Given that I am still a young and virile twenty-something, one might expect that I would have some exciting and wild plans for the coming weekend. However, those who know me well would tell one that this is rather unlikely, given my history. They would in this case be wrong, I am proud to say, and ought to be ashamed of their quick and thoughtless judgements that I am inherently boring; because this weekend I'm spending the large bulk of my time babysitting my mother's dog... er... dogsitting her dog. So you can see that I'm not going to be doing anything boring or uninteresting because, really, how much more interesting.....um... can... you...... get?
This dog has been a member of our family for some years, and yet I referred to it (rightly) as my mother's dog. He was her baby from the very beginning, and they've always had a special relationship that the rest of us couldn't quite understand. But I should go back to the beginning.
The story of the dog really starts a number of years before he actually came into existance. We'd had a number of pets off and on, growing up; dogs, cats, and..... well pretty much just dogs and cats. Well, what did you expect, a llama? We had not, as a whole, had very good luck with dogs. One died barely two months after we got it, another disappeared without a trace, and another fell in with the wrong crowd, became quite permiscuous, and then disappeared without a trace. There were two black labs, though, that didn't die or vanish, but had to be sold when we moved into town because they were always on a caffeine rush and we wanted our new neighbors to actually like us.(To this day, whenever one of us is acting especially spazzy or hyper, we are said to be "acting like Max and Hogan!") There were a few cats now and then, which did live slightly longer but tended to be generally ignored.
One night my father had a very vivid and bizarre dream, which he shared with us the next morning when we were all in the car on the way to church. In the dream, my brother Blaine had brought home a funny looking dog which he named Mr. Chalky. The family found this to be pretty humorous; my sister kept saying the name over and over and giggling, and my father had to pull the car over to the side of the road to wipe tears out of his eyes from laughing so hard. Perhaps the least amused was my brother, who seemed to think we were making fun of him somehow. He quickly got sick of my sister saying "Mr. Chalky!" to him and then collapsing into a pile of girlish titters. So, eventually, the joke passed as jokes so often do.
Years later, my mother really wanted a dog. Just a small dog, one that wouldn't be too hard to take care of but which can give her comfort now that all her children are grown and in school all day. She somehow convinced my father, and before we knew it she came home one day with a little Shitsu male puppy. Immediately, we all knew that the dog's name had to be, you guessed it, Mr. Chalky. Only my brother objected to the idea, having never been fond of the name and embarrassed, I think, by his role in my father's dream. So a compromise was struck. The dog would be called by his initials, MC. Emmy, for short.
So we've had this dog for a number of years now, much longer than we were successfully able to keep any other pet. He's very well behaved, and as I said responds so well to my mother that sometimes I think they have a telepathic connection.
I lost the dog once. I went outside and left the door open, and didn't notice he followed me out, eager for my attention. I went back in, closing the door and leaving him outside. I'm sure he probably waited near the door for awhile, expecting somebody to come and get him, but then he realized he'd been betrayed and went off exploring. Some old lady found him and brought him in her house, by which time we'd realized what had happened and I was searching all over our neighborhood, racked with guilt. He was gone for nearly a week, and we had pretty much given up hope. My mom, putting on a brave front, had even begun referring to him in the past tense: "Well, he was a good dog." We found him though, but I still feel guilty.
Given the bumpy history between me and MC, you can understand why, once my family left me alone with him for the weekened, it was a bit awkward at first. I decided to clear up matters right away.
"Ok, listen here, dog," I said, "I know we've had our problems in the past, but thats all behind us now. And for the next few days, I'm in charge around here. My opposable thumbs and cognitive development alone make my species superior to yours so by right I'll be calling the shots, though I am talking to a dog so that suggests I have problems of own. However, I know my mom lets you get away with just about anything, and lets you order her around like you're some kind of prince or maharajah or something but things are going to be different with me. You'll eat when I feed you, and eliminate waste from your body only when I take you outside. What do you have to say to that, huh?"
The dog hopped up onto the couch next to me, made himself comfortable, and yawned in a bored, haughty sort of way, as it would be beneath him to listen to my speech. He scratched his ears, licked my hand once, curled up to sleep, and was generally heart-meltingly adorable.
"Too-shay," I said, speaking phonetically because my French spelling is rusty, and moved over to make him more comfortable.
This dog has been a member of our family for some years, and yet I referred to it (rightly) as my mother's dog. He was her baby from the very beginning, and they've always had a special relationship that the rest of us couldn't quite understand. But I should go back to the beginning.
The story of the dog really starts a number of years before he actually came into existance. We'd had a number of pets off and on, growing up; dogs, cats, and..... well pretty much just dogs and cats. Well, what did you expect, a llama? We had not, as a whole, had very good luck with dogs. One died barely two months after we got it, another disappeared without a trace, and another fell in with the wrong crowd, became quite permiscuous, and then disappeared without a trace. There were two black labs, though, that didn't die or vanish, but had to be sold when we moved into town because they were always on a caffeine rush and we wanted our new neighbors to actually like us.(To this day, whenever one of us is acting especially spazzy or hyper, we are said to be "acting like Max and Hogan!") There were a few cats now and then, which did live slightly longer but tended to be generally ignored.
One night my father had a very vivid and bizarre dream, which he shared with us the next morning when we were all in the car on the way to church. In the dream, my brother Blaine had brought home a funny looking dog which he named Mr. Chalky. The family found this to be pretty humorous; my sister kept saying the name over and over and giggling, and my father had to pull the car over to the side of the road to wipe tears out of his eyes from laughing so hard. Perhaps the least amused was my brother, who seemed to think we were making fun of him somehow. He quickly got sick of my sister saying "Mr. Chalky!" to him and then collapsing into a pile of girlish titters. So, eventually, the joke passed as jokes so often do.
Years later, my mother really wanted a dog. Just a small dog, one that wouldn't be too hard to take care of but which can give her comfort now that all her children are grown and in school all day. She somehow convinced my father, and before we knew it she came home one day with a little Shitsu male puppy. Immediately, we all knew that the dog's name had to be, you guessed it, Mr. Chalky. Only my brother objected to the idea, having never been fond of the name and embarrassed, I think, by his role in my father's dream. So a compromise was struck. The dog would be called by his initials, MC. Emmy, for short.
So we've had this dog for a number of years now, much longer than we were successfully able to keep any other pet. He's very well behaved, and as I said responds so well to my mother that sometimes I think they have a telepathic connection.
I lost the dog once. I went outside and left the door open, and didn't notice he followed me out, eager for my attention. I went back in, closing the door and leaving him outside. I'm sure he probably waited near the door for awhile, expecting somebody to come and get him, but then he realized he'd been betrayed and went off exploring. Some old lady found him and brought him in her house, by which time we'd realized what had happened and I was searching all over our neighborhood, racked with guilt. He was gone for nearly a week, and we had pretty much given up hope. My mom, putting on a brave front, had even begun referring to him in the past tense: "Well, he was a good dog." We found him though, but I still feel guilty.
Given the bumpy history between me and MC, you can understand why, once my family left me alone with him for the weekened, it was a bit awkward at first. I decided to clear up matters right away.
"Ok, listen here, dog," I said, "I know we've had our problems in the past, but thats all behind us now. And for the next few days, I'm in charge around here. My opposable thumbs and cognitive development alone make my species superior to yours so by right I'll be calling the shots, though I am talking to a dog so that suggests I have problems of own. However, I know my mom lets you get away with just about anything, and lets you order her around like you're some kind of prince or maharajah or something but things are going to be different with me. You'll eat when I feed you, and eliminate waste from your body only when I take you outside. What do you have to say to that, huh?"
The dog hopped up onto the couch next to me, made himself comfortable, and yawned in a bored, haughty sort of way, as it would be beneath him to listen to my speech. He scratched his ears, licked my hand once, curled up to sleep, and was generally heart-meltingly adorable.
"Too-shay," I said, speaking phonetically because my French spelling is rusty, and moved over to make him more comfortable.
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Love your favorite(and only) sister BeKaH