Last Wednesday

It's Wednesday. I've decided to skip teaching and go to Ellen's memorial, because that is clearly more important than studying the verb "have to" and reviewing body parts vocab and how to make a doctor's appointment on the telephone. A little bit ironic huh? Ok, so we drive up to Hailey, me, Lisa, Mike, Bonnie, Bessie, dog, and cat. We're dressed up because Ellen got sick and died, because that is what people do when other people die. We arrive, we park, and I let the dog out to pee before we go in. Except that Sayers doesn't want to get out of the car. He's acting weird. I pull him out in the snow and tell him to pee, which he is really good at usually, but this time he won't even move. He won't walk, he's slow, he's not responsive.

Mike asks if he got car sick. Um, I don't think so. I start thinking that maybe he has carbon monoxide poisoning. Maybe when Bonnie spun out on the highway a few days before and crashed the fuel up side into a pole, maybe that did something to the fuel system and poor doggie got gassed on the car ride up. I put him back in the car and figured he'd recover. We went in, I hung up my coat, started to mingle with Ellen's friends, but of course all I can think about is my dog dying in the back of the truck while I'm inside trying to mourn and remember Ellen, but really only thinking about my dog instead and doing nothing for him. That would be a cruel turn of fate. So after piling my paper plate up with food I put my coat back on and went to check on the dog.

He was worse. Couldn't quite manage to lift his head or even want to. He was at the vet just the day before to get a routine vaccine, he was fine. They said he looked good. Could it be some freak delayed reaction to the vaccine? I took a peek at his gums, which instead of being a healthy pink color were about the same color as his teeth. For a second I questioned myself, they are supposed to be pink, right? Clearly giving him some fresh air turning off the car was not helping. I went back inside and got directions to a somewhat nearby vet and Mike drove with me down to the vet in Bellevue. We were, by far, the best dressed people in the place. I was even wearing my long black coat, which is taylored and which was now completetly covered in white dog fur from lifting him in and out of the truck several times.

Of course, the minute you get there, they want you to fill out paper work and expect you to remember things like your phone number. Come on people, I have no idea. I just need you to fix my dog so I can get back to my funeral. They were very nice though. They asked where I was from: Twin Falls. It was pretty clear though, the way they looked at us that they had a hard time believing that any two folks dressed the way we were could be from Twin. Look, people die . And their friends, even their friends from Twin Falls, dress up all classy for them. I told them I needed to go back to Hailey though, for a funeral. But that I am staying in Ketchum. They were so confused. Here I came from Twin Falls to Hailey, then took my dog to Bellvue, had to go back to Hailey, but was not staying there or going back to Twin Falls. I was going to be in Ketchum. OK. It seemed he was bleeding internally, so once they got a diagnosis they would refer me to a vet in Sun Valley, which is close to Ketchum.

We went back to Hailey, back to the memorial service. I found my plate of food was still there, so I ate it. And I mingled a little bit with folks, looked at Ellen's photo albums and found some embarrassing photos of myself with my equally dorky sister in them. It was strange, and sad, but sort of happy too, an Ellen celebration. But then I got a call from the vet and they explained the most likely scenario. Sayers' spleen was exploding; he had a tumor growing in it and it got big enough that the organ ruptured and the bleeding made him go into shock. That was his problem. He would probably have to have his spleen removed. "Have to." I have to go to work. You have to go to the dentist. My dog has to have his speen removed. Such application, I could use this in my class. But maybe there are too many haves, they might get confused. It is, after all, first level ESL.

Anyway, the vet made me cry because I was convinced that my dog had cancer and was going to die, and here I was, at a funeral, the only person crying. And I was crying because of my dog, not because of Ellen who did just die from the big C. I imaginged how she would respond to the news. I bet she'd be pissed. She was pissed that she got sick soon after finding the best dog she had ever had. And this was exactly the kind of thing that she would see as unfair and would get upset about. Ellen likes happy endings and cheesy movies that are unrealistically upbeat.

Ok, so to wrap this thing up, I took Sayers to the Sun Valley Vet Thursday morning and they took out his spleen and sewed him back up and he got to come home on Friday. He's healing up nicely now, though a little depressed now that i've taken his morphine patch off. But the vet did call this morning to say that he tumor was cancer. He has something like a 90% chance of dying within 12 months. So that sucks, but I can't say I didn't expect it. I had a feeling. I like my dog a lot. He's mine. He's my buddy, so we'll have to hang out and be pals and enjoy each other as much as possible. I really, really like him.