Gatsby, No Show Dog, Found a Home in Hollywood Anyway

This is a last testimonial to a Hollywood dog who died somewhere else. Maine. Gatsby never liked Maine.

Gatsby was an Old English sheepdog of 13 years. I bought him in Maine as a pup and drove him across America, through the rusted boredom of Ohio and the roadside blur of Kansas, through a succession of motels. Motels were all the same to Gatsby. He slept with one eye open each night, waiting for the suitcase to be thrown into the trunk in the morning--the signal that he was free to blow the place. He hated motels because there was never enough time for him to lay down his scent, to stake out a piece of dogdom. It was always just one night with the box of doggie bones and the smell of my scotch, and then on the road again.

Being a puppy, Gatsby needed a place to settle down. He found his home in Hollywood.

Maine wasn’t home. He never got used to the snow and wind and blowing leaves that stuck to his face. He never got used to the air. He was brought up on the smell of Chinese and French food in the alleys back of Restaurant Row on La Cienega. He grew to doghood around the corner on Melrose Place. He took his late-night walks sniffing the fronts of antique shops and theaters and expensive cars at the curb. Sometimes he would jump at an open car window and scare the Beaujolais out of a couple enjoying themselves in the dark.

Gatsby liked Melrose. He was unhappy when we upgraded to Hancock Park for the better schools and the bigger house. To Gatsby it was just another motel. He’d lost his scent again. In the “better” neighborhoods there is no smell of good food. The “better” people keep their dogs in the yard and away from the pedigreed lawns.

Gatsby was lonely there. I could tell. He took to staying on the patio, nose pointed into the downwind from Hollywood. He could smell bouillabaisse clear across La Brea when the Santa Anas were strong. He never got used to being upgraded. Moving to Maine was the last blow. The wind over Waterville never carried a trace of salami or Greek olives, just pine cones and ozone and the distant barking of hunting dogs.

One day before Christmas, Gatsby gave it up. He had decided, I guess, that this was it, this was the Last Motel. That he’d never again have a helicopter to bark at or taco leftovers to munch. Gatsby got sick, and I put him into the car and took him to the vet. I didn’t go in back with him. I handed him over and said goodby and left.

I knew what he was thinking as he lay back there waiting for the door to shut a last time. He was thinking about chasing the joggers on San Vicente, about ripping through the park at the museum, about finding treasure outside the back door of L’Orangerie.

One night next summer I will return to Hollywood and in the darkness scatter a handful of his ashes outside his favorite antique shop, and some more under the tree where San Vicente stops at the ocean. After that, watch for the shade of a sheepdog who answers to Gatsby. Give him a pat. Especially if you’re an actor. Gatsby loved actors.