Happy Guilt Birthday Guilt Bongo Guilt Doggo Guilt Privilege Guilt

it's a gauntlet of guilt

My puppy is a year old tomorrow.

We had a dog before.  At one point we had two, but the older-but-newer one bit the younger-but-established one once too often once too hard, and after we got each of them stitched and sutured and healed, we had to find a new place for the older-but-newer one to live.  Then we just had the one dog again. 

Chowder, our white and black pit bull, is about five years old, female, about 58 pounds.  She wasn’t great at walking loose leash when I first arrived; she has a reactive tendency around little dogs which coincidentally make up ninety percent of the dog population out here.  Over time, she and I got much better at walking. I started taking her to the dog park.  It went slowly well for about a year.  Certain big dogs she never got interested in, never let her guard down around, although she was happy as a clam playing tug for hours with her special mates.

Then we added Bongo the puppy last Christmas, and Chowder’s mama bear genes kicked in.  I took both of them to a few parks a few times. Even around dogs and people she knew, Chowder got protective.  Then scary.  I know some teeth met some flesh once or twice.  We don’t take her to the park anymore.  This has severely limited the amount of time I spend taking Bongo to the park.  Which it shouldn’t.  I should easily leave Chowder at home and take Bongo to play.  

But Bongo is his own ball of problems.  At 60 pounds, neither he nor his enthusiasm can be slowed.  It’s too anxiety provoking to take him around unknown places and dogs because he is so so so strong.  I’m only really comfortable dropping him at doggie day care, which is in the same place he’s been going since he was a puppy.  They’re easily doing half the work of raising him at this point.

This brings me back around to the guilt.  In the time it takes to type this, I could have taken Chowder for another solo walk.  In the time it took me to get up the wherewithal to sit down with the needed things to type this, I could have spend fifteen minutes (longer) training Bongo in impulse control.  In the hour I can’t seem to pin down in my mind, the errant balloon of time want to spear with Cleaning The Bathroom instead whistles itself flat through a sad tiny pinprick labeled Get Snacks For Pets And People Before Day Care Ends. 

An important injunction.  My pockets and fingernails reek of string cheese and hot dog pieces.

And all my blankets have holes in them. And the rug is duct taped to the floor.  And I spend way too much time freezing peanut butter in rubber molds for gnawing.  And I spend way too much time untangling multiple leads behind my ankles.  And I spend way too little time bathing these guys with oatmeal for their sensitive pibble skin.   Or giving them coconut oil rubs like the maven dog moms on TikTok.  Or reinforcing clicker cues.  Or otherwise doing everything in my purview to teach them both to protect themselves from the world, and to protect the world at large from them. 

Bongo is one year old tomorrow.  It still feels like any second someone’s gonna come take him away. Love, lacing a slipknot through the heart.