For most of my married life, I was opposed to owning a dog for two main reasons.
First, I’m pretty meticulous about cleanliness. I feel like I’ve had my hands full with a wife whose bags and drawers vomit clothing, ungraded essays, stained coffee cups, and unopened packages of eyeliner from Walgreen’s all over the bedroom, living room, office, and kitchen floors; in other words, the whole house. Dishes pile up, dust gathers. I wish I could stand it, but I can’t. So I clean it. Constantly. I did not need a dog to track in mud from the yard and leave drifts, waves, oceans of hair on the linoleum and hardwoods.
Second, there is no faster way for a human being to lose his or her dignity than to be enslaved as a canine shit servant, following the stupid animal around, and then picking up its steaming, sticky, stinking poop with a plastic bag. On the ground, the feces looks like a nice little pile, as easy to grab as a granola bar, freshly dropped. But it never is. The thin plastic can’t disguise the poop’s texture. It squishes like putty and smears on the grass. “Should I yank out the grass?” I always think. “I’d be pissed if I stepped on those shit smears in my yard.” And the stench! He eats one brand of dry dog food and some treats every day. How can his poop smell worse that that of a human who consumes a sausage McMuffin for breakfast, a Mexi-Melt for lunch, and an anchovy pizza after work?
My first worry turned out to be pretty much a non-issue. The humans in the house provide more dead skin, leg, head, and pubic hair, dirt, and grease than the biggest dog could. What’s some extra hair to vacuum or mud to scrub?
I still feel like a dogservant when I’m picking up the doggie doo, so I hand the bag to Monica whenever possible. Let her stoop so low. I’m over the feel and the smell of it, though. So completely over it, in fact, that I have actually considered placing the hot bag in my sweatshirt pocket to help warm up my hands on cold mornings. Haven’t done it, but it’s not out of the realm of possibility.
Last Monday, I had no need to cup the euthermic excrement for warmth. It was one of those rare Seattle days with no nip in the air whatsoever. Even the valleys on Mt. Rainier were visible, and Tebow was elated.
Most mornings, he doesn’t run, or even walk fast, before emptying his bowels. But Monday was so brilliant, I think he forgot about shitting altogether. He didn’t stop until the way back from the park. Just a quick squat about two blocks from home. Graciously, he gave me time to securely tie the bag before bursting down 92nd St., out-sprinting me and nearly collapsing his own windpipe when he hit the end of the leash. My choices were to sprint behind him or wrestle with the leash while he choked, coughed, hacked, and continued to pull. So, I ran.
Tebow’s ears were pinned back, and his legs and snout were moving forward in rhythm, like a racehorse trying to outstretch another at the finish line. I was hurrying behind, one hand secure on the leash, the other holding the doggie-doo bag in front of me, rushing past cars waiting for the light at 5th. As the discolored bag swung furiously with the weight of its obvious contents, I pictured what I must look like to the drivers of those cars and laughed, running in the sun, for the whole block
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