What had happened was, a friend of ours was getting married. She had a basset hound and a corgi, and the latter was so food-motivated and resource-hogging that he had to be crated so she could feed the basset. And her husband had cats, too. So the corgi really needed to be in a home with no other pets. And the dog already had a name, which was the same as my high school nickname. And drink had been taken, and I eagerly agreed to take on the dog.
That was fourteen months ago. In the last eight weeks, the dog has turn a ligament, had it repaired, and after six weeks of rehab overate to the point of needing X-rays…which revealed a cancerous mass on an adrenal gland, which meant surgery and hospital recovery. On two separate occations in the last nine days, we had to brace ourselves for the very real possiblity the dog was going to perish on the operating table, or in pain and unable to eat. But today, here is is, home – and with the aid of steroids and anti-nausea meds, he is eating and drinking normally and is getting around normally (if a little sluggish), and we realized just how attached we are to him. Attached enough to put enough money in him to pay for a decent used car.
But what stuck out to me is that there was life and hope, and if I could pay money to take a chance on that, I would, because there have been so many times – and more to come – in which I would gladly have paid any amount of money for either life or hope. Like when I was four, and Oscar – a pedigreed registered Dachshund, my first dog – was run over by some bitch on a three-wheel ATV. Or when my parents (let’s face it, mainly my mother) would just give away whatever dog we had at the time. Or when Bud, a little stumpy fyce, joined the household in late 1996 only for my father to pass less than two years later, leaving my mother (and the rest of us) with a reminder for the next decade and a half. Or when I stayed in a relationship that was bad and going nowhere for two years longer than I should have…for the sake of the dog. Or during a two year stretch when a friend’s dog, who supposedly never got along with men, proved to be my best guy friend in Silly Con Valley…until he moved to Norway and starred on House Hunters.
I don’t know how long we have with this little booger. He’s not the most affectionate type, he won’t climb on the sofa and flop at your side. But he is attentive to food, enjoys chasing the ball, is a helpful early warning system for anyone approaching the house, gets us out and about to walk him and get some exercise…and during the week when he wasn’t here at all and we didn’t know if he was ever coming back, his absence was palpable. He is an essential ingradient of the kind of cozy life I wish for, when the temps cool down and the backyard firepit can be lit and the string lights are on and I don’t have to acknowledge the world beyond our back yard fence. Just sat under the tree with a book, something tasty in the Yeti, 1930s country music on the speakers, and our little guy cozy in the grass, or on the footstool.
That would be enough. And for now, it is.