45.

Crafty Animals

I’m dogsitting for Katie and Matt this weekend, which means a weekend-long dog party with Jeb, Cielo, and Short Dog. If I’m being honest, the dogs are a little needy—a twinge emotional and perhaps a hair neurotic. I’m a poor substitute for Matt and Katie, the cross-eyed old lady who shows up in homeroom when everyone was hoping for the hip young guy with the spiky hair and sweater vests. No matter how many times I wrestle Jeb or rub Ciel’s belly, they just look at me from across the room and sigh: Oh, you’re still here.

For the last two and a half hours, Jeb has been chasing the same lizard. I watched them for awhile and I swear the lizard is deliberately messing with Jeb. At one point it was hiding at the top of a tree stump and when Jeb got within an inch of the spot, it sprung into action, executing a Mountain Dew X-treme leap off the edge, landing perfectly between two pieces of bark. There’s something going on with this lizard, honestly, no one’s that good. Wedged between the bark, the lizard breathed heavily, clearly calculating its next move. This is spy tech lizard—or the spy tech lizard training ground. It’s hard to imagine how a lizard could get wilier than this one, but I’ll remain open to the possibility. Jeb just came in for water, every part of his body shaking. The lizard is clearly winning.

Last night when I was at the movies, the dogs banded together to lash out at me—and I know that Short Dog was the leader. I have a history of animals T.P.ing my house, starting with Abe Froman in New Hampshire. After making the fateful mistake of leaving Abe alone for a night, I came home to find that he had busted out of his cage, grabbed the toilet paper with his very small hands, and darted madly around the house. He was exhausted when I got home, stretched out on his belly under the couch. Last night I arrived home to a similar scene—an entire roll of toilet paper spread out through every room of the house. When I finally found the roll it was wedged in a small nook between two pillows at the top of the couch: Short Dog. I like to think that when I left Short and Abe alone together, they had long conversations, sharing stories and talking about world events. As I went from room to room scooping up toilet paper, I made a series of loud, sarcastic comments (“Oh no, you are right Milo—the one thing that I was hoping to do tonight was to collect streamers of toilet paper tossed wistfully around the house. Honestly, I can’t imagine a better way to end an evening”), but ultimately I’m considering it a tribute to Abe Froman. His legacy lives on.