. The piggin's power resided in action, as well as memory and symbolism. Only occasionally did he have to reintroduce Skidboot the hard way.