525,600 Minutes

How I Became a Pet Owner - Part Three: Why Parker Still Lives With Us

Our tale last ended with a newly purchased "No Name" scaring the poop out of Romeo upon his arrival in the homestead.  You know what they say about first impressions?  Romeo was not even closely impressed by the arrival of this little twerp in his once blissful abode.  I can still remember the look on his face.  Similar to Jesus' response to Judas, I imagine.  He was so not pleased and I'm convinced he would have flipped me off if he had opposing digits that would have enabled him to do so.  As I was thinking, "This is temporary - it will all be fine," No Name squatted down and peed on my carpet.  I had completely forgotten what it was like to have a puppy.  Kind of like how you forget what labor feels like until you experience the first contraction with the second child.  And you just want to scream the F-word as loud as your lungs will allow.  It was kind of like that....

We made it through the first night.  Because I'm Mother of the Year, the puppy stayed in The Girl's room and she was "in charge" that night.  Until he started barking at 2:00 am.  Then I think I staggered upstairs and brought him into bed with me & Mach One.  In the three years that Romeo lived with us, he had never made it into the bed.  This little bastard was here for three hours and was already snuggled in, under the covers.  Bastard.  The next day was the moment of truth.  I called my mother and told her that I had a surprise for her - her Christmas present, to be exact.  Why I was giving it to her on December 12th, she didn't ask.  But she did say that she and my Dad were on their way to some fancy brunch at the country club so I better get my can over there if I didn't want to miss them.  I grabbed No Name, stuck him in my coat and headed over to the parentals - a full mile away.

I walked in the door and told my Mom to sit down & close her eyes.  I'm sure she was holding her breath in anticipation - what could it be?  Tickets to Hawaii or maybe a cruise?  Surely not a new mink coat or concert tickets to see Barbra Streisand.  "Open you eyes," I said.  And on cue, No Name popped his head out of my coat.  At first, she looked like a deer in headlights.  Then she started to cry.  Probably not a great sign, you think?  I told her that he was hers and I wanted him to keep her company when she was alone - just like Romeo.  Just then my Dad emerged from the basement and he too experienced the look of terror the moment he saw the puppy.  It wasn't quite the reaction I had expected but I figured they just needed a little time to get used to the idea.  After all, he was exactly what they wanted - a male & a clone of Romeo.  I was still patting myself on the back for a job well done.  My Dad said that with all the tests and doctors appointments they were going to, he wasn't sure how a puppy would fit into their schedule - especially at night.  "No worries," I said.  "I'll keep him at night and you guys can hang out with him during the day."  I figured that once he didn't pee on the floor or wake up 14 times a night to pee, I'd be all set to turn him over.  Essentially, when his bladder was ready, he'd be theirs.  And with that, they went off to their fancy brunch and I took No Name home.  Except that he had a name - Parker.  Cinderella liked the "Nosy Parker" concept, so Parker he became.  Of course, Romeo couldn't freaking believe it when I came back home with his nemesis.  To survive one night was one thing - but this little SOB was back in his house and dammit, he wasn't going to take it anymore.  I'm convinced that's what he was thinking.  In reality, he cowered in the corner and watched Parker chomp on the rawhide that Romeo had been enjoying moments earlier.

Well, days turned into weeks and weeks turned into months.  The parentals would come to "visit" Parker at our house but it seemed less and less likely that he was leaving anytime soon.  The fact that they didn't really like him had a little bit to do with my assumption of this fact.  Words like wild and out of control were regularly used to describe little Parkie.  And the fact that he could shred anything cloth in a matter of seconds didn't enable him to make friends or influence people either.  But the longer he lived with us, the more I started to like him.  And then like turned into love.  It didn't matter that he ripped the crotch out of every pair of The Girl's underwear.  And it didn't matter that he chewed the corner off of the decorative molding on our fireplace.  Nor did it matter that my son didn't have a pair of socks with toes or that Parkie would chew on snotty kleenexes or used sanitary products that he dug out of the trash.  None of these things mattered.  All that mattered was that I loved him - and my parents didn't.  I later found out that they didn't want just any dog - they wanted Romeo.  Not an exact clone - but Romeo himself.  A better daughter would have given into their wish - but Romeo is my dog and always will be.  I couldn't - or should I say wouldn't - give him up.  No way, no how.

So now you know why I have two dogs.  I never really planned on either one - but each of them, in their own way, has made me a better person then I started out as.  And for that, I'm forever grateful to both of them...

How I Became a Pet Owner - Part Two: Parker Arrives

Three years had passed and we were all living in canine bliss with our Romeo.  Honestly, the dog is perfect and I'm not kidding.  He won over friends & foe, alike.  People who hate dogs LOVE Romeo - it's scary actually.  If you remember, my parents did not have good luck with dogs and actually thought that Mach One & I were insane for bringing one into our household.  That all changed when they met the little guy and from that moment, they too were smitten.  So much so that they offered to watch him when we went on vacations because he was "far too good of a dog to be placed in a kennel with those other heathens" - that was literally the quote.  Romeo even got them to say things like "someday, when we're older of course, we'd like to have a dog exactly like him."  After I regained consciousness and then called my sister to tell her that Hell had in fact, froze over, I started to think about the possibility of making this a reality.  Thinking - that was my first mistake...

I'm the first to admit that the purchase of Parker was a complete knee-jerk reaction.  It was December 2005 and my mother experienced a health crisis.  My fear turned into a reaction.  And the reaction turned into action (that's kind of how it works, right?)  I decided right then and there that they needed a dog - NOW.  Not a year from now or when they got "older" but NOW.  If I could have, it would have been that very moment.  So I jumped on the internet, the amazing beast that it is, and Googled "rat terrier puppies in Michigan" - enter!  Seconds later, a plethora of puppies were at my fingertips.  I knew I needed a male, because Romeo the perfect dog is male.  Well, he was male - I'm not sure what he's classified as now post-surgery.  But he started out as a male and my mother wanted a male.  Probably because both of the females that she had were be-atches - literally & figureatively.  And this puppy - whoever he was - needed to look exactly like Romeo.  Male & a clone of Romeo - that was the selection criteria.  With one click of the mouse, this is what appeared on my computer screen:

I had found the clone.  In a matter of 10 minutes, I had located the exact dog that I needed to restore all sense of peace in the world.  So I emailed the owner and made arrangements to "look" at "Tuffy" the following Saturday.  That was December 11th and also happened to be the day of The Girl's 9th birthday extravaganza.  After a morning filled with roller skating & laser tag, we loaded up the kids and headed out to pick up my new brother.  Remember, this whole thing is all for my parents.  That's an important fact to keep in mind.

We arrived at the address that Clyde gave to me.  Clyde - can you imagine?  Mach One pulled up and I was convinced that the place was abandoned - it was that bad.  Mach One double checked the address and sure enough, it matched what Clyde had given to me.  Fearing for the safety of his young family, Mach One bravely said, "Stay here" and walked toward the door.  All this time I'm convinced that the place has been condemned and there is no way in hell that anyone lives here.  Just then, about 15 dogs came running out of a pen and caused Mach One to damn near crap his pants.  I recognized one of these rascals as being Tuffy's dad.  Sadly enough, I knew we were in the right place.  Mach One knocked on the door and was greeted by Clyde - a lovely man with a pony tail and no teeth.  I have a thing about teeth - I like nice, white, clean teeth.  People with black teeth or no teeth make me gag - I'm not kidding.  So here's a guy with no teeth and a house that looks like it's a hangout for crack addicts.  And I have my two children with me.  Lovely.  Mach One came out to the car and said, "This is the place and I'm telling you right now - it's bad."  Mach One is far less judgemental then his adoring wife.  So for him to say that, I might as well have been walking into Hell itself.

We entered the scary ass house and exchanged pleasantries with Clyde.  I must say, despite his lack of teeth, he was a very nice man.  Note to self - don't judge people by their teeth; or lack of.  All of a sudden, 4 puppies and about 6 dogs came running out from the living room.  Followed by Clyde's chain smoking wife.  I swear, it was like deja vu - the exact same living conditions and circumstances from which we rescued Romeo.  The Boy, who has no couth, said as loud as he could, "Geez, what happened to this place?"  Of course we patted him on the head and explained to Clyde that we're medicating him for the Tourettes and isn't he a cute little fella?  Lucky for us, Clyde thought he was a hoot - turned out that he had a 5 year old of his own who said mean things to people.  Imagine that.

I spotted Tuffy right away.  Probably because his poor mother was trying every conceivable option to get away from him.  When your own mom hates you, that's a problem.  Wouldn't you agree?  But he continued to torment her and his siblings during the course of our visit.  The Girl kept asking me "what's that smell" in the house.  That would be urine, sweetie.  That's what happens when you share a condemned house with 20 dogs.  She was ready to gag and I couldn't decide what to do.  That bratty ass little puppy looked exactly like Romeo and had a penis - remember my criteria?  The two sole elements had been fulfilled.  However, his mother hated him, as did every other dog that lived in that place.  All 20 of them.  That couldn't be a good sign.  What to do, what to do?  Meanwhile, Mach One had picked up Tuffy's brother, who was brown & white, and he had fallen asleep on him.  Deja vu, again.  Although Tuffy's brother was sporting a penis, he did not fullfill the looks requirement.  So he was voted off the island.  And the other two options did not have penis' (or is that penii)?  Whatever it is, they didn't have one - so they got voted off too.  I plopped down $300, in cash, watched Clyde's eyeballs nearly leave their sockets considering he had most likely never seen that much real money in one place at one time, and stuck Tuffy in my coat. 

I told myself that we weren't going to name him because he really & truly belonged to my parents.  But we came up with some options on the long ride home, trying to drown out the barking and yipping that was coming from the 2lbs. of utter brattiness that was trying to scratch my eyes out.  He finally settled down and we came up with a few options to offer to my mother.  One being "Elvis" since she is a huge fan, the second being "Benvolio" because that's what I would have named him if he was mine (but he wasn't, remember) or Parker, as in Nosy Parker because that little punk ass puppy didn't miss a thing that happened.  He was truly the nosiest dog that I had ever met.  And my mother used the term "Nosy Parker" all during my youth - so it seemed appropriate.  But it was her choice because it was her dog.

We brought Parker to our house since it was late by the time we returned from the hell hole.  Our ever loyal Romeo came running into the kitchen to greet us and I set little "No Name" down on the kitchen floor so that they could meet & sniff each other's butts & bond, like dogs do.  I should have known it was a sign of how this was all going to turn out when No Name growled at Romeo.  This tiny puppy growled at Romeo and Romeo cowered.  Apparently that's the difference between having testicles and not having testicles.  Since I've never had them, I honestly wouldn't know.  But that was my theory after witnessing what I had just witnessed.  Since No Name wasn't our dog and wasn't going to live here, it was no biggie that he hated Romeo and Romeo was going to need therapy from this one minor encounter.  No Name would be delivered to my parents the next day, with a bow around his neck and all would be well.  Or so I thought...

Here are a few pictures of Mr. Testosterone on the day he arrived...

Grown men couldn't resist this face.  So you know where that left me.  I was a goner from the get go...

Tomorrow (and I promise it will be tomorrow) - Part Three: Why Parker still lives with us.

How I Became a Pet Owner - Part One

My friend, Uncle Garr has repeatedly asked "what the hell has gotten into you" due to the fact that I am now the proud parent of not one, but two dogs.  I thought I'd take the time to answer her question and explain how the canines arrived at my house.

I love dogs - I really do.  Growing up, we had dogs.  Two, to be exact.  The first was Heidi.  She was a weiner dog (what's the real name - dachshunds, or something close?) and she was insane.  I'm not kidding - she was neurotic.  My mom bought her for my dad because apparently he had weiner dogs as a child - at least that's the story I heard.  Anyway, crazy Heidi the weiner dog used to hide in the cabinet, guarding her food whilst growling like Cujo.  Just the type of family pet everyone dreams of, no?  Cinderella (my mother) finally had enought of Heidi the Be-atch and gave her away to a lovely woman who had numerous weiner dogs of her own.  Heidi the Be-atch bit the lovely woman's daughter as she was trying to make her decision as to whether she should take her.  If a dog chomps on your kid, most normal people would not only flee the house like their hair was on fire but they would also call the police and have the wacko dog written up or terminated or something.  The stars were aligned that day and as luck would have it, the lady didn't mind that her kid was bleeding and scooped up Heidi the Be-atch and we never saw her again.

A few years went by and I'm sure my sister & I badgered my parents enough to succumb to peer pressure or insanity, whichever you prefer and we ended up with another dog.  Her name was Misty and she was an insanely gorgeous Siberian Husky.  Here's a young JillyD and Misty on her first night home in April, 1974.

I'm not sure if mercury was leaking into our house or radon, perhaps?  Whatever the case, Misty ended up being a crackpot too.  I guess crackpot isn't the right term - primadonna is probably a better description.  Misty thought she was human and truly couldn't understand why the hell she was restrained to a backyard.  She would howl - which made us very popular with the neighbors, as you can imagine - and would bolt out of the yard like a wild stallion in the instant that it took to open the gate just wide enough to squeeze through.  Needless to say, Cinderella also found Misty a new home when I was probably 13 or 14 and that was the last of the canines in our home forever.

So you can see why I always swore that I would never be bothered with a dog of my own.  In fact, I made Mach One promise that he would never, ever let me succumb to a weak moment and get a dog.  He needed to be the strong one and steer me away from any puppies in the window that may cross my path.  Fast forward to the summer of 2002.  By this time, I have two kids and an immense amount of Catholic guilt.  The Girl was 5 1/2 and begged everyday for a puppy of her own.  At two, The Boy was content just peeing in his pants and picking his nose.  But The Girl played on said Catholic guilt and made me feel like I was depriving her an integral part of being a child by not allowing her to have a dog. 

I believe in fate.  I believe that things happen for a reason and there are no coincidences in life.  During the 4th of July parade, our family met a woman with a really cute dog.  We chatted with her and the kids played with the dog.  Mach One asked her about her dog, Chips - what kind he was and the typical banter with a stranger.  Turns out that Chips was a Rat Terrier.  A what?  What the hell kind of name is a Rat Terrier?  I've heard of terriers but they're usually preceded by lovely words like Boston or Jack Russell - but Rat?  That's just plain wrong.  Now it would be really cool if I told you that the woman ended up being a ghost and we discovered this by trying to find her hours later and only coming across Chip's leash laid out neatly on a freshly dug grave.  But that didn't happen - and I think I've read too many horror novels.

Nope, we continued on living our pet free life until the following week when Mach One made his daily phone call to me.  "Want to hear something funny?  I was talking to Anne about that Chips dog and she told me that John, the shipping guy here, breeds those crazy rat terrier dogs.  He's got a litter of puppies right now too."  "Isn't that weird?"  "Hello - are you still there?"  In that instance, I had an epiphany and apparently forgot how to speak because Mach One was convinced that I had fainted on the other end of the line.  What are the chances of us running into a rat terrier - of which we had no clue existed on the planet - and then knowing someone personally who not only bred them, but had a litter?  If that's not fate, I don't know what is.  I explained that to Mach One and he didn't seem as convinced as me.  True to his word, he tried with all of his might to convince me that we didn't need a dog.  I already spent my days cleaning up The Boy's pee & poop - why would I want to subject myself, voluntarily I might add, to another mouth to feed & butt to wipe.  Well not really wipe - but you get my drift.  I stuck to my guns - and I may have cried a little - and Mach One caved.  The next thing I knew, Mach One was making arrangements for us to visit the little rascals the following weekend.

We arrived at John the Shipping Man's house.  To say it was horrific is an understatement.  His mother-in-law was chain smoking on the couch and his wife didn't have any teeth.  The dam & the sire, as they were affectionately called were none other than Itsy & Eddie.  Itsy like the spider and Eddie like my brother in law.  Itsy probably wished she was a spider because she made a damn ugly dog.  Eddie, on the other hand, was cute.  The next thing I know, puppies, puppies and more puppies scattered out from a hole that was supposed to house the dishwasher (and you thought I was exaggerating when I said the house was horrific.)  I immediately grabbed "Fatty" because he was fat and so am I - there's a bond between us chubbos.  But my beloved Mach One was far more pragmatic in his approach to puppy picking and examined all 6 of those dogs like you wouldn't believe.  They were all males so that made the choice simple.  But markings & temperment were among his concerns.  Meanwhile I'm clutching Fatty trying to figure out what kind of sexual favors would be required to walk away with two of these puppies.  Mach One picked one of the puppies up and flipped up his ears.  They were brown on the inside & he had brown eyebrows too.  Very attractive against his white coat with black spots.  Quite fashionable, indeed.  Then, said puppy snuggled into the crook of Mach One's arm and fell asleep.  Not only did he fall asleep - he was knocked out; snoring and everything.  Mach One looked at me and said, "Do you like this one?"  They had to pry Fatty out of my clutches but how could I resist a puppy that was snoring?  At that moment, that puppy became Romeo Montague Dean.  Such a cultured name for a little guy who lived in a dishwasher hole and breathed in second hand smoke from the moment he arrived on the planet, wouldn't you agree?

He was tiny & sweet & smart.  And he knew right away that I was the "Mama" and he decided right away that he loved me the best.

And from the moment I held him, it was all over.  I fell in love with this dog like one of those dorks who I had made fun of for most of my life.  I never understood how people could "love" a pet.  The ones I had were crackpots, remember?  But my Romeo was sent to save me from my misunderstandings and I can honestly say that he is the best dog on the planet.  He is zero trouble, causes zero problems and has brought me more joy then I could ever have imagined.  He's the happiest when he is curled up on a lap or chasing a tennis ball - whichever you prefer, thank you very much.  Right now, he's snuggled behind me, in the computer chair - his only criteria is that he has to be physically touching me as often as possible (kind of like Mach One...)

So a twist of fate brought Romeo into my life.  And I've never been so thankful to a stranger with a dog because little does she know, she changed my life that afternoon.  Without her, there would be no Romeo.  And I wouldn't know what it was like to experience the unconditional love of my boy with the ginormously large ears!

Tomorrow - Part Two: Parker Arrives!

I've always suspected it and now I have proof...

Benvolio (aka Parker) is indeed possessed.  Either that or he's Krypto the SuperDog - you decide for yourself.

My brand spankin' new camera finally arrived and apparently the new & improved flash has turned my dog into a demon.  Actually, he's always been slightly demonic - especially when he's chewing up The Girl's underwear and tearing holes in The Boy's socks.  But we all have our faults, don't we?  And we (meaning me & the kids ) love him despite his Linda Blair like tendencies.  Mach One is not as forgiving of his antics and truly believes that he's the devil incarnate.  Poor little Parkie - so misunderstood.

But you have to admit, it does make for a hee-larious photo, doesn't it?  Someday soon I will post the story of how Satan Parker arrived in our household.  Despite the fact that he will go down in history as the worst decision I've ever made, I do adore him and deep down inside, Mach One does too.  Even though he won't admit it - ever. Never, ever.

And here he is, after the exorcism...

We love you, Parkie.  Even Daddy loves you - really, he does!