No One Escapes the Cone of Shame

     Our yard is full of raised garden beds, trellises, poles and pegs and pineapples, any number of things that might slash the legs of a dog whose only speed is full tilt. When the Incredibly Speedy High-Jumping Shelter Dog got a little gouge on her ankle while chasing her Kong fetching-ball, which bounces like a Super Ball, through the far reaches, I figured I'd better find some place wider-open for our fetch sessions. I started loading dog, youngest grandchild and new Chuck-It ball launcher, a sort of atlatl for the suburban dog-owner whose arm isn't quite up to the distances this dog loves to run, into the trusty Subaru Forester and zipping off to the vast rear of our church property-- wide open, mowed, frequently played upon by school kids. 
     One day, we inadvertently crashed the school's break time, and the child-loving Tiger Lily was a hit with the students. They petted her and took turns throwing her ball. The schoolmarm pronounced her the school mascot. Great fun, until one day...
     I suppose it was a good thing no children were about when she returned from a long fetch with a gash on her leg, a good inch long, and a quarter-inch or so deep. As I moaned, "This isn't supposed to happen! There's nothing out there to cut yourself on!" she went on nudging the ball to induce another throw. Instead, I rinsed the cut with some of her drinking water and loaded up to return home. 
     "What do I do?" I asked assembled family. Husband's family dogs had never bothered with cuts; they just got hit by trucks. Son-in-law, most experienced with dogs said, "It'll be all right; I wouldn't worry about it." (Or, as they say in Wyoming, "Just rub some dirt on it.") Online dog-care sites had advice aplenty about bandaging dog wounds, and ways to keep bandages on in spite of teeth. I tried. Neosporin. Gauze. Butterfly bandages. That rubber tape stuff that sticks to itself and not skin. Finally, Sunday afternoon: Steri-strips, layer of rubber tape, rings of first-aid tape, and several more layers of the rubber stuff. She licked, but didn't chew. Only, by morning, she had somehow shifted the bandage bracelet up her leg and uncovered the hideous gaping wound, which looked for all the world like we'd cut into a rare steak to test for doneness. Where the Steri-strips went, I know not. I called the vet's office. They said to bring her in. 
     "That's quite a gash," said the vet. And here's what he would do: sedate her, clear out the "granulation" in the cut, which had been made worse by her licking, stitch it closed, and put her in a cone. The Cone of Shame. Come back in two hours. 
     I carried her collar and leash to the car. I went to Trader Joe's and bought coffee beans and cookies and mesquite-smoked almonds. I drove around to all the Poke'-stops I could think of. And after the last one, on the straightaway toward home, the heretofore distracted part of my psyche began to shout, "You are a dope. You failed that poor dog utterly. How could you think you could doctor her yourself?" And so on. Back home, I carried the shopping bag in and made ready to head back to the vet's. The hubs tried to comfort me. I had to stop him because it made me cry, as sympathetic reassurance does, and I still had to to retrieve her. 

    














     Back at the office, I told the doc I felt I should be wearing the Cone of Shame. Well, said he, even if you'd brought her in two days earlier, given her, ahem, reluctance to participate in medical procedures-- it took two attendants to hold her still enough to give her the anesthesia-- he might have had to do pretty much the same things anyway. I told him I felt a little less miserable. 



     She's home, with her pain meds and antibiotics, navigating the house with some difficulty. That darn cone. But her stub of a tail is wagging again. She's more reluctant than usual to let me out of her sight, because LOOK WHAT THEY DID WHEN YOU LEFT ME THE LAST TIME. I promise, girl, in future, my mommy instincts will outweigh all other concerns, and if I'd take a child with the same symptoms to the doctor, I'll take you to the doctor. Because, darn it, I love you. 

Waiting Room Apocalypse

     With my trusty Forester safely in the hands of the mechanics for its 12-month check-up, I mixed up a cup of coffee and selected a granola bar from the gingham-lined basket on the refreshment table in the waiting room. There was a basket of apples, too, and all sorts of tea bags. It looked like a motel breakfast buffet. I settled down with my snack and my newspaper. When I was about finished with the local news, two very odd-looking people walked in. Both were extremely thin and about the same height, on the short side, and it took me a minute of discreet staring to decide what sex they were. Both wore garishly embellished jeans, sliding down a bit on flat rear-ends. Studded belts encircled both. Ah, one had a yoked western shirt and, yes, I detect whiskers. The other had short, spiked, bleached hair perched above a pink tee aswirl with sparkly bits. Still not conclusive—until a slight curve showed itself on the chest. OK, female.

     Then it got weird. The two of them scuttled up to the refreshments, produced a plastic bag and began filling it with the granola bars and apples, every last one of them. “I can’t believe we’re doing this,” the female said. I’d say she giggled, but her voice was too harsh for that, like that of a lifetime smoker. “This is so wrong!” Um, yeah. A young man was sitting opposite me. We looked at each other and each raised an eyebrow. It was starting to feel like a reality show of the “what would you do?” variety, but the camera crew never appeared. If the thieves had been children, I suppose I would have spoken to them directly, but there, well, you never know what people might have in their pockets.

     I walked around the corner to the parts counter; people on the business side can’t see the waiting room. I told the clerk that two people were stealing all the snacks, while one kept saying “I can’t believe we’re doing this.” She looked disgusted and said “I can’t believe they’re doing it either.” Then, “I guess I’d better get the baskets and refill them.” We saw the pink-shirted creature out the window, apparently having taken the stash to a car. The other was gone. Clerk took the baskets away. The baskets stayed away as long as I was there, apparently because pink shirt came back to sit in the waiting room, utterly without shame, as far as I could tell. She was still there when I was summoned to reclaim my car.

     So, did I fail to stand against the decay of contemporary culture? Or did I do the best I could under the circumstances? Is it better to appeal to authority than tackle such a situation myself? Was I wise? Chicken? Both? Probably.