A week ago I was done with you, ready to return you to the SPCA or place an ad for someone to adopt you. I was done with all the jumping up to which we said, over and over, “Down!” “Get down!” To no avail. (Well, 10 days later I can say you do withdraw when I can look you in the eyes and say firmly, “Down.” Not “get down” but simply “down.” Progress.) I did think how embarrassed I’d be by the fact that you were still untrained and unrestrained and too rambunctious and hardly formed at only four months of age. To turn you out now because of your shortcomings said too much about me, and my shortcomings.
I had thought P and A would be more helpful, more interested, but I was the one constantly present with you. They came and went and hadn’t yet bonded with you in a the visceral way I had hoped. The burden was too much. I wanted out.
But then the next day came. The comfort of the nights we spent together in the guest room, peeing together in the night―me in the bathroom, you in the backyard (after first confining yourself―most of the time―to puppy pee pads in strategic places), waking early, feeling rested and generally content. But then the jumping up and pawing begins again with vigor, right when all I want is to enjoy my morning coffee and NY Times in peace, a prolonged uninterrupted peace.
I saw the future with A planning to move away, P getting older and less firm on his feet, and me stuck with everything, and then you getting older and needing care. I wanted out. Now.
That’s how I felt then. But our hearts are linked and we gaze at each other with huge love filling the space between us. To sever that will just give me angst about my parenting skills and loyalty and humanity. Gee, it’s all about me, isn’t it? Oh that you could have a guardian who is more attentive and selfless than I.
A few days ago, you vomited some food in the morning and stayed in the car while I returned a purchase at Costco, and now you sleep in P’s chair and seem a bit under the weather, subdued, maybe from being sick earlier.
You’ve started barking at things you hear. This is new. How will we ever get you to not bark? Do I want to? What if it’s a prowler or someone else to be scared away? But today in the backyard, you barked at G, our neighbor who was out working in her garden. G calls you LeBron because she thinks you look like him. Then, behold, I found a way to stop the barking: spray you with the hose on the “jet” setting. You stopped and didn’t resume. A “win” for me. In the house, I found a spray bottle and filled it with water for indoor barking. We’ll see.
Maybe it’s like with a baby, how you barely stay a step ahead of the crawling then walking, etc. But they do grow up and most don’t wear diapers when they go to college.
When I take you out, so many people want to pet you, they squeal about how cute you are, and you seem to make them genuinely happy, as they do you. “Can we watch him while you get your coffee?”
And still we persist…
QBA 