The Lady with the Little Dog...

I absolutely have better things to do with my days

But I would/could never say that.

Instead I hung up the phone and made the requested phone call immediately.

In the morning after dropping my son at school, I headed off to do this favor, the favor I was not in favor of doing.

I was lucky with the traffic, rather the lack there of.

I took the highways my Nav system told me to take, inland toward the desert and through the low foothills to where it's hot and dry, with low, scratchy looking shrubs dotting the sun-scorched landscape

And I took the exit the dog trainer told me to take.

I was early and there were a few stores I like in the parking lot where we were meant to meet.

I partook.

I killed time.

I bought sandals for my daughter, which she won't want

and didn't buy sandals for myself, which I want, but don't need.

Ring-a-ling-a-ling

"Where are you?"

I'm not at the right exit, apparently.

Not Summit Road, but the summit, the actual summit of the Pass...

Oh shoot.

AGAIN, I remind myself that I have better things to do today, any day actually, than pick up a friend's dogs from Hunting Camp in the high desert, when it's hot and the last days of school are dwindling down and things feel hectic at my house.

I grabbed an iced tea from a drive-thru and drove on and upward deeper into the heat and up to the Pass, to the summit of the Pass and pulled off to the side of the road, to the dirt and gravel and brush encircled space.

Two crates in the back of a dusty pick-up.  

This could be Taliban, I think to myself.  

eek...

A Duck Dynasty look a like, and me, with my clean, white SUV, in my Juicy sweat pants, iced mint tea in hand, sandals showing painted toes

 and oh no, no, no, no...

He pulled the dogs from their crates strapped into the truck bed and showed me the problem for the one, but there were many problems for the two, none of which I mentioned, maybe on account of the beard and the gun rack and the fact that I was shocked which rendered me speechless.

I pointlessly spread a beach towel in the back of my car and we placed the crates with whimpering dogs inside them in the rear of my no longer pristine vehicle.  

I drove the two hours toward my home, closer to the sea, away from the scorched earth and harsh heat, with the windows wide open in attempt to stay above the rancid odor.

I didn't/couldn't listen to the radio, but found myself humming lullabies, the kind I used to when my kids were smaller and hurt or sick.

I dialed the Vet near my home.  

"He's leaving soon", said his stern receptionist insistently.

"No he's not", I thought, persistently.

I was embarrassed to carry the stool covered, bleeding dog into the Vet.

Her silver stapled abdomen seeping serous fluids and her mouth dripped green bile.

She was cut up all over, but the stomach part was the worst.

I'd made the two hour drive in under 90 minutes.

I stuck around the waiting room, silent while taking a verbal beating about animal abuse and I kept my mouth shut as my breath felt stuck in my throat and tears pooled in my eyes.

Shaken, I got behind the wheel of my car.  

I held a clump of wet wipes over my mouth, because I now stunk as fowl as the dog who I'd left howling 

shaking

dying?

I reached my home and went into autopilot mode.

Crates out of the car, dragged beyond the high fence and into the backyard where I doused them with detergent then sprayed them down, left them to bake in the sun before I dealt with them further.

The second dog, who once upon a time was white, stayed hidden, pacing back and forth along the high wall behind the rose bushes while my own pup tried to lure her out to play.

I scrambled an egg and put it on a plate on the ground next to a leash, sat myself in my favorite wicker porch chair and waited, acted as if I wasn't watching her watch me...and in time she came toward me and ate her brunch slowly, painfully, her mouth torn a bit, her long ears full of thorns and small bits of sticks

I leashed her to the lawn chair and carefully, quietly poured buckets of warm water over her, being sure to avoid her head, in part because it was bloody and fur-less,

in part because I was afraid she'd bite me, though it was not in her nature

I didn't know who she was anymore

Tea tree oil shampoo, half a bottle

painstakingly pulling ticks and burrs with my finger tips till I caved and cut with scissors, the clumps and bunches of filthy fur.

She trembled, though the water was warm.  I lifted her into a kiddie pool, which is not at all for my kids, but rather for my Labrador to play in.

I laid her down in more water, which turned pink, though I'd been washing her for a long, long while.

I examined the pads of her feet.  Where did they go?

Then I patted her dry with a soft towel and let her disappear again behind the rose bushes.

My daughter came home from her day at school and soothed her into another bathing, afterwards applying heaps of antibacterial ointment to the dozen or more various sized punctures and to the bare, raw, sore spots where beautiful white fur used to be.

The dog remained aloof the rest of the day.

Avoiding me, but approaching my children now and then.

Good news, the other dog survived her emergency surgery. 

I wanted to cry when I hung up the phone with the Vet, but I never can.

 I was instinctively gentle with the doggies owner, when we spoke on the phone.  He was far away and unaware of the situation, which left me wondering what sort of man he really was.

I never understood the pull to the high desert dog camp,

nor his ability to leave these dogs, who were really more like his children, when he went away for long stretches.

There are times that this man has made me feel like I'm maybe not the best decision maker

I was non confrontational with the trainer, who around happy hour began blowing up my phone with inquiries about the dogs, the cost of surgery, and his advice on how to care for them

though clearly he did not care for them.

A powerful funk took me over, one I could not shake, one that blanketed everything else in my typically peaceful and mostly beautiful days

 and I wanted nothing more then to go to bed at six pm.

But that's not my life.

After I made dinner and helped with homework and did my usual things; the things I love for the ones I love, I got into my bed, my beautiful grown up bed, with it's beige linens, dotted now with specks of red blood, from the dog's still seeping wounds.  

Finally that dog, the now white dog, with red spots, jumped up onto my bed with me.

I like my space...

but I didn't get any.

She didn't want to be pet and each time I tried she'd leave

but later she'd sheepishly return.

Only when I didn't acknowledge her, did she relax -

right across my legs.

All night long she lay over my abdomen.

I could hear her non stop snoring

feel her body shutter

and then I knew

 that I had nothing better to do with my day, any day, not right now, not ever.

I didn't know how much I loved animals

though people probably look at my horse drawn, dog filled life and assume I am an animal lover.

But me, I truly had no idea how strongly I felt about four legged creatures, until I felt what I felt all night long;

the weight of her across my body

the weight of knowing how very badly she and the other pup must have been treated and the weight of not being able to say what should be said to the trainer

and knowing too, that I will never tell these sweet dogs' owner how it really was,

because he's my friend

because its my sorrow now, 

because for whatever reason, the universe put these troubles in my path today

and so this gets to become part of who I am and who I will be

 and happily that's sadly alright with me

It amazes me how everything changes us, if we allow it to