I Am My Own Dog
My dream dog appeared on Craigslist as a rescue.
The photos were…not great. I had been looking at websites for quite a long time, hoping to find a unicorn.
And here she was. She looked sad and derpy, but I could see the outlines of the kind of dog I desperately wanted. I emailed the guy from both my email accounts, explaining why I wanted her.
My daughter and I went to see her on an evening in early November, during a full moon. She was skinny and skittish.
And did not trust ANYONE.
Clearly, stuff had happened.
“The only way I was able to catch her was in mid-jump over a baby gate,” the man said. She was a tiny dog, fast and wiry. And she flinched away any time I reached for her.
But we took her home.
She wears a leash at all times, because she is almost completely uncatchable without it.
She’s bitten me twice. It wasn’t malice, it was fear.
She doesn’t know how to dog. Won’t chew on bones, won’t play with toys. She’s hypervigilant, alert, like a tiny meerkat with her head on swivel. She shivers, her bony knees knocking together as she sits up, trying to be good enough for a piece of chicken.
She breaks my heart.
