I felt the true sting of your passing today.  Pooch’s Palace, why must thou sit empty, your eyes staring vacantly out past the “For Rent” sign that adorns your façade?  My heart aches. Jack Russells and Poodles, both standard and cup, and Bichon Frises, Pomeranians, all gone now.

Months ago, in the Pre-K times, I mocked your existence, offended by the self-indulgence you allowed to grace your halls.  Designer bitches in Porsche Cayennes and Escalades would roll to your Magazine Street curb, sipping their Starbucks and gossiping gaily into their cellphones as their tiny purebreds leaped up and down in their laps of luxury, assaulting my ears with their incessant barking, tormenting my hounds who leapt about on their leashes like wild horses feeling the bite of a lasso around their necks for the first time.  Then, when the call was done, they would leave those whimsical beasts safely in the hands of your dog handlers, who would pet them and pat them and groom them all the day away – adorning those tiny ears with ribbons and bows.

Yes, imagine that.  I walk my own dogs, leave them in my own yard, allow them to sleep on my own couch and bed.  Spray them off with the hose.  No one looks after them if I’m at work or play.  They are mongrels.  Mutts straight off the streets; mutts who did hard time in the pound.  No Gucci collars or Versace coats for them.  They are hardy jump-in-the-back-of-the-truck-and-roll-in-the-mud-all-day-while-munching-poop sorts of dogs.

            But I digress.  When I first passed your empty bowels over two months ago, my hounds looked in your direction, and I thoroughly expected some rouge H2 to pull to the curb while some metrosexual scooped out Bitsy or Muffy or MooMoo and carefully, ever so carefully, carried her over the treacherous terrain of a Magazine Street sidewalk, not wanting to dirty her tiny white paws. 

            Yet nothing came to your curb.  Nothing.  No Fifi or Gigi or Winston “Willie” Regal III.  No mommies and daddies in their Bimmers or Bentleys.  No endless cellphoning as dogs were escorted into your innards and left to romp and play while their owners did what?  Go to Perlis?  Play a round of golf? 

            But today in the Post-K world I now understand the role you played.  This morning I was assaulted not once but twice – not so much by the minute canines themselves, but by their owners.  Tragically, they don’t know what to do now that their dogs are home all day, every day.  Don’t know what to do now that they can’t drive those five or six blocks or maybe even a mile to you, Pooch’s Palace, and leave their high maintenance minions behind.  Now they find that they have to care for their dogs all by themselves, day in and day out.  And, Pooch’s Palace, they have grown weary. 

Today, on my very own street, one of these poor hounds escaped its owner’s wrought iron safety barrier and charged down the pavement at me, sending my brutes into a tizzy and nearly causing me to be dragged to my death.  In another instance, a woman hid behind the walls of her townhouse turned condo and waited until I was just passing her gate, poobag in hand, dogs steadfast in their course.  Once I was in her crosshairs, she suddenly flung open her door, allowing her heat-seeking missile of a Jack Russell Terrier to zero in on us, yapping out his bloodlust.  Above her pink cashmere sweater, there was delight on her face as my dogs roared into action, alarmed at the onslaught.

            “He’s only playing,” she said, doing nothing as my arms pretzeled, and I become entangled in orange and green leashes. 

Even now the ropeburns sting.

            So, Pooch’s Palace, forgive me for not understanding the role you played in my community.  All of Uptown needs you back to curb these frightening new habits of the rich and idle, their nouveau riche games of mutt charging and lawn lunging.  Their dogs have gone feral, and I fear the pit bull fighting of the past will become the Cavalier King Charles Spaniel fighting of tomorrow.

            Rest in Peace.  Godspeed.

The Bichon Frise is an attractive Uptown breed.

The dogs of Pooch's Palace: metrosexual, or straight -up pussies?

Ever since the passing of Pooch's Palace, for Mitchell and Lauren, nothing has been the same.

The Jack Russells of Magazine Street have grown weary. Beware.

Jen Kuchta holds it down in the UPT.