Death Wish Dog

Originally posted on Thursday, December 11, 2008.

Okay, I don't know why this happened to me, I'm basically a nice risk-averse, middle-class lady, who tends to hang out with people who floss and watch their cholesterol. I've never considered bungee jumping or hang gliding. But somehow I wound up with a dog with a death wish. I could understand it if Charlie was depressed. But he's one of the most ebullient, fun loving, affectionate creatures you'd ever want to meet. I guess it's that way with a lot of our loved ones who harbor secret sorrows the rest of us never know about. Charlie's suicidal tendencies first manifested themselves last year when he ate the Christmas tree. Actually it was the tulle we had wrapped around the tree for a lovely gauzy effect which we will not be repeating this year. Since the tulle, and there were wads of it, didn't sit well Charlie followed it up with a chaser of carpet. Yeah, he ripped a chunk of our carpet off the stairs and gnawed on it hoping to settle his stomach. I won't go into details about what that did to his intestines because there are some things I just don't want to think about, but two surgeries were required to unclog them. And we replaced our pretty wool carpet with the fancy nap with a plastic commercial floor covering that was pretty much Charlie proof --we hoped. I won't dwell on the expense of the surgeries and the new flooring, I just want to say that there's a reason why I'm so frantic about getting my book advances. But Roger and I thought we were safe. Silly us. We replaced the carpet but we forgot totally about the bath mats. Yes, Charlie did it last weekend. We had a long talk with him about economics and explained that this time he was going to have to... how shall I say this delicately?... eliminate the rug on his own since we couldn't afford to open him up again. I think he heard us because the backyard isn't pretty and he isn't dead. But last night I found him consuming a Christmas candle loaded with glitter. I am going to talk to our vet about naming a memorial wing at his hospital after us Because Charlie will probably live forever but I'm not sure I'm going to survive.