I don’t Miss the Dog

Wow, that’s a bad blog post title, isn’t it?   Doesn’t it sound terrible to say I don’t miss the dog?   Let me explain first by saying those were words that ran through my head the other day and I thought the same thing about myself just for thinking them.

I do miss our dog.   She was a comfort to have around.   She was a happy dog aside from the aches and pains of being old and having bad knees.    She was sweet and would clean up every crumb of food the children left on the floor.   I think she probably ingested a pound or two of carpet fluff over the years just licking around for any food matter that might have fallen in the course of toddlers trying to get the food in their mouths.

She rode in the car well and was friendly to all adults.   Children, not so much.   She was afraid of being picked up and there were things on her that hurt that we never quite got a handle on.   Children move fast and would scare her sometimes.   But adults she’d gladly spend any amount of time with, including what was basically owner transference if we happened to go away and needed her to be taken care of by someone else (thanks Nana, Uncle Jonathan and Mimi).

She also got along with just about any dog.  She was respectful while not being submissive.   She walked well on a leash and didn’t have any phobias such as thunderstorms, although she got a few of them as she got older and specifically after the broken alarm sensor incident that happened for an entire day while we weren’t home.

And she was always happy to see us when we got home.   I still catch myself doing a few things even though she died over a year-and-a-half ago.   Sometimes when I come home as I’m opening the door I almost say, “hey Lu” in greeting.    I’ve also said more than once, “oops” in a loud voice when dropping food on the floor.   This was a word she picked up on that we didn’t realize she did for a while.   ‘Oops’ is a common thing to say when you drop something and she figured out it typically meant food for her if she got there before we could clean it up.    Once we realized that we just started saying, “OOPS” in a loud voice so we didn’t have to clean up.   We’d even drop things intentionally sometimes.

So yes, I miss our dog.   But life is less complicated with two children who run in and out of the house with their friends, trips that are taken and a dog who was in pain and in congestive heart failure.   So far, the children are fine without a dog replacement.   My husband and I are also fine with this as well.   But I do miss her sometimes even so.

The Big Boy Update:  My son created a lot of crumbs at breakfast.   His sister had created about the same number.   I told them they needed to sweep up and they could work together to get the job done more quickly.   My daughter balked.   My son, who usually does the balking, said to his sister, “I know how we can make this fun.   We can dance.”   And so he swept and danced with his sister.   I think they got about thirty percent of the crumbs while scattering another forty percent to further corners of the kitchen.

The Tiny Girl Chronicles:  My husband told my daughter tonight, “you should practice your patience.”  My daughter said, “but I’m not a patient person.”   When I came down to dinner I sat down and was told this funny little exchange.   I stifled a laugh and went to get my phone so I could write it down to write here.   When I got back to the table my daughter said, “I know what you’re doing mom, you’re writing that down so you can put it in your blog.”   The children are picking up on this more and more lately, even making suggestions themselves on things they think are, “blog-worthy”.