Happy Charlie Bravo Day!
Dad here; I can’t remember if I ever told the story of how the Duff came to be an inmate at the Casa del Whackos, and I’m too lazy to go back in the archives and look…
So, anyways; it seems that there has always been a scruffy-faced terrier in the mix at the Casa. First it was Ivan the Terrier, numerous foster schnauzers, Max E. Million, then last being Ajax who passed away over a year ago. After a time of mourning, I was severely tempted to go in search of a replacement to fill the obvious void, but I really knew better; things always seem to have a way of working out.
Then I saw a fiesty little girl up for adoption on a friend’s FB page; this was it, I just knew it. But hope deferred maketh the heart sick, and it didn’t work out. I was more than just a bit bummed.
A few days later I was grinding out some miles down on the Arkansas River Trail. I was approximately ten miles from the SUV when I spotted this matted up mass of hair gimping along on a back leg that seemed about 15° out of kilter. It was almost the same situation as Charlie except minus the crate, and this time I was on a bicycle, not a motorcycle. And the problem was the same; how to carry a dog when you’re on two wheels?
The answer this time was 1(800)CALLMOM
I told her that I had found an old man with a broken leg, and could she bring the CRV down to the river. Obviously, I was not thinking about my choice of words. She just knew that I had found an old homeless guy with a broken tibia, and she was a bit reluctant to come; not because she had any qualms concerning her own safety, but she had 85 year old Oba in tow. But what if it HAD been an old man, and it had been love at first sight? I can just see it now: Mom driving the two of them out on dates, the rear view mirror tilted up to give the two octogenarian love birds a little privacy; “hey now buddy, let’s keep the hands where we can see them!”
But I digress; it wasn’t a boyfriend for Oba but a dog for me. This was a fact that Mom only discovered upon pulling into the parking lot, her eyes rolling like apples on a slot machine. We loaded the scruffmiester into the Honda; Mom headed for the Casa, and I for my vehicle to rush home and supervise the integration..
You know the rest; he has since become the scourge of all that he encounters. I am convinced that he has some honey badger DNA lurking somewhere in his floppy carcass, as nothing or no one is safe from his attitude. I swear that he is the most expensive terrier ever, if his worth was determined by what he destroys. Shoes, gloves, hats, dryer vents, more shoes, the other dog’s sense of humor, are the only units of currency that he understands, and by what he evidently measures his own self worth.
And he has developed a fascination with “going”. It doesn’t matter how hard it’s raining, he has to have his frowzy head poking out of the window. After he pulls it in to baptize us all by shaking himself off, back out he goes, ad infinitum.
And don’t even let him hear the motorcycle fire up…
I don’t know that we’re ready for that just yet; that throne will always be Charlie’s for as long as she desires it. For every thing there is a seasn; the thing about seasons is they’re always changing whether we’re ready or not. Maybe all we can do is hope that the seasons merge smoothly instead of abruptly, but ultimately we have no say in the matter, just in how we respond to it.
We be of one blood, ye and I.
