Dogs and Children Complicate Things

It's been an eventful weekend. What I have learned is simple, yet important. I have learned that for their own comfort and well-being, you probably should not trust me with your dogs or your children.

So it started yesterday afternoon. Leslie and I had our "day together" with breakfast at Magleby's, a trip to the Farmer's Market, and a viewing of the delightful film Up (if you haven't seen it, go see it immediately. Drop whatever you're doing right now and go to the movies. It is so, so good). To appease the little birdies whose turn doesn't come for a month or two, I usually stop at Iceberg and take twist cones home, but since I also had my brother's dog Mose for the weekend, and the poor pooch hadn't been out of my backyard in two days, I figured we'd pick up the dog and take all the girls for a walk to Iceberg instead.

Thus far, it was simply a lovely Saturday with my nieces. We loaded Mary and Dot into the big stroller, and Leslie and Susie argued about who got to hold the leash, and all seven of us set off to get an ice cream. We got to Iceberg without incident, hitched Mose's leash to a table out front, and went inside to get their cones. My friend Marianne was there with a friend of hers, Joan, so we said hi and chatted while waiting for the ice cream. When they called our number, I got the girls situated with their cones and headed back outside to load them up and head back home. Of course, my timing being impeccable as always, this was the moment the skies decided to dump an entire spring's worth of rainfall in five minutes. It began to pour, one of those crazy, rare-in-Utah storms where it's like standing in the shower fully dressed. And there I am with 5 girls under nine and a poor, soaked pug. Within 30 seconds, the baby, the three year old, and the seven year old were all crying, and I was trying to figure out what the haitch to do. I had Leslie shepherd the girls back into Iceberg to eat their cones, while I tried to figure out what to do with the soaking wet dog. Of course, by now I am quite literally soaked to the skin as well. I unleashed Mose from the table and tucked him in the stroller, trying to put the rain cover down so he'd stay in and stay dry. I'm literally dripping (inconvenient outfit, too--dripping jeans would have been preferred to a dripping denim skirt that was being dangerously wind blown I think. My apologies to anyone who got an eyeful of my gams), and my engineering skills are rapidly failing, as I can't for my life figure out how to get the cover snapped down. Finally, I picked up the dog, wrapped him in a blanket, and stood in the foyer of Iceberg, which was now a puddle from the wind and rain, and stood there wondering how in the name of all that is holy I was going to get these five girls (and the pug) home.

As I was praying for the storm to cease, and little Dot splashed in the resevoir/entrance, Marianne and Joan mercifully came and offered to drive us home. After some pleading with the oldest, who didn't want to go without me (the stroller would not have fit in the back, sadly), and a few urgent wails from the baby, they piled in and made their way home to get dry. I put the dog in the stroller, figured out the rain cover, and ran home in the storm with 30 lbs. of wet pug. I think now that he's experienced the delight of being pushed around in a stroller, he'll never want to walk on his own four paws again. He's lazy like that. But strangely, I thoroughly enjoyed that trip home in the rain. There's something about that moment when you know that things really couldn't get much worse that is so liberating. I'm sure I was a sight, but I was an unexpectedly happy sight. Back at Gina's, I found out that Caroline had asked her mom that morning if they could have an adventure. Well, my dear Care, be careful what you wish for.

Anyway--don't trust me with your dogs or children, part deux, focuses on the dog part. I decided to take Mose on a walk in Rock Canyon this afternoon, and since I was at Mom and Dad's, and Jon and Cathy were heading to the Durfey's without Zoey, I figured I'd take her along on our walk. Jon and Cathy were cool with that, so I found two leashes, stuffed my pockets with doodie bags (I'm a responsible dog walker, you see) and headed to Provo. We had a lovely walk until we came across two very large dogs, collared but unleashed on the trail. Mose is a pug, Zoey a Cairn terrier, both little dogs. I can't blame either of them for freaking out when 300 lbs of canine come barrelling down the trail with no owners in sight. Zoey was so scared that her head actually shrunk, she slipped her collar and went tearing back down the trail. So there I am, screaming at the two big brutes to stay the hell away from my dogs (I did cuss, it's true, and particularly disappointing considering that I was listening to general conference on my iPod. See ya, Holy Spirit), trying to catch up to Zoey.

Complicating this ridiculous scene is Mose, the laziest pug in the universe, who moves at the approximate pace of the continental plates, even in an emergency. Zoey wouldn't stop, and wouldn't let me get within 3 feet of her until we got to the car, and about halfway down the trail, Mose decided to just stop and laid down on the trail. Picture it--Me with Mose, who is not exactly a featherweight, tucked under one arm, a bag of dog crap in my other hand, jogging down the trail trying to keep up with Zoey who refuses to chill out and behave. For the record, I don't blame her. For the first 20 years of my life those two dogs would have reduced me to tears. Okay, for the first 20 years my life pretty much any dog would have reduced me to tears. Good times, good times.

So, let's recap what we've learned:

-Pixar makes a helluva good movie.
-I don't want a dog of my own. Other people's dogs are lovely and delightful. Having responsibility for one every day would so not work in my schedule right now. I can't take the chaos. Even the sudden storm at Iceberg with the girls would have been no problem if I didn't have the shivering wet pug to think about.
-Other people are not lovely and delightful when they don't take responsibility for their pet and keep them leashed in public places. Your choices do effect other people, so keep 'em leashed, folks.
-Along the same line, I'm even more convinced that my short man/dog owner man rule is a good one. I could happily deal with either of those not-exactly-ideal situations, but not both. Sorry to all dog lovers or the vertically challenged, but both are issues for me. Short attractive man-green light. Tall attractive dog owner-green light. Short attractive dog owner-not so much. Is that entirely shallow?
-Caroline is unflappable. Which is great, because her Auntie Mar is flappin' all over the universe like the unbuttoned butt flap on a pair of long johns in a wind storm. Terrible metaphor, I know.
-Sometimes God won't stop the storm when you ask, but he's likely to send a couple of angels like Marianne and Joan to help you weather it.
-And finally, if you love your children and your dogs, don't let me take them off your hands. It's like begging the universe to throw a wrench in the gears!