At the supermarket in Nederland today I was told by a neighbor that
Lola, a little dog that had befriended me for several months last year and subsequently moved, had been killed by a coyote. Five years running
loose in Eldora and the surrounding mountains, nipping at bears and tires, and then four months off
the mountain and she's dead. I was really depressed when she moved and still miss her.
She was, in the lexicon of an earlier era, "a
corker." Actually, she was Corgi by
half, the rest was pure terrier...or terror.
"Willful," the breed descriptions read.
Lola pretty much got what she wanted. She slept around. A lot.
After she was gone, each villager questioned claimed she slept at his or
her house. Not only at their house, but
with them, in their beds, adjusting her muscular little body minutely until
every curve fit their every curve. Close. Eyelids blinking against the back of thighs. Once abed, the extraordinary energy and
stamina exhibited during the day ebbed and she became a good sleeper. A dead weight, a bowling ball, not always
asleep, but skillful at pretending if the alternative meant moving to make way
for her bed mate's deadened limbs or giving up an inch of covers.
Luxuriating among the linens and bedding, she was not an
early riser and studiously ignored the imprecations of early morning canine
visitors barking on the cabin deck.
Neither was she in a hurry for a morning meal nor the opportunity to
empty what must have been an outsized bladder.
As the morning wore on, she became anxious to go about her
duties as village mascot, official greeter of trespassing vehicles and chaser
of cars and foxes.
If there were no
signs from her current liaison of an impending walk—brushing teeth, washing
face, tying of tennis shoes—for which she watched closely behind a facade of
disinterest—then she demanded to be released to launch adrenalin-infused flank attacks
on the tires of passing vehicles, especially those containing dogs, and to
stage intrepid face-offs with the conveyances of stymied visitors, fearful,
unlike locals, to drive ahead.
She was
fast, and looked forward to, in fact sought out, every opportunity to match speed
and wits with the local foxes. Digging
in with her hard-shelled hind nails and pushing off with her powerful haunches,
she'd speed away on sturdy seven-inch-long legs, leaving puffs of dust in her
wake, careening into the corners like a quarter horse, as she left the road and
flew into the woods in pursuit, always returning with bloodless and empty jaws,
but still jaunty and seemingly pleased with the effort.
One of her favorite places from which to stage vehicle attacks
was the only real intersection in the village, a stop sign just past two abandoned
historic storefronts surviving from
the late 1800s when the village was a thriving mining town.
Lying in wait
under a van conveniently parked adjacent to the long-closed post office, Lola
enjoyed tracking her prey as it approached the stop sign, then, as the vehicle
started up, flying from under cover, barking loudly and nipping at the
invasive, rotating tires. Locals familiar with her five-year habit ignored her. Visitors ranged from oblivious speeders on
their way up the canyon to hike to the overly cautious who slowed then
stopped. This was a mistake. Lola was more than willing to face off with
any vehicle that seemed to have heeded her attack, stalwartly facing the idling
vehicle, like a toreador with a bull, waiting for it to make a move. These stand-offs had been known to tie up
traffic, considerable on summer weekends, while the animal lover, who had by
now left his or her vehicle abandoned, tried to entice the small dog off the
road or find the owner of a pet assumed to have slipped its leash.
This was not the case.
The owner, the single mother of a teen-age daughter, worked full time
and had long ago found that Lola, true to her nature, refused to be contained
in a fenced-in back yard. Finding she
always returned, she finally gave up the fight and allowed Lola free rein to
roam the village and its surrounding mountain trails, her only regret being
that she couldn't outfit Lola with a "Lola-cam" so she could share
the dog's adventures during her sometimes lengthy absences.
Lola was a born hiker despite her short legs. Her natural gait was a trot. A fast trot.
She always took the lead, rarely tired and added miles to her outings, going
off trail in pursuit of squirrels and intriguing odors, forging far ahead,
returning to encourage her slower human companion, then trotting off again,
covering ground at an amazing pace. 
One
day in late spring when there were still snowdrifts in the shade, we took a
long, roundabout trail to the top of Spencer
Mountain on the south
side of the valley. When we returned
four hours later, she flung herself on the floor and we both slept soundly for
two hours. When dark came, she was rested
and ready to go running with the only neighborhood dog she liked, a large,
shaggy yellow dog called Vigo. They were
out until 2:30 a.m. and I was like a mother waiting for a wayward teenage
daughter to come home from a night on the town. But she finally returned, giving a little bark at the cabin door to be admitted.
One of her great adventures to which I was an unwilling party, came last June when we came over a little rise in our favorite walking path and spotted a cow moose that had just given birth to twin calves. I got this marginal shot right before the excitement commenced.
Lola was a barker and she started up the minute she spotted the moose. The new mother had her fill fairly quickly and charged. I was not an intrepid photojournalist who stood her ground and captured shot after closer shot of the charge. I headed for a small copse of trees, the only cover I could spot that looked as if it might provide some protection. Once the cow moose had run Lola off, she returned to her babies, unconcerned about me. But my knees were shaking and I decided to leave the vicinity as quickly as possible. I called and called Lola as I walked the path back to the blacktop road and started back to the cabin. In the distance I spotted Lola, trotting east along the center line at a brisk pace, having done her dogly duty and leaving me with the consequences.
I was still mulling it over when the dognapping occurred. One Monday after Lola had spent the weekend with her owner, she was very late showing up at my cabin. When she did finally make an appearance, I put on her leash and we did our usual walk. On the return, we passed by a location where a movie was being shot. One of the crew said Lola had spent the morning with them and he really wanted her. I told him Lola's owner had asked me to take her at the end of October when she moved, but if he wanted to approach her about offering an alternative, he could go to her cabin, just down there, the one with the yellow door and the dragon fly door knocker, later in the evening when she returned from work.
I had a medical appointment that afternoon in Longmont and it was still quite hot off the mountain, so I dropped Lola off between the movie shoot and her owner's house. That evening upon my return, the movie crew was just packing up for the night and I saw the young man with whom I had chatted earlier in the day and waved enthusiastically.
Lola didn't show up that night and I thought she was staying with her owner, but when she hadn't shown up by the next afternoon, I took her leash and walked down to the area where they were shooting the movie. Another crew member told me the young man had taken Lola home with him the previous evening and he and his wife had already taken her to the vet and got her shots. I inquired if he had obtained permission from the owner and was told that he had told everyone on the crew that Lola's owner had moved and left her behind! I made it clear he knew this was not the case and was told to talk to the movie director, which I did. En route to the discussion with the director I saw Lola's owner's mother and told her what had happened.
The next day, when I checked, I was told they got Lola back, but as a result of the dognapping, her owner had decided to take her with her when she moved--to coyote country. I never saw Lola again. I'd guess that her owner, who apparently was still allowing Lola to run loose, is now glad she never outfitted her with that Lola-cam.
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