My Dog Boo

I have a dog named Boo. She’s a pain in the neck. I originally adopted her to get over my loneliness when we first moved to the town that we live in. I wanted a lap dog. A dog that would cuddle with me anytime I wanted her to. But she’s not very cuddly. What good is a lap dog if the dog doesn’t like your lap? She likes food, though. She will sit on my lap and stay there as long as I have food in my hand or somewhere nearby. So her lap sitting is conditional. I don’t like her very much. I think she knows this somehow. But what can I do? She’s just a dog.

Every morning, when I’m getting ready to take the kids to school (because they are too lazy to take the bus – but that’s another issue for another post), Boo sits by the door and looks up at me as if to say, “Can I go, too? Please, oh please?” She has that look on her face like she will love me forever and will do anything for me. She looks at me as if it’s her one last dying wish. Every morning, she does this to me. And every morning, I fall for it. And besides, who am I to deny an animal’s last dying wish? I don’t think she’s caught on yet there’s not a paradise that awaits her at the end of the car ride. But everyday, it’s as if she thinks today will be somehow different. The joy that exudes from her the moment I say, “Okay, you can come,” is priceless.

She truly knows how to live in that moment -- the moment when she believes that her greatest wish had been granted. Then, when we return home,the rest of the day is very uneventful. It’s the same old boring and monotonous life for her. But she has that one moment each day… that one moment of sheer joy and excitement that is indescribable. In that moment, I truly envy a dog.