Hope Report and Musings on the Elder Years

Well, I have never seen a more unresponsive dog. She has not wagged her tail or barked since she arrived. Sometimes she seems interested in food or treats, but usually her head is down and she is plodding towards her bed or across the road when we go on our somewhat stilted walks in around the same block. It is hard to interact with her. She doesn’t mind petting and is receptive, but there is no response. Even her level of submission can’t really be called submission because she doesn’t wince or cringe or lie down belly up. This must be dog senility.

I wonder if there will ever be a Hopie that emerges, or will she be in this shell forever? At the end of the day, or what I consider the end, she plops down on her bed on the corner of the rug, a spot she picked out herself, and emits a noise like a grunting growl. This is as doggy demonstrative as she gets. She stays planted on her bed until food bowls are clanging or leashes swooshing through the air as I get them unwound and ready for their necks. If it is time to go out and I drag my feet (procrastinate) she will wander into my bedroom and pee on the floor. It is my fault. I don’t blame her. She is just not all there.

Today she went to the groomer with Tippy. Donna was not impressed. She sounded dismissive. I value Donna’s opinion, she is a show dog woman and makes her living grooming and showing dogs while her husband sharpens blades of all kinds. It is the kind of work I would like to have had back in the 70’s but I didn’t have a husband that wanted to sharpen blades while I groomed dogs, and I guess I had too many other interests and not enough money to do it alone.

Why can’t I find (couldn’t have found) a man who wants to do the things I want to do? Oh, never mind. There’s no chance now. When I was 17, I had to come to grips with the fact that I was not ever going to be beautiful or slim enough to compete for miss america, was never going to have boobs big enough for anything bigger than AA, and my life was over. When I got divorced in 1969 or 1970, and again in 1982, and yet again in 1995 or 1996 or whenever it was, I realized I would never have my photo in the paper celebrating 60 years of marriage and my life was fractured. I always wanted that. I always wanted a man who would want to do things I wanted to do. I don’t know what happened, and there is not enough life left for another chance. Sigh. Mais où sont les neiges d’antan!

I will forever long for them, the snows. Figuratively only.

Leave a Comment