Learning To Say Goodbye

This is not going to be very exciting. Just felt like writing something and with this being about the past few days of my life it will probably not be very interesting to anyone - not even me.

I have 3 dogs - a Chihuahua, a Collie/Jack Russell Terrier mix and a Cocker Spaniel. The first two dogs are like 8 and 9 years old. The Cocker Spaniel is almost 17 years old and I think that translates to 119 people years - a very, very senior citizen. He very much acts his age - old! Poor baby…he doesn’t get around all so great at times. You can tell that when he gets up from lying down that he has a hard time of it and also when he goes to lie down he kind of circles the spot for awhile before he can make it to a down position. After sleeping in his crate all night, because he must have arthritis or something, he has a hard time making it out the door of the cage. But he has to be confined at night or I will have puddles to clean up in the morning, another sign of old age - bladder problems. He does seem to be thirsty much more than the other dogs which only adds to his bladder retention difficulties. And then there are times when he’s outside that he acts like a pup, jumping around and letting his presence be known to the entire neighborhood.

I made the mistake one night last week of letting him go out in the backyard to go potty without hooking him to his leash like I usually do. That was a big mistake on my part because he didn’t come back when I called him and it was so dark I couldn’t see where he was. I knew he couldn’t be too far away because the backyard is fenced in. But the thing is I realized after a minute that I was wasting my time calling him because I remembered he’s lost almost all of his hearing. So, now I had to go out there and try to locate him. Since he doesn’t usually have free run of the yard like that I’m sure he was in all his glory and not really caring to be found as he explored around in the darkness. Finally, I just decided to stand very still and quiet and hope to hear a sniff, a snort, anything that would tell me in what direction to walk to find him. After a few tries I finally found the big rag dog and brought him back to the house. I called him the big rag dog because he had not had a haircut in several months and while all that hair was probably serving to keep him warm on his short outings he gets now and again in all this cold weather we’ve been having - I decided it just had to go once and for all. Not only was he smelling pretty bad but that long fur coat of his was like a magnet to track every leaf he walked on outside into the house. I was constantly bending over and picking them up from the kitchen and living room floors and though it was very good exercise for me I did finally get tired of it.

Now, he has had a haircut since Dean has passed away but it was my sister-in-law who works with animals all the time who did it. She offered and I accepted even though I was planning on doing it myself, it was just easier back then to let her go ahead and groom him. One of my sons had mentioned that he (Rusty) probably wouldn’t make it to his next haircut if and when the time came. Boy, was he wrong. I swear, this dog is like the Energizer Bunny, he just keeps going and going and going…. Don’t get me wrong, I love him and don’t want to see anything bad happen to him but he seems to be outliving his life expectancy, even the Vet said this.

So, on my “master list” of things to do I had written down ‘Rusty’s Haircut’. That stayed on the list for awhile and even got passed over a few times for other things instead. I guess I was working up the nerve to finally tackle this chore which I was not really looking forward to and once I finally got started I knew the reason why! See…Dean always did this job and after my experience with the ‘old super dog’, I wonder how he did this by himself??

At first I was a little timid about approaching him because although I know he loves me and would never hurt me I wasn’t sure how he felt about me and the clippers together, as a couple. It turns out he didn’t like either one of us after awhile. This task actually took two days to complete. Yes, I’m a wimp and gave up after the first night when I ran out of daylight outside and was also just too exhausted trying to get him to cooperate. I did all the easy spots at first just to get warmed up, like his back and the top of his head and then worked down to his long ears. I cut all the hair on the outside of them and thought okay, that’s done and then looked underneath and saw all that hair too and wondered why I didn’t know it was there before. But I did get it cut and surprised myself that he still had his ears when it was all over with. It was about then that I decided to call it a night and planned to finish it the next day. We both deserved a break after all of this and I know he couldn’t wait to get away from me. Can you imagine that?

The next day came sooner than I really wanted it to but I dreadfully thought to myself I might as well get this over and done with. So I hooked him back up to the overhead leash on the porch to confine him to the small area I needed him to stay so I could finish the job. Well, let me tell you that confining him did not stop me from having to turn into a contortionist in order to reach all the spots still left to be cut. I stood over his head and lifted his face up to shave under his neck and pretty much had to stand upside down while holding him still and cut at the same time. An extra hand or two sure would have been nice but since I wasn’t born an octopus I had to settle for the two I had available which wasn’t near enough. The absolute worst part of all was trying to get his legs and paws done and with my luck he had to have four of them! I can’t even count how many times I straightened his leg out and he politely pulled it back under him folded and tucked it tightly underneath him. I guess I finally won the battle but had to pretty much sit next to him with one leg over his back and holding his leg with one hand and clipping with the other all the while turning and twisting in whatever direction he was moving at the moment. Needless to say, I think I got a pretty good idea what a pretzel must feel like - covered with dog hair, no less!

Finally, finally, finally…everything was done but underneath him. So here, I enlisted Corey’s help. We tried just getting him to lay on one side and then the other but that didn’t work so well so Corey rolled him on his back and somehow held him there long enough to get the job done. Of course, Corey kept telling me, Mama, be careful you’re getting close to ‘you know what’. I told him not to worry, I wasn’t planning on doing that part or going anywhere near it - and I didn’t and I don’t care if it looks weird. And he actually looked pretty good when it was all finished. I paid for it the next day though when every muscle in my body ached but still I was proud of doing this. Not so much that I made a dog look better than he did before but because it was just another small step into a widowhood that I never asked for but am now having to learn how to do all these new things on my own. And in case anyone is wondering why didn’t I just take him to the groomer - I can’t afford it…

So, as I said in the beginning, not much interesting has been happening…just a taste of this new life on my own. Exciting? No, but it’s a learning experience…for sure.