This is a story about a whining, spoiled bitch. Not me, the other whining, spoiled bitch in our house.
My dog is the spoiled brat daughter I never had.
She rules the roost, runs my life and continuously sucks all the oxygen out of the room.
Her boxer-shark puppy stage is now simply a distant memory of hyper-energetic fur and razor-sharp teeth reeking their constant havoc. No human arm or furniture leg escaped unscathed—we all have the scars to prove it. Yet, these days I’ve almost grown nostalgic because this second stage—tween-boxer—is a fucking nightmare.
She is just a month shy of her second birthday which in dog years makes her about thirteen and a half, which explains the entitled, leg stomping, bitchy attitude—and the whining.
Good Lord almighty in Heaven, the whining!
Will it never cease?
What horrible sins have I committed that my penance would be such as to be subjected daily to this bitch’s endless whining?
It has become the soundtrack of my life.
And it has no basis in reality.
That’s the thing, it’s not like she’s locked up in a kennel, or left to fend for herself on the mean streets of LA searching for scraps to eat or a cardboard box to call a bed.
OH HELL NO!
She is the most pampered, overindulged, spoiled dog you will ever meet, which makes this whole “my life sucks—that walk was too short—why don’t you guys have kids for me to play with?” dissatisfied dog act that much harder to swallow.
The other day I had to go for an early morning blood test so I took her with me in the car because I was tired of hearing: You never take me anywhere.
My plan was to get the test and then drive home via Burbank (completely out of my way) and drop her off at her favorite daycare facility Bow Wow Bungalow, to spend the day playing with her friends.
She played the sad-sack card whining the entire time.
I just turned the music up louder.
Which made her up the ante with a howl/cry.
Those cries are hard to drown out, so I had to crank up the volume even louder and proceeded to drive on.
I looked back at her in the rearview mirror—stink-eye—the death stare shot directly back at me while she twirled her hair and popped her gum.
If you had the misfortune to be sitting next to us in the stop-and-go traffic on the 405 that morning, you would have been accosted first by the music—Lady Gaga at full volume like those hoodlums at the stop lights that play their music so loud it registers on the Richter Scale.
If you had looked over you’d have seen a frazzled, middle-aged mother in a station wagon, screaming obscenities back at her petulant, whining, teen aged…dog. Who by that time was looking in the other direction, ignoring me completely, muttering under her breath “Talk to the paw”. (See photo above)
For the entire hour-and-a-half round trip drive, she whined and complained—right up until the street just before Bow Wow—then when she realized she was about to enjoy a day at Doggie Disneyland and she suddenly changed her tune.
Her face broke into a big smile and her whining turned to yelps of surprised anticipation. Her Velveteen Rabbit ears perked up and I think I even saw her wag her tail.
Oh sure, NOW she was filled with gratitude.
“Love you mommy, love you! You are the bomb! I’m so happy, you’re the best mommy ever!” she cried with joy all the way up the stairs, her little nub of a tail wagging furiously as she disappeared into the bowels of this dog Utopia.
Dammit she reminds me of me, I lamented on the blissfully silent drive home.
Hey, don’t laugh, I’m no different from you.
I whine and complain, pop my gum, stomp my feet and twirl my hair, the duration of pretty much every journey I undertake in life.
“Where am I headed? Where is life taking me? Why is this taking so long? Uhhhhh, this sucks, It’s not at all what I want to be doing!
Bitch, moan, complain—with a howl/cry and a stink-eye.
Wow, that’s identical to the tween-boxer’s backseat behavior.
I played the role of the Universe that day—I knew the destination was going to be off-the-charts fantastic for her. All I asked is that she shut up and enjoy the ride.
My little dog played me. She was void of even a whiff of patience. She thought she knew better. She second guessed every second of the trip.
She bitched and moaned because in her mind we should be at the park.
But I/The Universe had bigger, better plans for her/me.
Fuck. Lesson #1002847 learned.
Carry on,
xox
*Sad-sack stink-eye face.
