Having just watched the tender movie Marley and Me about the irrepressible blond Labrador I realized that our dog Luna is the only one of our “children” who has not figured prominently in this blog. Luna does not get taken to the museum or on ski trips; she does not have a weekly soccer practice (although she sometimes cheers on Walter from the sidelines) but for a little while longer she remains the largest of our three kids.

At around 80 pounds Luna is not even large for an English Bullmastiff; however what she gives up in weight she more than makes up for in determination and affection. I am perhaps the only member of the family with the strength to restrain her even on leash if she detects a moldy but choice piece of bread lying close by in the gutter. Luna is an eating machine.

Her puppy years passed easily enough with only the occasional TV remote control or pair of high fashion sunglasses as teething aid. But full grown her hunger knows no bounds. The cost of just keeping the “Brown Beast” as my mother rather reverently calls her in dog chow rivals New York City private school tuition. Add to this the occasional trip to the “Vet to the Stars” and the seeds of financial ruin are sown. The other members of the family may keep themselves healthy on the regular Thomson Reuters health plan but Luna gets the very best veterinary medicine can provide.

Most of the time Luna just lies around the house and in this she is hardly distinguishable from her human siblings. When we got our first Bullmastiff friends said we were nuts to try to keep such a large dog in a small New York City apartment. Well since then the apartment has gotten a little larger but the more important point is that even such a large dog as Luna actually takes up reasonably little space compared to the typical Park Avenue lap dog. These small yapping terrors fly about an apartment at warp speed leaping from couch to table top to kitchen counter. As such they remind me of fast moving electrons darting along their orbital shells. Per my canine adaptation of the well-accepted uncertainty principle of quantum physics you can never quite determine the precise location of these electron-sized dogs at any given time – although their ceaseless barking does provide an approximate clue. Luna on the other hand poses no such quantum mechanical challenge. Whereever she chooses to sit (and I would not argue the point) she takes up a fair amount of space but that’s it – she wont move again until feeding time.

Luna is also a quiet dog. She can happily sleep through the worst thunderstorm or display of Grucci fireworks but on the rare occasion she does bark or growl we all pay attention. She is a good guard dog and can appear quite menacing at full gallop but this potential ferociousness is undermined by her habit of always carrying a soft plush toy in her mouth to eagerly greet the Son of Sam or whichever intruder is nigh. I did think once of buying her a soft toy shaped like a gun but I thought better of it.

Certainly among the nicest qualities of dogs is that they are always happy to see you; don’t care whether you are rich or poor or whether you have had a good day or bad day at work or school. All they ask for is a little love and affection ….and of course about 100 pounds of dog food per month.