This photo was taken almost two years ago, the day after I brought Sparky home. Man, he has really let himself go. No wonder his nickname is Señor Piglet. He needs to get on the carnivore diet.
At the orphanage, he didn’t have his own name. They called him ‘Sammy’, but he hated that. Like I’ve mentioned previously, he’s kind of racist, and it bugged him to be named after the indigenous people of Northern Europe. He says the Sami people have small, round heads, large hands, and wide feet with splayed toes. I have no idea what he was talking about.
When I first brought him home, we were trying to establish some common interests. I told him that I taught physics. He didn’t know anything about that, but liked chasing pigeons. Being a congenial dog, he asked if I had any physics stories about pigeons. I told him about Nikola Tesla and his fondness for pigeons. He enjoyed that story and wondered if I had any stories about physics and dogs. I read him Kurt Vonnegut’s short story, Tom Edison’s Shaggy Dog.
Reading the story will give you some context. He wanted to know if Tom Edison was a real guy. I said that he was, and that he happened to be Tesla’s nemesis. He was happy about that. In the story, Edison is a jerk to the dog, but the dog is really smart, and makes Edison look foolish. The dog in the story is named Sparky, and since the dog isn’t real, he wanted that name.
Eventually, Sparky became self-conscious about not having a last name. He didn’t want to take my last name because he felt it implied something about our relationship that he didn’t want to explore. We put a pin in it.
Sparky and I like watching movies featuring dogs. Months later, we watched Laurie Anderson’s movie, Heart of a Dog. Sparky didn’t understand what was going on in the movie, but liked how Anderson talked about her dog, Lollabelle. Also, since Lollabelle was allowed to play a keyboard, Laurie Anderson must be a nice person who understands that good dogs are smart and should be allowed to do whatever they want.
If I’m honest, I didn’t understand the movie either, but agreed that Laurie Anderson was a national treasure. Sparky wanted Laurie Anderson to be his godmother. He took her last name as an homage.
Señor Piglet became Sparky Anderson. He prefers playing with Mr. Moose, but will chase balls until they roll under the furniture. He doesn’t mind that there was a ballplayer named Sparky Anderson.
