GOODBYE, AMADEUS!

He came home for the first time in the small space in front of a Bajaj scooter usually reserved for hand gloves , helmet and license papers. He was so small. It was in Pune, 1996, and he was delivered to us by a nondescript dog merchandiser who was brokering a sale deal for a pedigree German shepherd . That’s how he came into our lives. Around the same time, we saw the Hollywood classic , 9 Oscars winning movie Amadeus, based on the bizarre tumultuous life of a musical genius , Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. It was a compelling watch. My wife and I looked at the small soft inscrutable black-haired frisky thing in our hands and thought he possessed all the maverick predilections of the music icon. He was bouncy, irrepressible, clearly had a mind of his own and made arresting sounds, not necessarily musical , but impactful nevertheless. That’s how Amadeus came to be.

Amadeus (1996-2008)

In a country where “station” is pronounced “tishan”, “heart is hurt and hurt is heart” in Delhi, for instance, and everything is a “joy” in Kolkota ( is Sanjoy being cheeky, Babu Moshai??) , Amadeus got nick-named by all and sundry with a cowboy’s license. The girl who cooked called him Aamras. The driver pronounced him as Amdus. The walker christened him Amu. Which also frequently became Aam. I called him several names, Omelet being one amongst several of them. But it was Amu that stuck, the indigenisation perhaps is keeping with convenience and common sense. . Of course, I was also to discover that not many in the cocktail circuit knew that Amadeus and Mozart were the same person. But that is another story.

Amu had the formidable grandeur of the imperial king in his mane; a handsome frame, commanding a glistening hue of golden brown and dark black . The ears stood in perpetual attention, the side of his finely crafted jaw had a conspicuous dark spot, signifying the distinctive mark of a blue blood. The tail swaggered in rhythmic harmony whenever he smelt cottage-cheese, and since non-vegetarian meal is strictly prohibited at home, Amadeus was essentially a reluctant vegetarian who could have done with some red meat steak . In the end, his diet was supremely “saatvik type”, much to his discomfiture,. Which is why when I took him out for his walks so that he could do his daily ablutions, he would rather hold back his constitutional urges if he as much as spotted a bone. He had an art of concealing the broken bone pieces so ingeniously , it would take Hercules Poirot to discover it’s location. Later as my wife hollered at him for disturbing the pure vegan environment at home , he had a quizzical expression; “Me Dog, Love bone. Why you guys getting so uptight?

Amadeus was essentially in the Gandhian mould, and remarkably tranquil given his natural inherited inclinations when it came to the human race. But when he spotted another tail running around in his territory, he assumed wolfish proportions. He came into his refulgent own. It was his own sacrosanct home and neighboring dogs were forewarned to stay clear; that was his non-negotiable diktat. In that sense, he was schizophrenic. Only once he sniffed up with rather pervert intentions the dropping trousers of an unsuspecting visitor, till that poor fellow almost literally hit the ceiling.

He loved car-rides so much, I believe, he would have loved to be on the drivers seat. Going back and forth to Pune, he would stand upright even as the car bumped along the circuitous highways, his heavy breathing resonating in the car. For him , this was the open space that a journey provided, away from the claustrophobic excesses of the cosmopolitan base that was his life in Mumbai. Occasionally, I would watch him look at the traffic snarls from our second floor residence, as if he wondered why were the nitwits so clueless about work-life balance; why this utter madness, the incessant honking, the frenetic pace? I think he almost shook his head in acute disbelief.

He walked majestic, loved the early morning stretch, and did the complex poses with effortless ease, amused that we made such a big deal about yoga exercises. Unmindful of the sensex volatility, attrition rates, the Nano controversy and Sourav Ganguly’s exclusion from the Indian team , he snoozed and slept his way through his daily travails. He needed no stress-busters, excepting that sneaky mongrel sometimes. And almost everyone became his best buddy.

Giving him a bath was usually a monthly ritual, and he had Shyamalan’s sixth-sense about when there was a big conspiracy being hatched to trap him . He dodged intelligently, his nose smelling trouble yards away . Usually he hid under the sofa sets till some delectable biscuits he fancied invariably did him in. He was susceptible after all. And when he was fully wet and shampooed, his expressions conveyed disgust at our cleanliness fetish; get on with it, guys, and let me go, was his succinct message.

Amadeus adored my two girls, allowing them to indulgently create havoc with him, make a mess of his afternoon nap-sessions, put him through some fashion experiments, and even wear branded apparel. But he never ever complained. They gave him the most unadulterated pure love I have ever seen . It was a pulp of foamy mush and bonding of the souls. And my wife treated him with such gentle caring affection it gave him the status of being our “ little boy” at home. The feeling was clearly mutual. It was endless love.

Today was my day of giving him the Sunday walks, our regular routine. A walk interjected several times by his sniffing his way into the perfect spot for his daily constitutional . Amadeus had converted shitting into a sublime perfectionist art. I also think he sensed my occasional restlessness, but told me that this was the least I could do for him at least once a week. He usually won those silent arguments.

The day before yesterday at 11.07 am he passed away .Almost as quietly as he had arrived in the palm of a hand twelve and a half years ago. He had been battling an internal condition for over two weeks that had suddenly consumed his already-depleted energy and strong reserves. Over the last few months, the big jump at the door had transformed to a slower wag and a half-hearted lurch. Now he preferred to be smothered; his tiring legs prevented him from even making his customary call at the door. The big wide smile was still there as was the unbridled happiness of seeing us all home. But a spate of illnesses had become regular. The decline was perceptible. And it was time to do a Google search on average life expectancy of a German shepherd. It said 12-13 years. .

I took a walk down the back-lane today, where we hung in together. His favorite locations, his penchant for following a process. A sniff. A circle. A sniff. Two circles. And then indecision. I remembered it all. I looked around at all the places at home where he ensconced himself in his magnificent pose, watching the entire household with his alert eyes. At meal –time, his usual vessel was empty. That inimitable smell of boiled rice from his body was not in the air. His walking leash lay on the shelf untouched. When one heard a distant bark today, I almost thought he was resurrected. Or perhaps never gone. And I somewhere looked for those large brown eyes, speaking a million nuances, with just a longer lingering stare. Or the incandescent gleam of joy. Or the pain of an end that he knew was inevitable.

In Dale Carnegie they tell me that communication is about a combination of words, tone and tenor and body language. I have written approximately 1200 words here to express my love for Amadeus, knowing fully well that he needed to say none to express his own.