Jack on drugs

I used to love the Fourth of July. What wasn't there to love? There's the heat, beer, fireworks , block parties and smell of barbecue, with one kosher grill working overtime in an ecumenical setting that is one of our greatest holidays.

I always ranked the Fourth a close second to Thanksgiving, another fantastic day that pushes aside the idiot partisan politics and foaming nationalism that leave me wondering who actually speaks for this country.

The Fourth of July quote that I dearly love went directly from John Adams to John Paul Jones, the Scotsman who shelled the city of Kirkcaldy, Scotland, in a largely symbolic - there were no casualties - but breathtakingly wonderful act of pointless vandalism. Adams described the flag of this new nation as having 13 alternating red and white stripes with 13 stars on a blue field "representing a new constellation." I loved the day, see, loved its folklore and everything about it down to the sounds of children's voices echoing across the evening neighborhood. Only I don't love it anymore. It's like when some horrible event forever colors a day so it can't ever again be enjoyed in the same way.

I am talking of course about Jack the dog. I've written about this walking problem before. That's because I'm still amazed that he's alive, a dog so insane, so tied to the quivering harmonic gyrations of this Earth, so likely to gad about at light speed, that it is necessary to drug him on a daily basis. Not drugged into submission mind you, just drugged to the point where he can be seen by mortal eyes.

While Tom Cruise may well object to the psychotropic juicing of family pets I contend that, like Brooke Shields, there was no choice. I realized this a year ago on the Fourth of July when Jack chewed his way through a pair of French doors. We were gone for an hour but a nearby artillery-barrage-like fireworks display started early and Jack went like Mel Gibson in "Patriot."

I did mention that Jack is a German shorthaired pointer, didn't I? He's a gun dog, a natural hunter. While he often points at squirrels and birds with one paw raised and his body stiff like a drawing on a Father's Day card, I'm certain that the report of a real gun would rip him out of his skin.

Once a passing flotilla of Harleys sent Jack leaping over a 6-foot wooden fence and into the road where he was struck twice (bumper and windshield) by the same moving BMW, only to land on his feet and trot back to us like this was an everyday occurrence in his alternative dimension.

To prevent a three-time-loser pound fine of $180 I had to hang 2 feet of wire atop our fences, an addition that lends a white trash look to the place.

Jack , meanwhile, laughs at pain. How else could he lose a tooth chewing on a door and never mention it even though he now looks like a yokel with his lower-front gap. After that it was either farm him out to some other suckers, put him down or take the vet's advice and become a 1-800-PETMEDS regular.

Only I discovered during a winter lightning storm that a daily anti-anxiety dose can't prevent the sudden appearance of demons in Jack 's limited psyche.

So, I turned to the vet for special Fourth of July pills, one of which I stuffed down his throat at Fred's barbecue. Jack had permission to attend Fred's barbecue.

Luckily Jack behaved. Then he started to behave even better, going slowly weak-kneed, hangdog, sleepy-eyed and dopey-faced with medication. By the time we got home he was mumbling to himself in German. Still, as an extra precaution, we put a blue bandana around his head to hold in place the cotton we put in his floppy ears.

When the fireworks began Jack looked like a junkie Ellis Island immigrant dog.

I looked like an idiot. Next year Jack runs free. I'll take the drugs.