The other day, I was talking with my brother about the trainer coming to the house for our dog, Mitch. My brother said, “Whatever happened to the days when a dog was a dog?”

Dad was very anxious for us to have a pet; Mom did not share his desire. We had parakeets, fish, turtles (the ones you could buy at the dime store that we now realize were harbors of salmonella) and a kitten. Dad even brought home Harold one night. He joyously brought in a little box that contained a baby duck! Mom fashioned a leash and collar out of an old plastic belt and we walked Harold around the block. Not being one for domestic life, however, Harold broke his neck before reaching adulthood by jumping out of his box. We were petless once again.

One night, Dad asked if we all wanted to take a ride and go to the gas station. We groaned in unison, but we knew we had to go. We piled into our big 1959 white four-door Chevrolet BelAir (the model that had the batwing shape at the taillights) and headed to the gas station.

First, though Dad pulled into the local supermarket. His friend owned it and Dad did most of the grocery shopping. He talked us all into getting out of the car and going into the store. Once inside, he gestured for us to look up at the bulletin board.

“Winner of the dog: John A…” We were ecstatic, jumping for joy. The owner of the store gently handed the dog to us. We were absolutely thrilled.

Dad was Greek, so naturally his name choice for the dog was either Aristotle or Socrates. We shouted our collective “No!” and promptly named him Fritzie.

Fritzie was billed as a “full breed daschund” but he was definitely not full breed anything. He was a mutt, a Heinz 57, and we loved him.

Fritzie truly was “just a dog.” He barked like crazy at the mailman and he grabbed the mail as it came down the chute and sometimes chewed — I am sure — important things like paychecks. No special food for him, either — he ate what we ate with the occasional stick of butter he was able to skim off the table before we sat down to dinner.

No training classes — we chained him up in the backyard. I guess someone (Mom?) picked up the poop because I never saw any in the yard. We would take him for walks once in a while, but he was basically just there. Mom swore about him a lot in the early years, but later on, they were each other’s best friend. He didn’t bite anyone, there was no talk of who was the alpha in the household — he was a DOG.

Today, we have basic training, advanced training, therapy training, agility training, you-name-it training. We run around with our beautiful full-breed dogs — going to dog parks, leashed and unleashed, paying sums of money to belong to the dog park, getting them groomed every six weeks to the tune of what a downtown human haircut costs. We buy them clothes, boots for winter, even dog strollers that cost as much as baby strollers! Not to mention the vet bills — teeth cleaning at $300 (that’s with no extractions); tooth brushing three times a week. By the time the dog owner makes sure the dog is properly vaccinated – and has heartworm and flea medication – a healthy dog costs upwards of $1,200 a year!

When dogs were dogs, we also spent the summer riding our bikes to the pool, buying penny candy, sporting Lik-a-Maid stains on our fingers, coming in when the street lights came on and not a minute before. We were never in the house (that’s probably why Fritzie and Mom forged such a strong friendship) and when we did get home at night, there was Fritzie welcoming us with his wagging tail and his wet nose — content to see us. He was healthy. He lived to be 17 years old. Was he the lucky one to have us as a family or was it vice versa? I believe that we were the ones that were wealthy — we lived in the era when a dog was truly a dog.