[Time passes. The dog grows older. Will author Stuart Cohen mellow with age? Will the years they have shared a home soften his heart? Today you will find out. SB SM]
Chapter 16
A house just feels dirtier with a dog in it.
This kind of dog has medium length hair (fur?) and does not shed excessively. That’s a good thing. Still, we find plenty of dog hair in the dust that accumulates under tables and desks from shoes that have picked it up in walking around. The woman who used to clean our house every week told us she wanted to jack up her price because all the dog hair made for so much extra work. It turned out to be a good excuse to fire her and hire someone else.
You wouldn’t think that color would rub off a dog, but it does. The dog rubs against the back of the sofa covered in light-colored fabric, leaving a gray pall. We had it professionally cleaned along with the rugs with the food stains. Cleaning lightened the shadow temporarily. In recent years dog has taken to rubbing its chin on the corner of the sofa. That spot turned black. I’m not kidding. The black comes off with cleaning, but it comes back. Every time you push the cushion back into place, the dog sneaks in there, pushes the cushion away with its nose and blackens the corner of the sofa with its chin.
I bought a package of $5000 worth of furniture and carpet replacement at a public TV charity auction, anticipating that we’d replace the soiled room after the dog’s demise. I still have the gift certificate and hope the store does not go out of business.
Chapter 16
Wife and her animal went on occasional trips to the vet in the minivan which the dog, when young, could leap up into. That was okay. It occurred to me how the vet had dispatched Bunwah and I thought…
When at the vet’s office, the dog reportedly acted nervous in the unfamiliar surroundings, poor thing, which distressed Wife. Later on, Wife developed a friendship with a vet who makes housecalls. The dog would never have to be inconvenienced by a trip to the doctor again. The visiting vet would cut its nails and examine it at our house, and invariably pronounce the dog healthy. Still, as the vet was leaving I’d often listen in just in case there was a hint of something amiss enough to give me hope.
Wife got pretty tired of me making disparaging comments about the dog, and barked at me to stop. I backed off. When a couple we know’s newly acquired dog was squished by a passing car, under the watch of the babysitter who was presumably doing a better job looking out for their children. I sympathized. When they heard me mumble, “Some people have all the luck,” at least the dad was amused.
Dog owners take pleasure in talking at length about their dogs. If I happened to be in the room when such conversations took place between Wife and others, I was consigned to silence. Occasionally someone would ask me if I had a dog. I said no, but my wife has one. When they asked, “What kind?” I said, “A black one.” If they asked me what kind of animal I preferred, I answered, “Stuffed.”
I have been freer to speak my true feelings in the company of certain other people. To be diplomatic—you never know when someone you’re talking to might turn out to love dogs—I say that I have been patiently waiting for the dog to expire. I said that for a while before my daughters were old enough to understand what “expire” meant in that context. Once they understood, they yelled at me.
Daughter #1 finished high school and moved away with no sign of the dog failing.
Chapter 17
We never took the dog on family trips, even trips by car. There wasn’t enough room, people we were seeing did not want a dog visiting and after all, it was supposed to be my vacation too. When the dog was young, there were friends happy to keep it for even as long as a couple of weeks. I always appreciated coming home to a dog-free house until the friends would, heartbreakingly, bring it back.
I must have mentioned the idea of putting the dog in a kennel when we went away a dozen times. The suggestion inevitably invited shock and anger from Wife. We live in an upscale enough area that there had to be animal care facilities nice enough to serve that population’s pets. For reasons that were never fully elaborated, the idea was a non-starter. I wasn’t willing to get involved enough in dog care to look further.
If we’d go somewhere overnight, a neighbor across the street who likes dogs would come in to walk it and feed it. The trash was up on the kitchen counter, and no matter how bored the dog got, there was not much tasty it could get into. We heard a tale about a dog that had learned to open its owner’s refrigerator and tear the contents apart, spewing broken eggs and left over everything everywhere. Fortunately, my wife and daughters’ dog was not that intelligent or resourceful.
As the dog got older, its vehicle travel diminished and then stopped entirely. When we went away on more extended trips, it could no longer go off visiting. A new and more expensive strategy was called for. Wife had done some teaching and had former students willing to dog sit, either to come in a couple of times a day or to move in if we were away for a while. I never wanted to know how much these young people were being paid for such easy duty, but I know that Wife is happy to throw money at former students she likes. It comes out of her account, so the dollar figure stays her business. What concerns me is trips during the winter. Instead of turning the heat down to a minimum we had to keep the thermostat up to human comfort level. As oil prices have spiked, that’s a significant expense. One more argument it would be pointless to make out loud.
Daughter #2 finished high school and went off to college.
Chapter 18
A more nuanced family problem has been about what happens when Wife goes out overnight or for a few days and I stay home. Because I decline to participate in dog maintenance, I’ve never learned the routine. I could have of course, but that’s not happening.
Dog care has never been on my radar. I ignore the animal entirely unless it barks or I step on it. I certainly can’t be relied on to let it out at the right time, or even to remember to feed it. If I were out and decided to stay out, or go somewhere overnight when Wife is out of town, what would I do?
Most of the time, my non-involvement has just been part of the landscape, consistent and predictable. If Wife decides to stay out longer than usual, she sees it differently. She glares at me. She makes icy comments about being “unsupported.” Even after many years of my reliable non-participation. When a daughter is around, she has an easy solution. Otherwise, Wife has to call her former student, who won’t stay in the house if I might be there, or scramble in some other way.
I almost sympathize. Had the dog followed the normal span of a dog’s life, there would have been moments of compromise during the timely final stretch. But this dog’s lifespan has been anything but normal.
Chapter 19
Dogs of this breed rarely last past age thirteen. I’ve heard of families whose dog died or had to be put down at age below ten. I’ve been envious. I agreed to have the dog in our home based on a certain assumption about how long the commitment would be. If my attitude has been unfriendly, at least I’ve lived up to what I signed on for.
The dog is nineteen. That’s right, nineteen years going on nineteen and a half. People ask if that’s right and Wife assures them it is. They marvel at how fortunate we are to have a dog live that long. I look away.
Its face has turned gray. It is blind in one eye and nearly blind in the other. It needs soft dog food. We have the occasional mistake left on the oriental rug, for which Wife blames herself for not letting the dog out soon enough. Random barking, day and night, is more frequent than ever.
The dog can’t climb the two steps to get back in the house from the garage anymore so Wife has installed a wheelchair ramp covered with a slab of all-season carpet for better traction. It still shits up the yard, and now Wife is so concerned with the challenge of reentry to the house that cleaning up the mess does not cross her mind.
When the notice came from the town that it was time to renew the dog license, Wife asked, “For what?” Dog licenses, she told me, were how they identify runaways, and there was no way this dog could even crawl away in its current state. She waited a month, in case the dog died, and was assessed a late fee. She also got a notice that the dog’s four-year rabies shot was up for renewal. It would have taken an appearance before the health board to request a waiver. The answer was obvious: call the town and tell them that the dog was already dead, but Wife felt funny about lying. She had me make the call. She figured I’d enjoy saying the words.
Daughter #1 visited not long ago to say goodbye to the dog. Actually, she visited a couple of times, having underestimated. Daughter #2 is less sentimental about the dog, though she likes it. Actually, she is just sentimental enough about the dog to find fault with me for my unhelpful attitude.
The kitchen trash barrel has long since returned to under the sink as enthusiasm for garbage dumping has waned with age. Bits of chocolate left about are safe. The dog no longer strays from our property, if only because walking has become so difficult that it dares not go far. The extra body weight that accumulated when children took delight in giving an unending supply of cookie bones has melted from its ribs. It doesn’t finish every meal instantly any more, something that was unimaginable for most of its life. The vet calls the dog “a very old lady.”
Wife has told me how hard it would be for her to have to put the dog down. That’s animal lover’s jargon for mercy killing, which is still killing. If and when this happens, I hope the visiting vet can take care of all the steps including disposal. I certainly don’t anticipate a funeral. Do people have memorial services for dogs? I couldn’t imagine attending one with a straight face.
Sometimes when I see the dog out of Wife’s earshot I tell it, “You’ve done your job. You can die now.” Given the history of non-relationship we have had, it pays me no heed.
Chapter 20
The approaching death of an old dog is not something to speak of with glee. At least in front of Wife and dog-sympathetic friends. Besides, there is no guarantee that the end is as near as I’ve been led to believe. The dog has disappointed me in this regard for years.
Even as I anticipate better times absent a dog in the foreseeable future, I no longer feel the same level of revulsion when I come home and see its old body on one rug or another in the traffic pattern. It does not greet people who come to the door with the enthusiasm and noise it did even a year or two ago, and it still largely avoids me. Barking has become worse; the other night it went on for hours. I sleep with earplugs.
Parts of the house have devolved into a doggie nursing home. Our nice hardwood floors are covered with cheap throw rugs so that the dog will not slip while walking across the same floor it has walked for fifteen years. Lately its hind legs have started to fail, evidently due to arthritis. It struggles to get up or plops down when a leg gives way. A barricade of chairs blocks our step-down living room so that the dog won’t wander in and have difficulty stepping back up and out. Wife gives it all sorts of medicine: thyroid pills, pain pills, incontinence pills even glucosamine-laced dog treats. But there is no remedy for old age, and at nineteen plus years it is already the oldest dog anybody around here has heard of.
I have been warned repeatedly that when the time comes I am not permitted any visible signs of joy. I will show compassion, not because the loss of the dog will upset me—it will surely please me greatly—but because I care about Wife. During an especially pathetic recent stretch of diminishing dog health, an evening when Wife wept copiously, I alerted Daughter #1 and Daughter #2 via email that they are unlikely to see the dog alive again. They accept and understand.
I do have some plans, though. The plants along the floor will be refilled with potting soil. The barricade that blocks entry to the living room and the throw rugs on hardwood will vanish. The long-delayed room renovation, new carpet and new sofas, will begin. If Wife is too heartbroken to pick up remaining dogshit in the yard, I might even pick it up myself.
With the dog failing, this might be a time for even a curmudgeon to start getting all misty. That’s not happening. I admit, I hate having the dog less aggressively now than I have every single day for the last quarter of my life. I am not going to miss it.
Surely people will talk to Wife about acquiring a replacement animal at some time in the not too distant future. With us in our early 60’s now, wanting to travel and with no children at home that doesn’t make much sense. I want to sell the house and move into something smaller anyway. I told Wife that if she suddenly decides she wants to be single, getting another dog would be a good way to accomplish that.
I put up with a dog I never wanted for over fifteen years for the sake of my family. I’ve really hated having a dog.
###
About the Author
Semi-curmudgeon Stuart Cohen has been accused of taking himself too seriously. But not lately. After graduating from Yale in the chaotic spring of 1970 he went skiing. The next year he enrolled in trade school to learn the craft of photography. He spent 25 years as a commercial and editorial photographer and actually made a living at it. Along the way he took up writing and wrote three consumer books on photography for major publishers. He also wrote extensively in the photography trade press on industry trends and ethical issues.
Since leaving photography he has been the head of a symphony orchestra, synagogue president, non-profit board member of various organizations and basketball coach to 12 – 14 year olds. His more recent and most important books include The Seventh System: The Thinking Person’s Guide to the Human Emotional System. https://www.seventhsystem.net/ , and a Positive Psychology book, Happier Tomorrow, Happier Today, Happier Right Now, 24 Proven Keys to a More Satisfying Life https//HappierX3.com You should check them out.
He is divorced, and remarried to a woman to a woman who hates cats. He now lives in Santa Fe and enjoys hiking and snowshoeing in the mountains.
Living for Nearly Damn Ever with the #%@&*! Dog
Smashwords Edition
Copyright 2012 by Stuart Cohen. All rights reserved.
ISBN-13: 978-0-9833077-1-6
Cover photo of dog courtesy of freedigitalphotos.net
Please do not steal any part of this book, especially since it can be downloaded free.
Any quotes must be attributed. Please make sure you spell #%@&*! correctly.
Contact the author/publisher via email: sc@aya.yale.edu
Published by Mezuries, P.O. Box 1271, Marblehead, MA 01945
Thank you for downloading this free ebook. Although it is a free book, it remains the copyrighted property of the author. If you’d like to share it, please encourage your friends to download their own free copy at Smashwords.com. Thank you.