Conventional wisdom says that you can’t teach an old dog a new trick, but the lady in condo #1210 in my building is trying to do exactly that.

She’s trying to teach her dog Jack to live a little longer.

Jack is a gregarious, six-year-old Golden Retriever with a rich, lustrous red coat that puts most my ex-girlfriends’ hair to shame. Jack is lean and lanky, so when he runs he strongly resembles a horse, a similarity which of course quickly dissolves once he starts sniffing peoples’ butts in the building’s elevator.

Jack, like most Golden Retrievers, possesses a friendly, eager-to-please demeanor. If he were a guy, he’s be the loyal, wide-eyed friend up for anything who shows up to a party with a 12-pack of beer because it’s the nice thing to do.  

Of course then he would drink too much, rip off everything but his underwear, throw up on the girl he’s hitting on and pee in the fish tank but we’re getting ahead of ourselves.

Two months ago, I struck up a conversation with Jack’s owner “Ann.” The quotation marks are necessary because, well, I don’t know her name. Like most people in my building, I know all the dogs’ names but just a few of the humans’. She is “Jack’s owner,” I am “Simba and Clementine’s owner” and so on. This can seem unsettling but when I consider that I could be “The Guy Who Never Dusts His Apartment” or “The Guy Who Routinely Comes Home with a Fifth of Vodka,” I elect not to protest.

Ann said she had just found out Jack had cancer, unfortunately a common disease in the breed.

“I’m so sorry. What kind?” I asked, as if that would help frame any of my responses. I just wanted to be inquisitory and polite.

“Mastocytoma. He has a mast cell tumor of the paw. Twenty-five percent of all dogs with skin tumors have this,” she responded.

With that, Jack ran by us, in full pursuit of a squirrel, and then a bird, and then a tennis ball. If he had cancer, I didn’t know it. He was in superb spirits all things considered. Hell, if I get a hangnail I curl up in bed, cry, eat Ben and Jerry’s Cake Batter and listen to Air Supply.

“What can you do?” I asked.

“Radiation. Prednisone. Prayer.” She said, as she smiled, perhaps to make the conversation less uncomfortable.

“Good luck,” I said.

“Thank you,” she responded, as she flung a tennis ball off into the grass, which sent Jack bounding after it like it was the last biscuit on earth. He caught up to it, pawed it to a stop and chewed on for several seconds, before dropping it out of his mouth and panting with a tongue slightly smaller than a pancake at I-Hop.

Weeks later, I saw Jack and Ann again in the same grassy play space behind our condo. I looked down and saw Jack smiling despite a hairless, raw paw with a bright pink hue – the consequence of the radiation. It looked bad.

Knowing what I intended to ask, she offered, “He’s had three treatments. It’s helping a little but he can’t walk after each one. He’s fine today but the last treatment was a week ago. I talked to Tom (her husband) and we are not going to take him again. We just can’t … We can’t take him …We can’t do that … ” as her voice trailed off.

 “What are you going to do?” I asked.

“Love him,” she said.

It was a beautiful response, and one that has not escaped me since. When I head out on a run, I often see her strolling with him amongst the grass, or on the trail that snakes past our building. Ann is pretty beyond her 45+ years and her large sunhat and graceful walk lend her a sophistication you can’t pick out of a store window. When it is windy, her dresses ripple in the breeze like when you shake a bed sheet, and this adds to her eloquence. She belongs on a book jacket.

Of course, Jack is anything but, and it is precisely this juxtaposition of energies and imagery that give me pause. Sometimes I will slow up, just enough to watch them play, just enough to watch her love him. But I do so with caution, not wanting Ann (or Jack) to notice I am being deliberate. I don’t want to ruin it.

I think about stopping to say, “Jack is a beautiful dog and he loves you,” but she knows this.

I think about stopping to say, “Ann is the best owner you could ever want,” but he knows this.

Her walks with Jack are longer these days. Either that or the walks are in greater frequency. I think I know what this means, but I don’t ask. All updates from now on must come from her – whenever she feels like sharing.

I see them walking side by side.  I can tell Jack is begging for the tennis ball. I can tell Ann is begging for more time. Time to rub his ears. Time to wake up in bed alongside him. Time to watch him nap.

Time to teach him one last trick.