There are days when what I think is not something I want to share. I've been told that my blog is only the "nice" side of me, not the real picture. I guess that's true. My momma taught me that if I can't say something nice, I shouldn't say anything at all. I suppose my blog is a good example of that. So, when I'm silent you can assume that I am either too busy, or I have nothing nice to say. Most of the time I'm just busy. I have ideas of things I want to write, but not the time to post them. The last few days, well, it's been the latter. This is not a nice story. Frankly, it sucks.
Writing is good therapy for me. It helps me sort out my thoughts. I type a line, then delete. Try it again another way, with slightly different words, backspace again, until the words match my thoughts. Sometimes once I get the words out I decide I don't feel that way anymore and I delete them for good. Sometimes the point I get too seems so pathetic, even to me, that I don't want to save it and ever remember feeling that way. More often, my writing and self editing bring me focus. (See, just there I started to write "more concise ...." which wasn't exactly it, so I backspaced to the point that it was right, and tried again. Now, maybe I should just go delete it all.) So, for today, for this post, I'm going to let down the guard, and let you in. I'm not feeling very nice things right now, and I need to write. I'm going to ramble on the way I normally would in private and post it here. Not to worry, it's just an experiment, next post I promise I will be back to my nice self. It might be a few days, or even longer, before I am up to writing something good for public consumption again. Maybe I will just post pretty pictures to quickly move this thing off the top of the page. I'm sure no one will want to read my rambling crap more than once, if that. Just for the sake of this experiment, please ignore any grammar errors. I'm going for honest tonight, not the "A+" with a gold star.
So, you all know that in the last year and a few months we went from no dogs to three dogs. Carl and I had a dog 18 years ago, but none since. So, we weren't 1st time dog owners, but pretty dang close to it. We were certainly out of practice at it all. It started in January with Chester, who was a puppy we got from friends who discovered they weren't 'dog people'. In March, after a string of robberiess in our carport and yard, we got Charlie to guard our house. He was offered on Craiglist inexpensively, and seemed the perfect fit. I really don't want to write about this - I feel sick to my stomach right now just thinking about it. Somehow I have to let it go, and I can't bare the thought of telling this story again, live and in person to another soul, so I supposed getting it all out here and now is a good idea, as much as I'd rather just go play scrabble and pretend everything is fine. It's not fine. My heart is broken and I feel terrible.
Yesterday I had to take him to the Humane Society and they put him to sleep. There, I said it. It's ugly isn't it? It just isn't right. It's one of those things that should never, ever, ever have to happen, but it did and it sucks and I feel like crap about it. When we adopted him, his previous owner said that he was getting rid of him because he had moved to a tiny studio in town and just couldn't keep him there. Charlie is a lab/pit bull mix and wasn't a huge dog, but certainly not a dog that could be happy living in a tiny condo. Anyway, he promised vet records, but never delivered. He had hives and other skin junk going on. We took him to the vet, got him well, and started living with our 2 dogs. (Shuggie, otherwise known as Little, showed up a few months later, starving and neglected.) He was so anxious. That's an understatement. He was riddled with anxiety and fear is probably more accurate. One neighbor made him especially crazy. Eventually he and the neighbor had an altercation, and the man was bit. It could have been a lot worse, but it was not good. There were other incidents, and the aggression was unpredictable. I read all of Cesar's books, and employed his methods. They seemed to help, but even then, there was no real rhyme or reason to the outbursts. I really hate admitting this. I don't like to fail. It feels like we failed Charlie. I would much rather tell a success story, or just keep my mouth shut. Anyway, we tried and tried, and I think Carl said it best, "That dog is just slightly unhinged." Last week we had house guests and he was not well behaved. Some of the things he did had me worried and he spent some serious time in the garage away from the guests because of it. The other night, Quincie and her friend were just heading out to walk all the dogs when Charlie saw our neighbor (not the same neighbor that he bit, this was someone else. The neighbor that made him go nuts was at our old house.)and his boxer puppy walking down the block. The other dog was with his owner, on a leash. Charlie went crazy, pulled away from Quincie and went on the attack. The man was understandably angry, yelled at her, and took his dog home. Later that night I went over and spoke with him. He is a nice guy. We are very lucky.
I guess you could say that was the last straw. We had to do something. Everyday we were taking a chance that he would hurt someone seriously, and that would be terrible, so irresponsible, especially when we knew, we knew he was unhinged and very strong and just not predictable. While evaluating him, worker at the humane society discovered that he had a micro chip. That micro chip had his original owners name and phone number on it. At that point, that person was considered his legal owner, and would have final say on his fate. They spoke to her, and the end was determined. Apparently we were not his 2nd owners, but at least the 3rd. He had a history of similar problems in his short 2 and half years of life. I can't go through all the details of the story from here. My mind just won't let me. The conversations that led to the ultimate decision, the prayers, the pleas, the ideas that were considered and rejected, all of that, is just too agonizing to hash over. I have to let it go or it will consume me. I can say this, and hopefully sum it all up, and you can get a glimpse of the pain from a far enough distance that it doesn't rub off on you: Sometimes, doing the right thing feels so terribly, horribly wrong, that you second guess your decision every fragment of each moment all along the way. Sometimes what you have to do goes against every natural fiber of who you are. Sometimes your heart breaks and sometimes you need something, or someone, outside of yourself to hold you up, and help you go on. Some days just suck. I'm so grateful that Ryker was there with me. As much as I wish I could have spared him that pain, rather than shared it with him, I am grateful that I was not alone. He is a very special person, and I am so privileged to be his mother. As a mother, as a friend, as just me, I would like to shield everyone from the ugliness of the world, and take it all on myself if it would keep it off those I love.
I suppose that's why my blog is usually just "nice". The world is full of days like yesterday for all of us. I don't even want to HAVE days like yesterday, and I certainly don't want to SHARE them with others and spread the unhappiness. I'm not even sure I'm going to share what I have written tonight. If you see it now, and it is gone later, you will know I took it down. It doesn't seem fair to pass on all this sadness. Some may say, "Come on Wendy, he was just a dog." But to me, a life is a life and love is love, and damn it, I love Charlie and his life was sacred. I feel terrible that he trusted me and I led him to his death. I do take comfort knowing that we gave him a happy home for a year, and that we really did love him and tried our best to help him. The employees working there yesterday are special people. They were kind, supportive, helpful and went beyond professional courtesy. I am grateful for their goodness and that Charlie's last moments were not in a scary negative place.
It's been a sad couple of days in our house. If we are not ourselves, now you know why. We are sad. We had to do a hard, hard, hard thing. We miss our dog.
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