The Reluctant Automotive Journalist
Sebring, FL –
Anyone who lives and breathes motorsports knows what Sebring means. For sports car fans, it’s the start of the season – no matter what may or may happen at Daytona in February.
Every year for the past 8, Sebring’s been my destination in mid-March. Starting in 2004, I’ve loaded up my little compact car with enough stuff to get me through a week, and driven (or, this year, taken the Amtrak Auto Train) the approximate 1000 miles from my home in the DC area to sunny central Florida. It’s a great way to stick a fork in Winter and call it “done.”
This year, however, is a bit different – and not because of the racing.
In fact, with a 56-car field, the 2011 running of the 12 Hours of Sebring is shaping up to be one of the all-time greats. Turbodiesel powerhouse teams Peugeot and Audi are once again set to square off, this time not just to win Sebring, but also to kick off this year’s Intercontinental Le Mans Cup. Last year’s ALMS champs, Highcroft Racing, have returned with a new car, but minus the Patron sponsorship (Patron is continuing as Series sponsor to ALMS, as well as Scott Sharp’s Extreme Speed Motorsports Ferrari deal). Where Highcroft will be seen after Sebring is yet to be determined.
No, if there’s one reason I’m not 100% “here” at this year’s Sebring, it’s Kitsune.
Some time back in 2000, my girlfriend and I had occasion to visit the dog pound in Montgomery County. On a tip from my mother, we went to see this rather unusual dog – he was big and fluffy and red, a Chow mix. He sprinted and bounded through the air like a giant red fox – and he was on the “kill this one soon list” at MCHS. See, when you’re a stray dog and the dog catcher picks you up by the scruff of your neck and your tail, apparently it’s poor etiquette to snap and him and say “NO!”
The big fluffy red fox-like mutt was declared Vicious and Unadoptable. That’s pound-speak for “we’ve got better things to do than take a chance that this one’s aggressive.” He was aggressive, indeed. In fact, he aggressively chomped on every dog biscuit my mom or my girlfriend or I would hand him through the chain-link gate. When I entered his cell and sat beside him, and wrapped my arms around him, that was it: He was coming home with us one way or another.
While my girlfriend’s name was on the adoption paperwork, and while she gave Kit his name, it was soon clear he was my dog. I’d walk him. I’d play with him. I’d buy his food and treats. And when he needed a trip to the vet, I didn’t blink at paying the cost.
In the first few years, Kit earned himself a nickname: Mr. Naughty. Take him anywhere – to a park, to a friend’s house, to our own backyard – and he’d find some kind of trouble to get into. He has always loved herding other animals; we’re quite sure he’s part Border Collie in addition to the Chow genes. Set him loose at the dog park, and he won’t attack any other dogs. He won’t dominate them. He’ll just chase them. Round in circles, across the field, wherever his “herd” would go, he’d run them round. Not until he started to get old did he slow this down, though even as a senior dog, he still likes to try and play the Chase Game whenever he can.
In 2007, Kit had his Year of Living Dangerously. In the Spring, on a trip to the Savage River in MD, Kit stepped on something sharp and lacerated the hell out of his leg. Several of the arteries in the leg were cut clean, and he was bleeding like mad – all over the back of my mom’s car, as she drove him home in a panic. I tied off the leg and we got him over to the emergency vet clinic in Rockville, they patched him up, and he spent a couple of weeks recovering. This incident made me a believer in self-dissolving sutures.
A mere few weeks after the bloody leg incident, Kit responded to a threat at my house that could have been the end for him. As the sun began to set on a warm day in late May, Kit was let out into the backyard, where he encountered an intruder. The Chow in him, programmed by nature to protect the home and protect the pack, went to negotiate with the raccoon that had found its way into our yard.
I first became aware of this, when I heard loud barking, and then yelping from Kit as well as mom’s big dog, Bosco. Kit had advanced on the raccoon, telling him “you’d better get the hell up outta’ here,” and the raccoon said “arrr! I fights you,” and bit into Kit’s side.
Bosco, ever the best-friend to Kit, came out of the house, saw his buddy under attack, and went right after the furry trespasser attached to Kit’s mid-section. It was something of a tug of war for several seconds – which seemed like forever – before Kit was able to shake off the now-mangled coon.
The raccoon died of its injuries soon after, and we got Kit and Bosco rushed to the vet for examinations. Being still daylight during the attack, and with the raccoon’s aggression, I was worried it was likely rabid – a worry which was confirmed by the county’s Animal Control division a few days later.
Kit was thankfully up to date on his rabies vaccine, and as such was only subject to a check-up, a rabies booster, and an in-home “house arrest” for 45 days.
Later that same year, in November 2007, Kit tore up one of his hind legs. His anterior cruciate ligament was badly damaged, and required surgery with a lengthy recovery: Four months of physical therapy (usually done by me), 30 mins at a time, two to three times per day. It seemed like it took a year, but when Kit was finally able to run and play again, it made ALL of it worthwhile – not just the money spent on the operation, but all of the uncomfortable flexing and stretching of that leg, every day, for months on end.
He and Bosco made it through the raccoon deal, and went on to take many more walks together until Bosco suddenly succumbed to cancer in October of 2009. Our dogs have always been loath to show discomfort, and when Bosco suddenly collapsed, it was a shock to everyone in the family. His death affected everyone in the family, but it was my mom and Kit who seemed to take it the hardest. Kit was without his best buddy, for the first time since he came to live with us.
Losing Bosco was the first of two deaths in the family that would cause Kit to age noticeably. Eight months after Bosco, our beloved Beagle-mutt Shadow became very ill, and after two weeks of ill health, she too was gone. In less than one year, Kits two best friends had vanished, and I quietly began to wonder just how long I had left to enjoy his company.
I still don’t have that answer, entirely, but I know now that it won’t be long.
Two weeks ago, after noticing Kit limping with his front leg over the weekend, I took him to his vet for a look-see. The vet took blood for a CBC, did a routine physical exam, and took X-rays of his front legs. Kit’s right front leg looks like that of a dog half his age – it’s in great shape, with almost no perceptible calcification of the shoulder joint.
His left leg, however, showed a peculiar shadow. There were also curious spots in the chest. His vet asked if he could show the X-rays to a radiologist, to get an opinion as to what we were seeing.
The answer came three days later: Kit has osteosarcoma, advanced stage, and has already spread to his lungs.
To say I was hammered by this, is the great big hairy godfather of all understatements. The past week and a half, I’ve probably shed more tears than I have in the previous twenty years. Kit still looks good – he’s happy and smiling and his limp has decreased and he’s playing with our “new kids” Zeus and Della, but the Senior Dog is on borrowed time – cancer doesn’t turn itself off, and it doesn’t care how good you feel.
Cancer is Hell.
So… where am I? I’m in the media office at Sebring International Raceway, in Florida. The last few days before the trip down, I seriously considered canceling the whole deal – the hotel and the train fare wouldn’t necessarily be write-offs, and I could probably get anywhere from a partial to full refund on those… but to what end? I can be worried about Kit up in VA or MD, or I can be worried about Kit while doing my work, down in FL. I don’t know if the decision to go through with the trip was right or wrong, but it was definitely the harder of the two choices. I hope I don’t regret it.
And Kit, for now, is with my mother. She’s done holistic treatment on her own dog (Shayna) when conventional medicine threw up its hands and said “that’s all we can do, you’re out of options,” and Shayna lived a happy four more months thereafter. Kit is reportedly enjoying his food, doing well right now, and apparently doesn’t begrudge me the trip – at least I hope not.
I’m here. I’m doing what on any other day I’d love to be doing. And all I can think of, is next week when I get to see Kit again.
