He swaggers around the house, the lord of the manor. The rules no longer apply. He is given treats for little or no reason at
all. The leftover steak that still had
several days of sandwich-ability has long since been turned into cubes in the
plastic bowl on the floor. His smile is
smug and assured.
I read many years ago that dogs are not born with a
propensity to smile. I hope it’s
true. I’m not talking about that
teeth-baring grimace they wear when they are panting, looking just like your
pervy Uncle Chet as he laughs at one of his off-color jokes. I’m talking about that smile when the dog’s
yap is closed and the corners of his mouth point inexplicably upward. I read they learn that, how to smile, from
humans. It is an expression of
happiness.
We’ve discussed his last meal and are leaning towards a
bacon cheeseburger. Obviously, I won’t
have to sweat it when considering whether it’s done in the middle. We read previously that it’s better if you
have a plan for your own dinner, when your pet has passed. You’re probably not going to feel like
cooking after throwing the last shovelful of earth, and you may not feel like
going out. Remember watching that couple
at the next table end their relationship between the soup and salad
courses? Yeah, me, too. We’re going to spare the restaurant-going
public all of the ugliness of our grief.
Flash has been dictating the terms all day today, demanding
to go out mere minutes after he came in.
If we are outside, he wants to come inside. If we stay outside, he will insist on
rejoining us almost immediately. We
don’t complain. We open the door. He frankly can’t believe his luck, but he’s
willing to ride it as long as it lasts.
When it is too dark and buggy to stay outside, we adjourn to
the living room, where I grab the implements of torture…the toenail
clippers. Flash hates having his
toenails cut and always did. When he was
younger, I suspect that he hated being confined for the few minutes it took me
to trim his talons. Now, it is more
complex. With his joints the way they
are, I suspect that it causes actual pain, wrestling around on the floor with
your feet in the air. He snaps and he
snarls…he has the last several times.
But he never bites.
I know that many of you are thinking that we could have
skipped this step. After all, he only
has 48 hours to live. But the recently
re-finished floors are echoing with the clickety-clack of toenails that are just
thaaaaat much too long. We don’t want to
have to re-do the floors just because I was being lazy.
The deck, of course, is a lost cause. The last four boards before you reach the
grass are cross-hatched from the running starts of our fierce defender. Readying to leap into the yard on our behalf,
he leaves the inadvertent graffiti of his devotion to his family. To remove those slashes in the pine seems
somehow disloyal.
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