My Dog Years: For Every Year I Walk Dogs, I Age 7

Puppets

One morning Lucas and I were late and somehow managed to miss both shifts at the park. There was only one solitary figure at the northern end of the park throwing a ball for a dog. Lucas had a keen eye and a sharp mind. Before I could stop him, he spotted the fluorescent orange "Chuck-It" ball thrower the person was carrying and made a break for it.

I was slightly panicked as he cantered away, fading into the bamboo and chain link boundaries of the park. A few minutes later, he returned proudly carrying the immaculate color blocked rubber ball. I pried it out of his little jaw and waited to return it to the statuesque woman, who strolled about a hundred yards behind Lucas. When she finally approached with a forlorn American bulldog at her side, I handed her the ball and apologized for my wiry toy thief.

"Sorry about that."

She crouched down, raised her oversized sunglasses and gently reached out to touch Lucas's lower lip.

"That's quite an underbite you've got there."

Her voice was somehow familiar but it was her eyebrows that suddenly created the context for the woman standing in front of me. It was Brooke Shields. All through my awkward, overweight adolescence, it was her face that stared out at me from countless magazine covers and advertisements. I still remembered leafing through Vogue magazine and reading a quote from fashion photographer Francesco Scavullo where he called her "the most beautiful girl in the world." She had also starred in a pair of controversial films that sexualized innocence. The first was a French film where she played a pre-teen prostitute. Later, she starred in a period romance about shipwrecked cousins who survive on an island.

The exploitative nature of both films was lost on my own mother. Having been known for her own beauty as a young woman, my Mom was awed by Brooke's beauty and had immediately gone out and bought herself a pair of Calvin Klein jeans. She had offered me a pair as well but my body had never been coltish and I was under no delusion that I could squeeze myself into a pair of Calvins. Brooke seemed almost like an apparition as she smiled down at Lucas, a strange mirror of the second awkward adolescence I found myself going through. She looked down at her bulldog.

"At least he chases the ball. You don't do anything, do you dopey?"

The bulldog felt her judgement. She hung her head and averted her eyes.

As Anderson's pregnancy progressed, she began sleeping more and persuaded me to meet her at the park later where she had met a group of friends, coincidentally all from New York City. I didn't want Lucas to miss his time with Miles so I gave in. It was an alternate universe where there was another Brenda with dark, curly hair like mine. This Brenda was all confidence. She strutted onto the field flanked by her two rescue dogs. One looked like a coyote and the other was a Golden Retriever mix who looked like he had been through it. Brenda's face broke into a mischievous smile and she spoke with a thick accent from one of the boroughs of New York.

"Okay, we can start now."

With her was a sophisticated beauty with stunning eyes that were blue, green and brown. Her feigned Long Island accent was made even funnier by her natural elegance. I knew from Anderson's description that this must be Cara. Cara had recently moved to Los Angeles from Manhattan. She was a freelance Creative Director for high end beauty and luxury brands. Her husband Schorsch, a tall and lean metrosexual was a composer for film and television. He flashed the New York hand sign at Brenda and made her laugh.

"What up, B?"

Schorsch had a self-consciousness about him that made it hard for me to relax around him. In the first few moments of our conversation, he quickly mentioned that Amos Newman, the son of musician Randy Newman was his best friend. His awkwardness reflected my own feelings of insecurity so I shifted my attention back to our dogs.