Xena the Dawg Pulls a Houdini
May. 29th, 2011 09:25 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
mallorys_camera‘Nother thunder and lightening show the following evening. I opened the front door to call the Meezer in, and Xena the Dawg bolted out.
Snarling and cursing, I grabbed a flashlight, went out after her. My God, it was raining hard! And not the slightest sign of Xena either. It was as though a crack had opened in the ground and swallowed her up.
Xena is now 15 years old. Mostly blind, mostly deaf. She still gets around fine, can actually run quite fast when the spirit moves her. She’s Max’s dog officially; Nancy gave her to Max when he was nine. But Max didn’t want her anymore after he grew up and Ben didn’t want her either after he ditched us despite the fact that Nancy was his mother.
So I got stuck with her.
I don’t like Xena much, truth be told – in her youth she was the Cindy Crawford of the canine world, much petted and pampered; but in her old age, she’s kind of like the Joan Crawford character in Whatever Happened To Baby Jane. I do feel a strong sense of responsibility towards her – when she signed on to become a family member, she didn’t realize the contract was subject to change at any moment or that one day she would become the Velveteen Rabbit.
Anyhoo, I felt really bad when she ran away. Couldn’t figure out why Xena ran either – thunder really scares her, and it seemed as though the storm had stalled right over our house because the thunder was really loud, like Napoleon was firing cannons and I was Moscow.
I texted Ben: I think Xena may have become a casualty of the storm.
Half an hour later, he called back. “Why the hell did you have the door open anyway?”
“I told you. This storm is so violent I was afraid something would happen to the cat. So I tried to get her in.”
“Did the cat come in?”
“No-o-o –“
“That cat is nothing but trouble!” he snapped. “Well, I hope Xena finds her way back. But somehow I doubt she will in this storm. I think she’ll run down to the road and get hit by a car.” Accusation unspoken but hanging heavy in the air: And it’s your fault.
Ten minutes later he must have thought better of that because he began texting me this bogus sympathy: Sorry you had to spend so long out in the rain. Silly old dog doesn’t know any better. Likely she’ll show up.
That likely, bla bla bla is a Jayne LeGro circumlocution, and although I hadn’t thought of Jayne LeGro in months, I thought of her now and that thought made me furious. I will drive over to her house and I will key her car and I will slash her tires, I thought savagely.
Ben had pulled that same bogus sympathy routine a few weeks earlier when I’d texted him that Mark had died. I’d texted him because I’d texted Max – Mark taught Max how to play chess and was the first person to introduce exotic food items like pomegranites into dietary preferences that ran strongly to Kraft Macaroni and Cheese. But Max didn’t text back and I needed to to communicate with someone: for better or worse, Ben is the guardian of the person I used to be.
A life well lived, Ben had texted back portentiously. And that’s what matters.
But, in fact, Mark’s life had not been well lived – at least for the past 15 years or so when there were no more MS remissions and the disease just kept on becoming worse and worse and worse.
###
Slept badly that night. Got up at five in the morning and went out searching for Xena. Nada. But no little Jack Russell corpses on the main drags through town either. Surely that was something.
Posted a Lost Doggie bulletin on Craig’s List. And that was how I eventually tracked her down: she’d been picked up by a Good Samaritan who saw her running in the rain, taken to the Cornell Vetrinary school and then transported back to Freeville Animal Control.
I called the Animal Control guy – he was very nice but of course since the law states that under circumstances such as these, the animal must be examined by a vet and the vets were all closed for the three-day holiday weekend, I wouldn’t be able to pick her up until Tuesday.
And because she was being boarded for three days, it would cost $100 to ransom her.
I texted Ben to tell him the news. He texted back magnanimously, Do you want an advance on your child support so you can pay Animal Control?
No, I texted back, because you’re going to pay half.
He called a second later. “And just why do you think that I should pay for your dogs?”
“Because they’re not my dogs,” I snapped. “I don’t actually like dogs. I like cats. But they were part of our family once and somebody has to care for them now.”
There was silence for a moment.
“Fine,” he said and slammed the phone down.
###
Everything in my house is covered with dog hair. Milo's. I am so-o-o sick of it.
Snarling and cursing, I grabbed a flashlight, went out after her. My God, it was raining hard! And not the slightest sign of Xena either. It was as though a crack had opened in the ground and swallowed her up.
Xena is now 15 years old. Mostly blind, mostly deaf. She still gets around fine, can actually run quite fast when the spirit moves her. She’s Max’s dog officially; Nancy gave her to Max when he was nine. But Max didn’t want her anymore after he grew up and Ben didn’t want her either after he ditched us despite the fact that Nancy was his mother.
So I got stuck with her.
I don’t like Xena much, truth be told – in her youth she was the Cindy Crawford of the canine world, much petted and pampered; but in her old age, she’s kind of like the Joan Crawford character in Whatever Happened To Baby Jane. I do feel a strong sense of responsibility towards her – when she signed on to become a family member, she didn’t realize the contract was subject to change at any moment or that one day she would become the Velveteen Rabbit.
Anyhoo, I felt really bad when she ran away. Couldn’t figure out why Xena ran either – thunder really scares her, and it seemed as though the storm had stalled right over our house because the thunder was really loud, like Napoleon was firing cannons and I was Moscow.
I texted Ben: I think Xena may have become a casualty of the storm.
Half an hour later, he called back. “Why the hell did you have the door open anyway?”
“I told you. This storm is so violent I was afraid something would happen to the cat. So I tried to get her in.”
“Did the cat come in?”
“No-o-o –“
“That cat is nothing but trouble!” he snapped. “Well, I hope Xena finds her way back. But somehow I doubt she will in this storm. I think she’ll run down to the road and get hit by a car.” Accusation unspoken but hanging heavy in the air: And it’s your fault.
Ten minutes later he must have thought better of that because he began texting me this bogus sympathy: Sorry you had to spend so long out in the rain. Silly old dog doesn’t know any better. Likely she’ll show up.
That likely, bla bla bla is a Jayne LeGro circumlocution, and although I hadn’t thought of Jayne LeGro in months, I thought of her now and that thought made me furious. I will drive over to her house and I will key her car and I will slash her tires, I thought savagely.
Ben had pulled that same bogus sympathy routine a few weeks earlier when I’d texted him that Mark had died. I’d texted him because I’d texted Max – Mark taught Max how to play chess and was the first person to introduce exotic food items like pomegranites into dietary preferences that ran strongly to Kraft Macaroni and Cheese. But Max didn’t text back and I needed to to communicate with someone: for better or worse, Ben is the guardian of the person I used to be.
A life well lived, Ben had texted back portentiously. And that’s what matters.
But, in fact, Mark’s life had not been well lived – at least for the past 15 years or so when there were no more MS remissions and the disease just kept on becoming worse and worse and worse.
Slept badly that night. Got up at five in the morning and went out searching for Xena. Nada. But no little Jack Russell corpses on the main drags through town either. Surely that was something.
Posted a Lost Doggie bulletin on Craig’s List. And that was how I eventually tracked her down: she’d been picked up by a Good Samaritan who saw her running in the rain, taken to the Cornell Vetrinary school and then transported back to Freeville Animal Control.
I called the Animal Control guy – he was very nice but of course since the law states that under circumstances such as these, the animal must be examined by a vet and the vets were all closed for the three-day holiday weekend, I wouldn’t be able to pick her up until Tuesday.
And because she was being boarded for three days, it would cost $100 to ransom her.
I texted Ben to tell him the news. He texted back magnanimously, Do you want an advance on your child support so you can pay Animal Control?
No, I texted back, because you’re going to pay half.
He called a second later. “And just why do you think that I should pay for your dogs?”
“Because they’re not my dogs,” I snapped. “I don’t actually like dogs. I like cats. But they were part of our family once and somebody has to care for them now.”
There was silence for a moment.
“Fine,” he said and slammed the phone down.
Everything in my house is covered with dog hair. Milo's. I am so-o-o sick of it.
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Date: 2011-05-29 02:11 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-05-30 06:19 am (UTC)