Tracey Ullman
– Introduction –
I have always been mad about dogs. They make me happy. I’ve had a great variety of dogs in my life – funny dogs, kind dogs, crazy dogs, dopey dogs. A Bichon Frise ate my baby daughter’s umbilical cord. It wasn’t attached to her at the time, but was carefully stuck inside my baby book along with her hospital ID. I left the book open on the floor to answer the phone and heard a chewing noise. Dogs do awfully odd things and we think nothing of it and carry on feeding them and letting them sleep on pillows beside our heads.
The smartest dog I ever owned was a small mixed breed called Bianca, saved from an infamous high-kill shelter in downtown LA. She was emaciated, bald, and had a bullet lodged between her lung and liver. For one so hard done by she never bore a grudge to humanity or seemed to suffer from PTSD. As soon as I brought her home her behaviour was exemplary. She didn’t chew, bark, or pee indoors. Bianca was so poised that you felt that when you had finished reading The New York Times you should pass it on to her. And then, oh joy, we discovered she could sing. A soulful vibrato we would coax out xi
