MIXING IT UP

It has always been a puzzle to me how people can experience empty nest syndrome. It was a delight to me when my beloved children grew up and eventually left the nest. It is even more of a puzzle why people seem to think that I should be experiencing similar feelings about my little canine guest for the past eight days who left after she healed (after being spayed). Today she finally left to join her adoptive parents and her adoptive brother. The two dogs look so much alike that two plumbers asked today if they were from the same litter or if they are being bred to be that way (in the combination of Rottweiler/Basset Hound). The answer to both these questions is NO.

Apparently this mix in not as rare as one would suppose. One rare breed was a Rottweiler and a Dachshund (with a comment that one dog was standing on a rock)!

Not being a fan of having to clean up other people's messes, the notion of having a dog run my life is quite unattractive. Call me lazy, if you will (and you might as well) because I prefer plants that shed leaves and that do not decay with a bad odor. I can clean up a plant at my leisure, put it on the curb for the trash collectors if I deem that move necessary, but I can't do the same with a loving, gentle animal.

It is odd to be loved more than experiencing such love myself. This little dog soon became velcroed to me whenever we were left alone together in the house. Her body had to be in contact with some part of my own for her to settle down and not be climbing on me. If I got up and moved more than three feet, she was with me even to sniffing any orifice she could point her nose at whenever I needed relief, a change of clothes, or whatever else I tried to do to get any part of my life normalized.

Far from leaving me with empty nest syndrome, I am comforted knowing we have bonded and she will visit me occasionally. Almost half the size of her adoptive brother, Rocco, and in far less perpetual motion, she will be a more welcome visitor to my home than he. One sweep of his tail clears off my entire coffee table. No waste basket survives its contents during a visit from Rocco, who moves like the Tazmanian Devil. Anything that is hanging... towels, dishtowels, hanging stockings, is there to be moved. Anything that isn't nailed down is apt to be found anywhere in the house and, since he cannot talk, one may never know where. In Rocco's world, all things are his toys, and all are chew toys.


Dogs may give unconditional love but I, as an owner, never could give it back. Marching to the beat of my own drum, I cannot see myself marching to the drum of a quadruped no matter how loving it might be. Having changed diapers for too many years of my life as a parent, I cannot see pooper scooping after a dog no matter how much love that beastie may offer me. I guess I have come to realize that craving touch by me is for skin, not hair. Carefully observing where a dog's tongue has been does not find me welcoming being licked anywhere the dog can reach on me. Dogs tongues move faster than an aroused, adolescent boy with the arm speed of an octopus.

With all due respect to dog lovers of the world, I humbly submit I will forever be kind to animals, and will sincerely believe all who say they love their dogs more than any people they have ever known. Sweaty dog smell is as repugnant to me as burning rubber. I unashamedly confess I prefer the love and touch of a man to any dog no matter how little the dog talks back to me or how blindly it obeys me. Once a man can lie down or roll over, he beats any dog for recreation and entertainment!