The View from Bintliff Drive: Life Lessons from Neighborhood Dogs

An Essay
I have to say that my earliest worldview was greatly shaped by the dogs that lived on Bintliff Drive. This is ironic, in a way, because I've always been a "cat person" by nature. In our neighborhood, pets were called by their full names: Chippy Perkins, Skipper Helm, Sam Ballard, Rebel Asher, Brownie Kuehm, Arthur Bradley, Henry Henderson, Von Broom Baker. Looking back, each one of those dogs taught me a life lesson that still impacts me today. After fifty years, my parents still live there, so the lessons are replayed each time I visit my homeplace and stroll down our street. First of all, you have to make a mental movie of our modest street, which made a big horseshoe. The open ends of the horseshoe were Bintliff and McAvoy Drive, which bordered the elementary school where we walked each day. The closed end of the horseshoe was where Bintliff and McAvoy met and where a walking bridge crossed over the bayou to our our junior high school. Historic note: In the 1960s, most kids could still safely walk or ride bikes to their neighborhood school.

Von Broom Baker. Von Broom Baker (a gray Schnauser) lived near the bayou end of Bintliff Drive. He alone can be credited for my acrobatic talent of riding a 24" bike with my feet raised over the handlebars! Whenever I rode toward the curve onto McAvoy, my eyes stayed peeled for the little "Hitler dog" whose fierce shrill bark filled me with trepidation! I had to pedal fast and hard to generate enough speed to raise my legs high enough to outlast the flying gray streak. Eventually I just took the long way around Bintliff to play with my friends on McAvoy. In life I've learned that there are many humans like Von Broom Baker . . . full of bluster and bite, daring anyone to pass by, lest they bare their teeth and lash out . Thanks to that neighborhood dog, I was prepared for people like him - -but since I can no longer raise my legs over the handlebars, I usually just make a wide circle around them!

Rebel Asher. I loved the Asher kids and Rebel (a black lab mix), who lived directly across the street. One of our favorite pastimes was performing Beatle songs for all the neighbors. My older sister, Suzanne, always had to be Paul; Leslie Asher was John; Randy Asher was Ringo, so I was stuck being George. During the hottest hours we would play in the garage, shaking our wigs and lip syncing to the record player while waiting for the popsicle man to drive by. Historic note: In the 1960s, playing INdoors was considered a punishment--what on earth was there to do inside? Houston summers were brutal, so the popsicle man was right up there with God when it was 98 degrees with 98% humidity. We didn't have tons of money, but we could usually scrape together enough change to buy an Eskimo Pie, Drumstick or Bullet. Rebel Asher also loved the popsicle man--or maybe it was his big UPS-style truck. When the bell started ringing, all the kids would scramble for money and alert the others to come. Every time, Rebel Asher would get swept away by all the excitement and chase the popsicle truck all the way down Bintliff toward the bayou. I'm sure the popsicle man had nothing against that sweet dog, but one horrible day, his wheels squashed poor Rebel, leaving a deep crimson blood stain right in front of our house. Thereafter, second base was permanently marked when we played street kickball. It was traumatic for Leslie and Randy and all of us who had witnessed our first death. Kids didn't really go to counseling back then, so we decided we would never buy anything from the popsicle man again--ever. What can I say? It was simple justice. Forty something years later, I can still shed a tear over Rebel Asher, second base and my last, melting, red white and blue Bullet. Some of my favorite people today, are those who savor life and live every moment with joy and purpose. They have boundless energy to give to others and live creatively in kairos time (every moment is ripe with opportunity) versus chronos time (tick tock by the clock). My friend, Tiger Easley, was alot like Rebel Asher--he lived life more full and free and in love with Jesus than anyone I've ever known--almost like he knew that his life would be "cut short" by the brain tumor that sent him to heaven a few decades earlier than his family and friends thought was just.

Sam Ballard. After the Ashers moved away, a boy named Quentin came to live in their house. Quentin hated girls, so needless to say, he wasn't a part of our Beatle's Fan Club. To top it off, he had one of the ugliest dogs I've ever seen--very old, mutt version of a wire-haired terrier. Sam Ballard had terrible asthma and flea allergies, so he would just lie on the driveway scratching, snorting and wheezing. Historic note: in the 1960s, humans still got better health care than animals. Sam Ballard didn't play with us much, but he was always present, taking everything in: like when Quentin used croquet wickets to pin me down in my yard or, when I pulled weeping willow branches off the Sharp's tree to whip Quentin's bare back or, when Quentin shot me in the head with a slingshot full of tallow berries, or when I aimed a softball at Quentin's head but it curved and smashed a distinctive hole in their front door. . . old Sam Ballard never growled, chased me, or even moved out of the way--expressionless, he just watched and wheezed.
Eventually, Quentin and I actually became good friends, but I have no memory of what became of that dog. I've met several "Sams" over the years—people who quietly (well, not so quietly in Sam's case) watch the world pass by without ever entering into the fracus . . . considering today's world, maybe they have the right idea . . . at least Sam Ballard didn't go the way of Rebel Asher!

Arthur Bradley. A seldom-fluffy sheepdog, Arthur Bradley, lived at the closed end of the horseshoe where Bintliff and McAvoy met. The Bradley's yard backed up to the bayou, so their back and side yards were enclosed by a chain link fence. Unlike most other dogs in our neighborhood, Arthur was always kept inside the fence "for his protection". Poor Arthur was so frustrated! He jumped and barked and ran up and down while all the kids cut through the empty lot next to their house, to access the walking bridge to our junior high. Arthur strained every muscle to scale the fence when kids steered their bikes in and out of the little drainage holes that had been cut into the street to prevent flooding. Every now and then he would escape his prison yard and joyfully chase after cars, turtles, or kickballs until, once again, he was dragged back behind the aluminum curtain. After a string of such incidents, the well-meaning Bradley's took stronger measures and bought a long chain that allowed Arthur freedom to run, but "protected" him (from drivers like the popsicle man). And that was that . . . until we heard the shocking news that Arthur Bradley had hung himself trying to jump over the fence one last time. Every kid in the neighborhood had a different story about how it happened, but I perceived the dark truth . . . Arthur Bradley was "a suicide". One day he decided life wasn't worth living unless he could be free. . . at least Rebel Asher lived and died enjoying life right in there with all of us kids. Not too many years later, a human friend of mine followed Arthur Bradley's example. In an attempt to leap (literally) from her emotional and spiritual prison, the death of hope took away her last chance to work through adolescence with the rest of us. Years after her funeral, I remembered Arthur Bradley and hoped he and Kim were playing together somewhere. It would be many years later that I would begin to understand that humans have their own version of chains, every bit as real and devastating as poor Arthur Bradley's.

Brownie Kuehm. One of my favorite "people" on Bintliff Drive was Brownie Kuehm. He lived across the street and down a bit, inside a house with an obnoxiously bright orange door and equally "orange" owners. I think he was a cross between a Golden Lab or Retriever and an Irish setter. Historical note: in the 1960s, no one would have dreamed of paying for an Aussie-doodle or Daisy dog- -we had Henry Henderson, who was a bizarre cross between a basset hound and a dachshund-- that's the legend, anyway). Even though Brownie didn't smell too good, I liked him more than any other dog because he didn't jump on people. or chase cars, or bark much. He just followed us girls everywhere and quietly hung out nearby, whether we were stirring up "projects" in Janet's bathroom, swimming in Patti's pool, or engaging in our weekly cat fights themed: Two's company, Three's a crowd. Janet, Patty and I eventually left for college and lost touch, but years later, Mr. and Brownie Kuehm still religiously took their evening walk or drove by in their long car with knobby, plastic seat covers that smelled like a cross between B.O. and L'Air du Temps. Windows down, Mr. Kuehm would call out "Hey, hey hey!" while Brownie looked straight ahead, tongue out and fur blowing back. Sometime over the years, the orange front door was repainted and one way or another, Brownie exited Bintliff Drive. So did the other dogs . . . and most of the original families that moved into our neighborhood when the huge oaks and pines were just sticks poking out of the chinch-bugged St. Augustine.

As I said, my earliest worldview was greatly shaped by the dogs that lived on Bintliff Drive: Von Broom Baker, Rebel Asher, Sam Ballard, Arthur Bradley, Brownie Kuehm and severalothers. Maybe someday, I'll share how their human family members influenced me- -but most were just like Brownie Kuehm- -they lived quietly and loved loyally, minding their own business, but right there if you ever needed them--a worthy aim to bring back to our 21st century neighborhoods.