Nicholas (the borzoi in this portrait) belonged (along with two other enormous, quite beautiful, and usually placid borzois) to my longtime friend, Dorothea Summerell. She’s now married and living (along with a couple, I think, of more recently-acquired borzois) in her native Savannah.

In the the old days, however (the 1980’s), Dorothea lived in a a very lovely, tall, townhouse in Georgetown. I used to slap on my thrift-store tuxedo and travel up from Charlottesville for her very elegant parties….most of which were presided over by MRS. JONES, an enormous (everything in the house, except Dorothea herself, seemed enormous to me in those days) black woman who put up with very little.  As far as I could tell, Dorothea was the only person on the earth Mrs. Jones actually liked.

I recall being at one of Dorothea’s late-afternoon parties when Mrs. Jones (up to her elbows, quite literally, with fried chicken) was in the kitchen when some enterprisingly swishy, seersucker-suited, THING came flouncing by the doorway, stopped, and held out a dirty plate…..airily asking/demanding “OH!  Can I give This to you?????”.

I was parked in a corner of the kitchen, watching.  Mrs. Jones glared, wiped her arms off with an apron, put one hand on her hip, and held out the other one…flatly declaring “Well, you could try to SELL it to me, but why don’t you just GIVE it to me, Mister???”.  She was justifiably pissed.  I was delighted.

As for the borzois?….my favorite tale involved their escaping into the streets of Georgetown during some other party (I wasn’t there, that time). Being Borzois, they lived for their daily walks and runs. Apparently, everyone went running off and down varous streets in their party clothes….futilely yelling “Guinevere!”…”Nicholas!!!….Basil!!!!!….Come!, Come!!!!……  Those dogs could NOT be found.

Someone (maybe Dorothea herself?) finally had a very simple and bright idea….it involved standing at the front door, loudly shaking those dogs’ leads and collars, and shouting “WALKS!  WALKS!  WALKS!!!!” .  Within a minute, those dogs appeared around the corner at the end of the street and came galloping back to be buckled into their leads and hauled back into the house.  Borzois are among the World’s Most Beautiful Dogs, but they never seem to make the final cut for World’s Smartest Dogs. As Dorothea’s told me “Oh….they didn’t recognize their freedom once they’d gotten it…..”

I love that story……