Wednesday
Mar162005
Home Free?
Wednesday, March 16, 2005 at 12:11PM
You might think, when you finally get the kids all in school, you’d be home free. FINALLY. Break out the bon bons, put new batteries in the TV remote, and settle in to catch up on your stories!
Well, we all know that bon bons are a bad idea, and I think my husband hides the TV remote from me to protect his over-complicated technological secrets (I don’t even know how to turn the damn thing on anymore). Still, there is always plenty to do, home alone during the day.
It took me ten years to get all three kids off to school during the day, and I was ready to par-tay this year. Actually, ready to get to work! I spent the first eight years experimenting with home business, and figuring out what I wanted to be when I (they) grew up. Now that I know, I spent the last two years struggling to work around naps and playdates and Mommy-and-me and everything else to get anything done. My youngest started pre-K this year--I was home free, baby! As long as I was done by 3 p.m. And could break for sick kids, repairmen, orthodontist appointments, volunteer duties, Science Fair, Book Fair, holiday parties, and other school emergencies.
I envisioned my days as peaceful, productive: Get up early, get everyone off to school and work, clean up, run a load of laundry, enjoy a cup of coffee over the newspaper (I’ve actually done that--once!), and get to work at my desk, in my office-above-the-garage by 9 a.m. Break for lunch, maybe a quick errand in the afternoon (pesky grocery shopping). I would be ready--even eager!--to be Mommy again when the bus brings my babies home. I didn’t count on Shaney, our geriatric old dog, to become my fourth dependent in the absence of the other three.
You know, we bring pets into our lives...and especially with dogs, after their toddler stage (potty-training, teething, Terrible Twos, etc.), they more or less take care of us: great company, good protection, unconditional love. And then they get old, in their teenage years--the twilight of life for dogs--and you find yourself taking care of them again.
Shaney, who is a lab-shepherd-collie mix, and Data, a beagle-terrier mix, were our first babies. We brought Shaney home twelve years ago, and Data just a couple of weeks later, to keep Shaney company during the day while we were both at work. (Why doesn’t the two-dogs-to-keep-each-other-company thing work with children?! But I digress--)
Shaney has been in decline for the last two years. Aging rapidly, she has hip dysplasia, she is mostly deaf, and while she was never the brightest puppy (Shaney was the pretty one, Data was the smart one), she was always the sweetheart, and still is, although she is losing what little mind she had, in a very foggy, walk-into-walls, everyday-is-a-new-day kind of way.
Unfortunately, we lost Data this summer suddenly and unexpectedly, from obesity and complications. She was a fat little thing, and she was always much quicker to “hoover up” anything and everything edible that the kids dropped or left too close to the edge of the table. She was very smart. Like the surviving spouse in an elderly couple, Shaney has really gone downhill, missing Data. Although she has tried to make a replacement best friend out of a leather ottoman in our living room. Picture a big lab-shepherd-collie, licking, nuzzling, and trying to snuggle up to a footrest covered in dead cow. Every time the dog comes back inside the house, she runs--well, hobbles--to the ottoman for love and companionship. Shaney was never smart.
We lost Data in June; the kids all went to school in August; and I was home free, right? I didn’t count on Shaney: following me around the house to stay as close as possible; demanding her breakfast on time every morning; wanting to go outside every half hour, and then scratching at the door to come back in almost immediately. (I guess she forgets why she went out in the first place? Forgets she was just out fifteen minutes ago?) Occasional accidents and messes; barking at anything and everything, and, more and more often--barking at nothing at all. (Does she hear voices? See dead people?). She wants to go with me whenever I go out in the car, but she can’t jump up on her own anymore, so I have to pick her up and help her in and out of the car...she’s not so crazy about that either, and then tries to stand up the whole time in the car (it’s difficult for her to lay down--it is quite a process, even at home), so she stumbles and slides all over at every corner and stop.
Getting older isn’t easy on any of us--and apparently, once a mom, always a caregiver: There will always be someone to care for. Sorry, Rebel Housewives, there is no such thing as 'home free.'
Live, Love & Laugh--
Well, we all know that bon bons are a bad idea, and I think my husband hides the TV remote from me to protect his over-complicated technological secrets (I don’t even know how to turn the damn thing on anymore). Still, there is always plenty to do, home alone during the day.
It took me ten years to get all three kids off to school during the day, and I was ready to par-tay this year. Actually, ready to get to work! I spent the first eight years experimenting with home business, and figuring out what I wanted to be when I (they) grew up. Now that I know, I spent the last two years struggling to work around naps and playdates and Mommy-and-me and everything else to get anything done. My youngest started pre-K this year--I was home free, baby! As long as I was done by 3 p.m. And could break for sick kids, repairmen, orthodontist appointments, volunteer duties, Science Fair, Book Fair, holiday parties, and other school emergencies.
I envisioned my days as peaceful, productive: Get up early, get everyone off to school and work, clean up, run a load of laundry, enjoy a cup of coffee over the newspaper (I’ve actually done that--once!), and get to work at my desk, in my office-above-the-garage by 9 a.m. Break for lunch, maybe a quick errand in the afternoon (pesky grocery shopping). I would be ready--even eager!--to be Mommy again when the bus brings my babies home. I didn’t count on Shaney, our geriatric old dog, to become my fourth dependent in the absence of the other three.
You know, we bring pets into our lives...and especially with dogs, after their toddler stage (potty-training, teething, Terrible Twos, etc.), they more or less take care of us: great company, good protection, unconditional love. And then they get old, in their teenage years--the twilight of life for dogs--and you find yourself taking care of them again.
Shaney, who is a lab-shepherd-collie mix, and Data, a beagle-terrier mix, were our first babies. We brought Shaney home twelve years ago, and Data just a couple of weeks later, to keep Shaney company during the day while we were both at work. (Why doesn’t the two-dogs-to-keep-each-other-company thing work with children?! But I digress--)
Shaney has been in decline for the last two years. Aging rapidly, she has hip dysplasia, she is mostly deaf, and while she was never the brightest puppy (Shaney was the pretty one, Data was the smart one), she was always the sweetheart, and still is, although she is losing what little mind she had, in a very foggy, walk-into-walls, everyday-is-a-new-day kind of way.
Unfortunately, we lost Data this summer suddenly and unexpectedly, from obesity and complications. She was a fat little thing, and she was always much quicker to “hoover up” anything and everything edible that the kids dropped or left too close to the edge of the table. She was very smart. Like the surviving spouse in an elderly couple, Shaney has really gone downhill, missing Data. Although she has tried to make a replacement best friend out of a leather ottoman in our living room. Picture a big lab-shepherd-collie, licking, nuzzling, and trying to snuggle up to a footrest covered in dead cow. Every time the dog comes back inside the house, she runs--well, hobbles--to the ottoman for love and companionship. Shaney was never smart.
We lost Data in June; the kids all went to school in August; and I was home free, right? I didn’t count on Shaney: following me around the house to stay as close as possible; demanding her breakfast on time every morning; wanting to go outside every half hour, and then scratching at the door to come back in almost immediately. (I guess she forgets why she went out in the first place? Forgets she was just out fifteen minutes ago?) Occasional accidents and messes; barking at anything and everything, and, more and more often--barking at nothing at all. (Does she hear voices? See dead people?). She wants to go with me whenever I go out in the car, but she can’t jump up on her own anymore, so I have to pick her up and help her in and out of the car...she’s not so crazy about that either, and then tries to stand up the whole time in the car (it’s difficult for her to lay down--it is quite a process, even at home), so she stumbles and slides all over at every corner and stop.
Getting older isn’t easy on any of us--and apparently, once a mom, always a caregiver: There will always be someone to care for. Sorry, Rebel Housewives, there is no such thing as 'home free.'
Live, Love & Laugh--