I got a dog

You ever heard of a divorce that was all rainbows, puppies and soft bunnies?  Me neither; I think it not possible. Everybody has weeds in their roses. It is called Life.   Seeing as how I have been here and done this a few, uhhhh, times in the past,  I can rate this one as a 7 out of a possible 10 on the ‘F You UP’  scale.  The Long Marriage closed out a decade ago and it was a soul searing Perfect 10. I still twitch and gibber when I recall that personal hell on earth that lasted an interminable time.

Little Blondie can’t not lie.  I think the grammar Nazis call that a double negative but no other sentence describes it in more perfect fashion.  Many things can cause a marriage to fail.  Not keeping your panties on could be one. Then again,  keeping your panties on when your husband would clearly prefer them to be kicked over in the corner ain’t so great either.  Stealing from your spouse could be a reason to split but speaking from personal experience,  it can be easily forgiven.  Stuff is easily replaced and mostly inconsequential in the Cosmic Continuum.   But being a consistent liar is a deal breaker.  It has to be and I don’t get to make the rules on this one.  A liar introduces doubt with every word uttered into a Holy Union where I count on my partner to have my back without question.  A liar also disrespects the person they lie to.  Every lie cut away a small piece of my heart to the point I had little left to live on.

Tuco – The Good Dog

So it came to pass Little Blondie worked really, really hard and landed a good security job here in the oil patch.  I was truly proud of her because I was fearful her physical disabilities, daily prescribed and entirely necessary opioid use due to pain and mental/moral lassitude would be a hindrance. She pulled it off and did what she had to do.  When the chips are down, she is a hard bitten true survivor.  I got an email along about then that started out sorta like this here ‘Pay attention.   Have I got a deal for you……’

Hmmmm.  Somehow or the other I had gone from being a doormat at the shithouse threshold to a stellar and magnificent man in 24 hours.  Something must be amiss; ya think?   In oil patch fashion, her new job was two weeks on /two weeks off.   I thought to myself that will suit her well because the grind really drags her down and two weeks to recharge is a good thing.  The reason she was all kissy-kissy was she wanted me to keep Tuco the Dog while she was doing her two weeks at the man camp.  I was nonplussed at such aberrant expectations and sent back this one line reply ‘You can’t be serious?????’   Move on, end of story.

3 weeks later, 4 days before she was due to start the new job, she made a trip to the Palace to exchange bowling equipment for direly needed cash.  Nothing like buying the same same bowling equipment twice. She also filled a supply list for me since I was two weeks past the last town trip. Thank you for that caring act LB. There was a kissy-kissy tang in the air and my spidey senses were jangling. As I was unloading the Durango, I noticed a case of Tuco food in the back.  Uh oh I says to myself.  We visited around a little bit and I was enjoying the company and seeing the both of them when the tears and hand wringing commenced.  She had found a kennel to board Tuco the Dog for two weeks but, you know, Tuco the Dog was a sensitive and precocious animal and she had never been caged and she knew how much I loved that dog………….

People our age with a loved pet know when I say a dog is almost like a child to us.  Especially a fine dog that spends every waking minute with you as a companion,  never relegated to a back yard or neglected on the end of a tie out chain.  They become a part of your life just as intrinsically as your young children did decades previous.  Tuco the Dog admirably filled that role and I have never known a finer animal.  In any divorce, the children suffer most.  Even the dog kids.  How do their little lemon sized brains process the fact that one of their masters is no longer present?  I couldn’t tell you and it pains me a great deal to even ponder it.  I will say Tuco the Dog did her best to crawl right up in my lap while I was sitting at the dinette.  It made my heart swell out of my chest.  Abiding and true love is a wondrous thing.

So I stepped outside of the lies, stealing and cheating perpetrated on me by a woman with a heart of obsidian and agreed to dog sit for Little Blondie for two weeks.  Tuco the Dog is loving life and so am I.  She knows who she is and what her role is at the Princess Palace.  Just like she never left. Fine silky dog hair wafts on the floor fan breeze in the Palace. Errant caliche dirt makes its’ way inside on dog paws. Little enough price to pay as I would gladly pay a cost far higher. My heart sings when I glance down at her laying at my feet.  One day at a time. friends and neighbors, one day at a time.

Parting Shot: Today is Little Blondie’s 46th birthday.  Many happy returns of the day.  Honest.

Colonel Cooper says

As we approach the birthday of Theodore Roosevelt we are tempted to enjoy as much of his writing as we can. I was shown the quotation that follows in connection with the popular discussion of “The Multi-cultural Society.”

“The one absolute certain way of bringing this nation to ruin, of preventing all possibility of its continuing to be a nation at all, would be to permit it to be become a tangle of squabbling nationalities.”

End Note: Ain’t Love Strange by Paul Thorn from the So Far So Good cd.  Sometimes you just say F**k It! and spin up some Paul Thorn. What other singer you know crawled in the squared ring with Roberto Duran?

“God will love you if you put on that blue polka dot mini skirt with black stiletto heels.”

What he said…….

Paul Thorn, Elvin Bishop and Delbert McClinton

Good and tight – rockin’ the night. If you don’t know of Paul Thorn; you should.