Guest Poops On Our Front Walk
Fred came to visit today, which he often does, always unannounced. Sometimes I look out the window and there he is, laboring toward our front door in the oppressive Florida heat. Fred is elderly, quite deaf and, we’ve been told, has cancer, although he certainly seems to be surviving for a long time following that diagnosis. Today he pooped twice on his way up our front walk and then stood at the front door and whined loudly.
Fred is a very small, long-haired, white dog who might be a mix of Westy and Bichon; a Beasty? He lives in the house behind ours, is as dear as you can imagine and also extremely poopish. He often has poopy hindquarters, and one day he came to the door with an entire poop hanging from his rear end. I cleaned him off, after which I, too, had poop all over myself.
Mercifully, Fred seems to be loved, although not taken care of the way we take care of our dogs, as though they are the center of the universe. His human is alcoholic and I think makes money by selling herself to various men. Fred likes to come over here to be greeted enthusiastically by our three dogs, who then immediately lose interest and go about their sniffing-the-yard business, as does Fred then, his white coat dingy and matted with Sticky Weed, poop and God only knows what else. I open our gate and let him in where he is safe from anything unkind, and I bend way over to rub his stiff, little back and then fetch him water. Note how I am the one fetching in this scenario, rather than the dog. My husband says Fred comes over in search of a better life.
Fred will surely poop his way to Dog Heaven before long, and knowing this makes me very sad. When I pick him up to carry him back to the hole I cut in our fence that leads to his back yard, I have a quiet-but-other-worldly experience. For such a small dog he is surprisingly heavy, overfed and certainly under-exercised. I don’t know what’s inside his little body, other than cancer and poop, but it feels like cement. And he smells slightly musty, in a doggish way.
At any rate, when I heave Fred up into my arms he goes utterly still and this makes me cry, because to me it heralds the nearness of his departure from this world, and it brings all my other losses to the fore. Sometimes I kiss his tiny nose as his dark eyes look intently at my face coming toward his. Then I see the primal Fred, the original, ancient, divine soul, the revered companion, rather than the poop encrusted old fellow of the probably tumorous, weighty innards.
Dear Fred, I feel you going and I will miss you when you go. But I trust that I will see you in that Great Poop Meadow in the sky. I’ll be in the Eternal Pee section, since apparently I have a bladder the size of a lima bean.
NOTE: Fred did go to Heaven, and his human and I stood on either side of the back yard fence and wept. I think I kept him too long, she cried, describing his last three days of suffering.
You gave him a good life, I said. She did love him dearly. I hope she’ll be reunited with him, whenever she leaves her tattered, earthly life.
END
