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My Two Cents

If you want to know what a dog is thinking the best way to find out is to read a book authored by one. 

Turns out, they’re pretty profound thinkers. Interspersed with the predictable fixations on food, walks and occasionally sex, are philosophical musings, existential strategic plans, and astute observations about the menagerie of human behaviors.  

That is, if the quadruped doing the writing is Peter and Jennie Mayle’s dog, Boy. 

(Header) For those who are too young to know or too old to remember, Peter Mayle is two things. 

An awesome writer. 

And.

The reason relaxing vacations in any town in any country on the Mediterranean are no longer possible. His breakout best-selling book, A Year In Provence, kicked off an entire genre of Move to the Mediterranean! Lifestyle Literature—books/films/TV Shows like Under The Tuscan Sun and Mamma Mia. 

By showcasing a charming alternative to the heart-attack inducing 80s Gordon Gekko capitalism lifestyle, he convinced people a plane flight and a few Francs was their ticket out. Who wouldn’t trade a cramped cold apartment and windowless cubicle for “stressors” like remaining neutral in the local family generations-long feud over whether a favorite pitchfork was returned after the French Revolution or a fierce debate over Champagne vs Prosecco drawing lunch out to 4 hours.

Apparently his talents rubbed off on his dog, Boy.  His dog memoir is even better than his human POV works. Dogs make us all feel less constrained. Somehow the playfulness of imagining what his dog was thinking freed him to apply his familiar perspicacious, droll,  and insouciant style to fresh new unconventional situations. Romance, flatulence even ways to use tennis balls to include humans in the fun are told from the offbeat canine-centric angle. Pure entertaining fun.

From a more analytical perspective, these stories are fodder helping us laugh at our foibles and peccadilloes. Critiques delivered by a dog let truths slip past our defenses and nestle in our consciousness without triggering the usual human impulse towards self-justification. 

One of my favorite examples comes when Boy recounts what “The Other Half” said to a mother who is a guest having dinner at their house.  Boy refers to Jennie and Peter as “The Management” collectively. However, individually Jennie is “Madame” and Peter is IMHO hilariously “The Other One.” But I digress.

The “mother” insists a dog is nothing more than a substitute for a child. “The other half’ (Peter) usually fairly docile and innocuous is incensed. Filled with liquid courage, he lets loose.

“I hadn’t reckoned, however, on the effect of her monologue on the other half. I may have mentioned previously that it usually takes something close to an earth tremor to rouse him from his after-dinner reverie. But at this point—inspired, no doubt, by a surfeit of propaganda on the joys of fertility—he pricked up his ears and bit back. Good stuff it was, too, the gist of it being that many couples in these overcrowded times live in small apartments where dogs are forbidden. Desperate for companionship, the couple either buys a parakeet or has a baby, depending on available cage space. Therefore, one could just as easily put forward the opposite argument—that children are, in fact, dog substitutes. Have another drink.”

Boy’s charm is disarming. Truths wrapped in fur and delivered with a wagging tail let us laugh at ourselves and open our minds to fresh perspectives. Long after the happy afterglow of this slim wonderful book has faded, somewhere subconsciously you’ll one day look at your dog and marvel how much more complex her world is than you realized.