Friends

Last night I was up until the wee hours of the morning working on today’s post. I remember being especially careful to save it. As a matter of fact I remember reading the words “Draft Saved at 3:23:44am” and then saving it one more time. I didn’t publish right away because I was unsure how to start the post. I had several paragraphs to choose from, all about me.

I believe it was divine intervention that deleted that post (but not a single one of the pictures) sometime between 3:30am and now. Someone stepped in this morning to remind me today’s post is not about me.

Today’s post is a tribute to the life of my good friend Meriel’s best friend, Wrigley aka the Goon, who passed on peacefully yesterday afternoon.

Right in the middle of Thanksgiving dinner.

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Just like all the dogs Meriel adopts (and sometimes passes on to me), Wrigley was special. She was not the kind of dog that just anybody would bring home from the SPCA after falling head over heels in love with. As a matter of fact I think that she was on the verge of being deemed unadoptable, when Meriel got a call to come and meet “Pippy” (that name used to seem to fit her but Meriel quickly changed it).  She was a little scrawny and bent, she had been overbred and did not have the most glowing disposition. Meriel was enamored, and immediately showed her off with a warning not to get too close. They were a match made in heaven (did I mention Meriel is as neurotic as I am?).

The first time I spent any time with Wrigley was at work. Sometimes Meriel would have to bring her because of various health problems. Wrigley would sit at my clients feet, trembling, whining incessantly until someone picked her up and put her in their lap.

I often dogsit for Meriel’s other dog, Fenway, when she goes out of town. She usually took Wrigley with her, the Goon was quite the world traveler.  Meriel took her everywhere, usually all dressed up, pretending like it was normal to go everywhere with a dog in a bag.  Sometimes even asking others to carry her.

We were never sure how Wrigley would handle the stress of being around my kids for more than a few minutes. I think that Savannah could have sat with the tiny dog in her lap for hours but her only positive interaction with Jackson involved her snatching an entire grilled cheese sandwich out of his hand. Luckily, he wasn’t used to dogs at the time, and was too confused to try and get it back.I can’t imagine he would have kept all of his fingers otherwise. So if Meriel was to go somewhere without the Goon, she always had someone else sit for her.

One weekend, just over two years ago, Meriel was looking for someone to watch Wrigley overnight. My kids happened to be out of town that weekend with their Dad, so I volunteered to keep both dogs.  Grudgingly, Meriel agreed, with a stern warning not to let Wrigley out of my sight for a minute.  I assured her that I wouldn’t and loaded the dogs in the car. While Wrigley and I had never been close, this particular weekend reaffirmed her knowledge that she was better than me.

Our first battle began as soon as I pulled onto the interstate on the way home. The Goon immediately tried to kill me by getting under the steering wheel, this is how lap dogs like to ride in the car. I gently (really. she seemed so fragile) put her back in the passenger seat and she immediately climbed back into my lap. This back and forth went on for the entire drive.

Once we were home I let Fenway run around our big fenced in yard for a couple hours. Wrigley had no interest in that foolishness and glared at me threateningly the entire afternoon. I think there was some pizza that I refused to share involved.  She was never more than two feet away from me, waiting for me to sit down long enough for her to get comfy next to me.

Apparently, our big fenced in yard, also had one or two dead animals that Fenway enjoyed snacking on.  This was before I had a dog of my own so it didn’t even occur to me that rotting squirrel was such a doggie delicacy.  I also grew up in the city, so I was firmly opposed to doing yardwork and had no idea that it is not uncommon for squirrels, birds and possums to choose suburban yards as their final resting place (I am happily back in an apartment, where maintenance takes care of these things).

I didn’t realize that anything was amiss until the next morning, when I woke up to the most horrible stench I had ever smelled in my life. What my daughter would call the smell of  ”a mongoose stuck in an elephants butt.” Fenway had explosive diarrhea in every room of my house. Every time I got one massive splatter cleaned up, I would see him sheepishly leaving another room. I could almost see the green stink fumes trailing behind him.

Finally, I had enough, I opened all the windows and took both dogs outside to wait for Meriel to get back.  We only had a couple of hours and it was a beautiful day so I sat outside with a book while Wrigley slept under my chair. After about an hour I ran inside to refill my glass of water, Wrigley had been sleeping peacefully for a while so I thought she wouldn’t even notice I was gone. I was inside for literally less than a minute, I got my water right out of the tap which was just inside the back door. Less than a minute!

When I came back she was gone. I realized the Goon must have been plotting her escape all morning. She waited until I went inside and squeezed out of a three-inch opening in the bottom of the fence. I still suspect that she had something to do with Fenway’s tummy troubles. She was smart and that weekend she wanted to make it clear that she was smarter than me.

I immediately got Fenway on his leash and we ran through the neighborhood frantically searching for Wrigley.  At least I was frantically searching, Fenway was too busy chasing squirrels and greeting all the neighborhood children.  As I ran by I asked everyone I saw if they had seen the little black chihuahua and if begged them to bring her to me if they found her. After two times around the block I decided to call Meriel, in the hopes that she would have some advice to get the Goon to come to me or at least reassure me that I would find her.

For the record hysterical sobbing is not reassuring. After reminding me that she told me not to let Wrigley out of my sight, and informing me that she was on the interstate in the middle of a full-fledged panic attack, she hung up and called another one of her friends to help me.  This friend was more experienced with dogs than me, especially Wrigley, so I knew that she would be helpful.

Within seconds my cell phone rang, thank god! someone sane to help.  Unfortunately the voice on the other end of the phone only assured me that “oh yeah, she’ll just keep running whatever direction she was going.”

Great! By this time I was in tears, shakily calling for Wrigley to please come back.  I was devastated that I was responsible for losing one of my best friend’s dog. She had probably run into a busy street, or gotten washed away trying to cross the creek, or been eaten by one of my next door neighbor’s eight pit bulls.

Eventually, I gave up. Just as I was kneeling down to apologize to Fenway for losing his sister, and give him a big goodbye hug, because I would surely never see him again, my very favorite neighbor ever (the only one I didn’t duck and run away from when I saw her coming down the street) pulled up behind me. I was so relieved to see Wrigley’s bug-eyed, little face smirking at me out the driver’s side window as she stood on my neighbors lap. Turns out the Goon just hopped into the car as soon as she opened the car door. I called Meriel and didn’t put that dog down until she arrived to pick her up.

Wrigley was never allowed to stay at my house again but over the next two years I a grew to appreciate her a little more.

She definitely had her bad habits,

but she was constantly striving to be the princess that Meriel always knew she was.

And as good friends are, she was always there for Meriel.

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Over the past few months Wrigley’s health had taken a turn for the worse.  She started having coughing fits that sometimes lasted all night and seizures and fainting spells had become the norm.  Meriel spent many hours at the vet doing everything she possibly could to make her more comfortable.

Yesterday, Meriel picked me up to go to Thanksgiving dinner and I waited patiently as she changed Wrigley’s diaper.  She sat snuggled in her lap the whole drive, and we were both fine with just rolling down the windows every time she passed gas.  When she seemed to be struggling to walk up the steep driveway, I actually picked her up and carried her to the door of my Aunts house.

Wrigley seemed a little more lethargic than usual yesterday, and just after being served a plate of Thanksgiving turkey, she was rushed to the emergency vet by a shockingly calm Meriel.

Ten minutes later I received the simple text message “she’s gone” that I was so dreading.

I believe that little chihuahua somehow outsmarted me again this morning by deleting the post I had almost finished. In true Goon style she was able to remind me just one more time that it was all about her.

We will all miss you little Goonie.