April 15, 1999

Dear Patty,

A peaceful, easy feeling can be hard to maintain here on South Lorimier Street. Cars with death-wave bass speakers cruise by regularly, then burn rubber up the hill toward the Mississippi River bridge. A neighbor with high-test vocal cords screams at her kids just as often. We are not guiltless. No one walks by our house or next to our fence without Hank erupting in barks if he sees them. Lucy joins the chorus if it's another dog. All in all, ours is a noisy neighborhood.

Work is much the same minus the baring of canine teeth. People carry on conversations from one side of the room to the other and there's always a phone ringing. One reason I like golf so much is that it's such a quiet sport that at certain times talking is impolite.

So it was I was indulging in an annual fantasy last weekend, a trip via TV to Augusta, Ga., and the Masters golf tournament. CBS plays soothing music throughout, often between shots, and the golf course always looks like a deep green Garden of Eden decorated for spring with azalea blossoms.

It's the Masters, where even the galleries observe decorum. No one yells "Get in the hole" after each shot. At the Masters, announcers speak in hushed tones even if they're in the studio. It's like a library.

Yeah, the scene is so genteel I'd probably hate the reality, but it's a Fantasy Island of tranquility when you feel like you're living in a sea of turmoil.

Suddenly this daydream was interrupted by the sound of DC yelping. It was the yelp I have begun to equate with the words "Danger Will Robinson" from "Lost in Space."

By the third yelp my tennis shoes were on, sixth yelp I'm out the back door.

The emergency: It seems Lucy was celebrating Ground Hog Day late this year.

Ground hogs have been spotted in the neighborhood recently, including one squashed beneath bass notes and smoking tires on William Street. Apparently, one had misguidedly decided to make a home in a back yard roamed by two dogs who live to terrorize squirrels.

Lucy had crawled as far as she could inside a large hole dug at the base of our cottonwood tree. Only her back half was visible, her only sign of life the rise and fall of her breath.

Hank was huddled right behind her. He had not gone down the hole first, of course, being afraid of the dark.

Carefully I nudged Hank out of the way, very carefully because he was agitated and snarling. Prozac can only perform so many miracles. Grabbing Lucy's back paws, I pulled but she didn't budge. She was dug in like troops at the Battle of the Bulge.

Sinking my knees deep into the muddy dirt around the burrow, I pulled harder, and now both Lucy and DC were yelping. Lucy wasn't hurt, just upset about being separated from her prey.

It was impossible to tell if DC was upset that Lucy might kill the ground hog or that the ground hog might kill her. It didn't matter.

Once she was all the way out, both of us muddy but not bloodied, Lucy sized up the ground hog's defender like a halfback five yards from the endzone. Quickly I grabbed the untrained dog owner's best friend, her collar, and escorted her to the back porch, resisting every step, Hank trailing behind.

DC thanked me and bid me return to Augusta National, but the Masters spell had been broken. No yelping, snarling and muddy clothes are allowed at the Masters.

DC built a little fence around the ground hog burrow, only afterward worrying that she'd imprisoned it. No matter. Lucy broke through the fence the next day, but the ground hog had escaped.

The hole was no longer interesting to Lucy. She lay on her blanket, a picture of serenity.

Love, Sam