My Dog Deserves Better

While we were on the Great Discovery Road Trip, ‘Grandpuppy’ got to spend the week with my adoring parents. I have to admit, I didn’t really consider his stress level when I arranged to meet my mother in a parking lot to transfer him to her car. I heard him yelp all the way to the freeway. It was the sound of panic.

He knows my parents. He visits them occasionally with us, and they visit all of us. I never thought it would bother him.

Here’s his routine. We get up early to get the munchkin ready for school. Sometimes grandpuppy gets attention, but often he gets hooked to a leash and walked – very quickly – out to the potty spot, since our patio home doesn’t have a private yard. He comes in, he attempts to steal leftover waffles, we trip on him, and he goes into his part of the house, which is tiled slate and therefore easy to clean. He has a nest of doggie beds under the desk where he sleeps. If he can find bones the munchkin hasn’t hid, he chews on them. He waits for us to come home, plays for a little while at night, curls up on the couch with my hubby, drifts into doggie dreamland, and then is abruptly woken and put back in his kitchen/dining/den area. He’s very, very loved, but it’s a crazy house and a crazy routine.

I wasn’t there when he arrived at their house, but I can imagine the scene. New toys were laid out; new bones were given to him. There were acres to run across, peacocks to chase, foxes to study, and at the end of the day there was a fluffy bed piled with blankets for him to sleep on. When morning came, no one got up to go anywhere. He spent time in the backyard, or the barn, as he wished. He ate horse poop and barked at the cows across the road. Doggie heaven. 

Isn’t it interesting that he was depressed? Isn’t it interesting that he didn’t eat for three days, that he cried when I came to get him, and that he clung to us for the first few hours he was home? His little doggie mind couldn’t rationalize that he was in a home that would generally be judged as better for dogs, with people who loved him. He didn’t care that it was doggie heaven. He wanted his people. 

But.

Rest assured, potential and actual Adoptive Parents, I’m sure all of this is only applicable to the canine species. He’s an angry doggie who doesn’t understand that he was saved from time at Ye Olde Doggie Daycare or some other sterile and institutional setting. A child would understand that a home with ponies and barns and peacocks made for a better life. A child would know that her pink princess canopy bed came at the cost of her people, her identity, and would find that a reasonable trade.  A child would understand that all the love, adoration, money, and idyllic nature scenes in the world made up for everything. She would be grateful. She wouldn’t cry. 

I guess I’m glad my dog deserves better than she did.