Rescues

We've been busy. Nick is graduating. I seem to not be able to do anything I'm supposed to do. I've spent the last two days baking cookies, reading Dorothy Dunnett, and cleaning.

I guess it needs to be done. But I still have a textbook to review, a research proposal to finish and a final exam to prepare for. It's like I can't make myself do anything. The only thing I can do is make myself sit zazen and exercise. After that, I just fall to pieces.

My ex is coming, with his teensy weensy little wife. They'll do things like be all smiley and hale-fellow-well met-and pray and shit and look stable and everyone will wonder what all the fuss was about and how I could possible leave such a great guy. rarrrgh.

Jay is doing his part by having a nervous breakdown. The signal pattern in my life with my significant others has been that, when the shit is coming down particularly hard on me, my partners all have nervous breakdowns, so we can all focus on them.

Last week, he took his dog to the pound and had his cat put to sleep.

"You did what?"

"Don't judge me. I just couldn't handle the dog any more. It was too much. I can't handle anything or anyone making demands on me or requiring any sort of commitment at all. I can't do it. Don't worry. I'm not breaking up with you."

I tell Nick about it. Nick shakes his head, and says with surprising cynicism, "Well, if you decide to marry him after we leave, just be sure not to give him power of attorney."

How do you take a four year old lab to a pound? Who adopts an old dog?

I went out to visit her. She was, coincidentally, in a kennel sponsored by a friend of mine. She rubbed up against the chain link when she saw me, ducking her head and whimpering. "It's okay, Ellie bellie," I told her. "I won't let anything bad happen to you." I saw a note taped to the door. It said, "Hi! I'm Ellie! You just saw me on the Sam Salt Show." Sam Salt is a local personality around here. He used to be the weatherman, but they tried to fire him because he was gay (this was back in the seventies). Our town had a letter writing campaign. SAVE SAM SALT! He's very tall and completely hairless, but he's ours. He barely even has eyebrows. He is our gay, hairless weatherman here in Little Dixie, and we love him. Now he has a talk show. And one of the things he does is have the pet plaza, where he features a dog or cat from the humane society. Good, I thought. Sam Salt will save her.

I made the mistake of telling him this while we were sitting in our bar. I tell him I saw her on tv.

He started crying.

I sat there, watching him, sipping my white wine. Well, at least he's not a total bastard, but he still took her there.

I told my dad about it. He was quiet. "I don't think it's a deal breaker, Haley." He said finally. Then he told me about how when everything was falling apart for him when I was a teenager, he took our border collie out into the country and abandoned her. "I just couldn't handle things anymore." Then he went to Pakistan. For three months. "I felt terrible about the dog the whole time I was over there, and when I came back, one of the first things I did was drive out to where I had left her. I got out of the car, left it running and looked around, and she came running out from the woods and jumped into the back seat of the car. As if I'd never been gone."

I went back again on Monday, but Ellie was gone. She'd been adopted. So good. I would have taken her, but I really didn't want to. And I was angry. For being put in the position of saving the dog.

"You don't have to rescue me," Jay said.

"You're not the one who needs rescuing."

That night, Jays says--"Guess what. Ellie got adopted. Did you do it?"

"No. I know."

"How do you know?"

"I went out there to see her."

"Me, too. I went out there to get her back."

"Well, good." I said. "All's well that ends well." Maybe he does need to be rescued. I'm still never giving him power of attorney.