All That Ails You: The Adventures of a Canine Caregiver

by Mark J. Asher

  So I knew something was brewing, I just didn’t know what it was, or when it would happen.

  I didn’t have to wait long. I was lying in the reception area when Carla, Ron Peterson, Tamara Peterson, and a few of the residents, came walking toward me. Someone turned out the lights, and I heard Veronica yell, “Happy Birthday, Wrigley!” A cheer went up, as the lights came back on.

  In my excitement, I jumped up on Jane, who was the closest to me. She held my front paws for a few seconds, dancing back and forth before releasing me. Ron reached over and gave me one of his rousing “atta boy” body pats. Veronica blew out the candles on the cake she was holding, and then pulled each one out before handing it to Jane. She and I posed with the cake, while Ron took our picture.

  Before I could dig in, Jane read the inscription aloud, “Happy Birthday to our loyal and loving house dog, Wrigley!” Everyone clapped and cheered again.

  I showed my appreciation by sticking my snout in the center of the small, round vanilla cake, and took a large chunk out of it. After a few more bites, Ron gave me a gift to unwrap. I excitedly tore at the paper, and uncovered a gift basket filled with treats. He let me grab one of the larger biscuits before lifting the basket off of the ground, and putting it away.

  The next gift wasn’t edible, so Jane unwrapped it for me.

  “How thoughtful . . . Maureen, on behalf of Marjorie, got him these,” Jane said, holding up DVD’s from the National Geographic show, Dogtown.

  The mention of Marjorie’s name brought a sense of sadness over the group. Everyone—me included—still missed her very much.

  “How old is he now?” Sandi Schifman asked, coming over to say hello to me.

  “Eight,” Theresa answered.

  “With this sweet boy though,” Jane said, getting down on her knees to wrap her arms around me, “we don’t count years . . . we count our blessings every day that he’s in our lives, and here to comfort the residents.”

  “That’s so sweet, Mom,” Tamara responded.

  “You can see who the most loved and pampered male in our family is,” Ron joked.

  “Well, he’s my only son,” Jane beamed, still hugging me.

  “But I’m your only husband,” Ron responded. “At least that I know of.”

  “Oh, come on, honey, don’t be jealous,” Jane replied.

  While Ron and Jane continued to banter back and forth, Sandi Schifman leaned over the side of her wheelchair to pat my head. “Wrigley, you’re a senior citizen now, just like the rest of us,” she told me. “I’m starting to see some grey in your muzzle.”

  “That’s right, in dog years he’s eligible to be a member of AARP, or as I like to call it—AAR, I can barely Pee,” John Stokely joked, referencing the male anatomy that slows with age.

  I suppose the residents were right—taking into account my age and size, I would probably be considered an older dog. But dogs age differently than humans. Our final years are brief, and in most cases, we don’t suffer from long illnesses. We pretty much go until we’re gone. I think I prefer it that way.

  Over the past couple of months, I did notice a few signs of aging beginning to creep in. It took me a bit longer to chase down a ball, and I could feel some aches and pains before I got going in the morning. I just didn’t pay any attention to them. A dog’s life is short, and you have to soak up every bit of it while you can, ailments be damned.

  The only things I feared about getting older were not being able to smell and taste as well. And of course, enduring more of those awful excursions to Dr. Sager’s office.

  17

  The time between Christmas and New Year’s is normally quiet and uneventful, but a watershed moment—the kind that separates everything that came before it, and everything that comes after—was about to occur at SunRidge. It was so out of the ordinary for anything I’d ever experienced as the house dog, it still feels surreal recounting the details.

  I was sound asleep on my bed in the front office after Jane, Theresa, and most the staff had gone home for the evening, when something caused me to awaken. I walked out into the hallway to see what it might have been. When I looked down both of the corridors, they were empty, and nothing looked unusual.

  As I turned to go back to the front office, I heard movement. I looked up and spotted someone at the far end of one of the corridors. I couldn’t make out who it was, but I could tell from the shape of the figure that it was a female. For a split second, I thought it might have been Linda, the overnight caregiver on duty, but she was slighter and smaller than whoever this was.

  Instinctively, I began heading down the hallway toward the person. When she heard the sound of my collar jangling, she looked startled. She froze for a second, and then began walking toward me at a quick pace.

  As the person got closer, I realized it was Corina, one of Walter’s caregivers. When our paths met in the middle of the hallway, she was sweating and seemed scattered.

  “Let’s go, dog, let’s go,” she told me hurriedly, leading me back toward the front office. I anxiously spun around and followed her. When we turned the corner, she shooed me into the office, closed the door behind her, and walked away.

  I stood by the door for a few moments, wondering what to make of the situation. The rage I saw in Corina’s eyes reminded me of Norm, when he would get angry at me, but far more intense.

  My mind flashed on the times he would lock me in the garage, when Tracie would leave the house. Eventually, I learned how to open the side door by clawing at the handle with my front paws until it turned. Then I would let myself out into the backyard, and run around, until he spotted me and came to get me with a frightening look on his face.

  I looked up at the front office door, stood on my hind legs, and began furiously pawing at the round door knob. Despite swatting like crazy at the handle, I couldn’t get it to turn far enough in one direction to open. Unable to continue standing, I fell back to the ground. Immediately, I sprang back up, and tried another time… Still, no luck. Exasperated, I fell to the ground again.

  I sat and stared at the doorknob for a few moments thinking about what to do next. Finally, I leaped up a third time, grabbed the door handle with my mouth, twisted my head to the left, and felt the door move forward. I slipped through the gap, and quickly headed for Walter’s room.

  When I got there, the door was closed. I instantly jumped up, and began scratching on the door and the door handle. Just as I fell to my feet, Corina opened the door. She was panicked and out of breath.

  “Stay away, stay away!” she yelled, trying to push me aside.

  I fought off her hands, darted between her legs, and into the room. She quickly turned around, and came toward me.

  “Come . . . lie down . . . you stay,” she said, trying to coerce me onto the couch. When I resisted, she turned and went into Walter’s bedroom.

  I followed at her heels, until I spotted Walter on the ground with his back against the bed, groggy and moaning in pain. Blood was coming down the right side of his face.

  With her back to me, Corina leaned over and began flailing her arms at Walter, slapping him in the face and across the chest.

  “I told you not to talk to me like that again. Why don’t you listen!” she cried, as Walter feebly held up his arms in defense.

  I quickly moved around Corina and put myself between her and Walter. She shoved me hard with her right hand across my throat, trying to clear me away. When I moved back toward her, she began wildly kicking me, hitting me in the ribs and in my face. On one of the kicks, I caught her pant leg with my teeth. Quickly, I readjusted my grasp to grab her ankle, and clenched down with all of my might. She yelped in pain, and fell to the floor.

  I went over to Walter and sniffed the blood on his head. His breathing was slow, and he was barely conscious. I don’t think he knew where he was.

  “Leave him alone, let’s go…” Corina urged me, struggling to get back on her feet.

  Ignoring her plea, I lay down beside Walter. The mo
ment I did, I heard Linda rushing into the room. She must have heard the scuffle between Corina and me.

  After that, all hell broke loose. While Corina tried to explain to Linda what was going on, I could hear doors opening, and residents beginning to come out of their rooms. Amid the confusion and commotion that was unfolding, I could hear sirens wailing, coming toward SunRidge. The next thing I knew, there were two paramedics in Walter’s room. One of them tied a makeshift leash, made out of rope, around my neck, and handed me to Linda.

  The Petersons arrived almost immediately afterward. Jane and Ron rushed past me on their way into Walter’s bedroom. Theresa came right after them. She spoke to Linda for a few minutes, and then took me out to the courtyard.

  When we made it to the large tree at the edge of the courtyard, Theresa got down on her knees, and held me to her side.

  “Are you okay?” she asked, anxiously, feeling around my body to see if I was hurt.

  When she finished looking me over, Theresa got back on her feet and nervously paced around, talking to herself, until she led me back inside. By now, all of the residents were aware of what had happened, and the building was vibrating with tension and fear. As we moved through the hallways, Theresa stopped several times to comfort residents, and persuade them to return to their rooms. We walked into the front office to get my leash, and then headed to the parking lot, where Theresa loaded me into the front seat of her car.

  We drove through the empty nighttime streets, until we arrived in front of a two-story house in a cul-de-sac. Theresa pulled into the garage, and we walked directly into the kitchen, where she gave me some water.

  “Everybody’s asleep,” she whispered to me, “so we’re going to have to be real quiet.”

  She led me into the living room, took off her shoes, and laid down on the couch. Then she called me up to join her, and covered both of us with a blanket.

  Just as I was about to fall asleep, a book dropped onto the hardwood floor, scaring me half to death. I looked up and spotted a black and white cat.

  “Get down from there, Steinway,” Theresa instructed the kitty, who was defiantly staring at us from the top shelf of the bookcase.

  The nocturnal nuisance looked back at Theresa, as if she had spoken a foreign language. She reprimanded the cat again, and finally, it slowly made its way down to the floor and out of the room.

  18

  The next morning I drove back to SunRidge with Theresa. Although Jane and Ron had spent the night there, trying to calm down the residents, you could still feel the tension, as soon as we walked through the front door.

  Theresa unclipped me from my leash, and I made a loop around the building to see if I could lighten up the somber mood. I found many of the residents scattered in small groups, talking about the incident, and still noticeably shaken.

  A happy dog with a wagging tail, and a wet nose, was definitely a welcomed sight. As each of them interacted with me, and slowly pet my coat, their breathing became more relaxed. In their conversations, the residents wondered aloud what the fallout would be from the previous night.

  Would Walter sue the Petersons and Corina? Would he return to SunRidge? If so, in what condition? What would happen to Corina? Would she go to jail?

  It would take a while for their questions to be answered, but at the moment, it seemed hard for anyone to believe that life at SunRidge would ever be the same again.

  But even as everyone was pondering what the future might hold, life was slowly returning to normal. Carla was making the rounds, comforting the residents with her warm ways. Sandi Schifman, along with a few other residents, was going to a stretching class. Ethel Leeds and Harriet Tobin were having tea in the library. I was giving greeting sniffs to a new resident named Karen Kratzer, who was showing Veronica pictures of her first great-grandchild. And Jane and Theresa were at their desks, working away.

  Although life went on, the incident was still the topic of most conversations for the next couple of days. Some residents felt that Walter got what he deserved.

  “I’m sorry, but what goes around, comes around,” I overheard Virginia Greer say over lunch, in earshot of the dining room boundary line, where I was resting.

  “If you ask me,” Dee Dildyne offered, sitting next to Virginia, “he’s an arrogant you know what.”

  “But to be abused like that . . . horrible,” Joan Hardwick responded.

  “I agree, Joan,” Claudine Merrit said. “Nobody deserves to be viciously attacked under any circumstances.”

  Jane and Theresa discussed the incident as well in the front office.

  “Don’t get me wrong—what Corina did was unconscionable,” Theresa told her mother, later that afternoon. “But I don’t think she’s a bad person. She just snapped. I wish she would have quit before she got to that point.”

  “That’s ridiculous!” Jane quickly responded, while waiting on hold with the hospital to check on Walter’s condition. “Everyone gets angry, but you have to be evil to get in a rage and hurt someone like that. Especially an old man.”

  Another day passed, and just as the awful incident was beginning to fade from everyone’s consciousness, Walter returned to SunRidge. He looked very different than he had on the first day he arrived. This time, he had a large bandage across his forehead, his arm was in a sling, and he had a subdued expression on his face.

  My first instinct was to go over to him and say hello, but I thought better of it, and decided instead to lay down in front of the reception area couch, while he talked with Veronica. When he finished telling her about his ordeal at the hospital, he looked back at me and said, “And I wouldn’t be here, if it weren’t for Wrigley.”

  It was the first time Walter ever called me by my name. I got up and walked over to his scooter, and sniffed around it, taking in where he’d been. When I sat down beside him, and looked up at Veronica, he dropped his left arm out from a blanket that was covering his lap, and pet my head.

  I couldn’t appreciate the breakthrough in Walter’s behavior for long, because something close by smelled heavenly. Before I could discover exactly where it was coming from, Walter put his scooter in reverse, and headed to his room. That’s when I realized the scent was coming from the side pocket of his scooter.

  I quickly followed him, my nose poking in the air, like a seal balancing a beach ball. Carla, and a few of the residents, couldn’t help but stare, as we came down the hallway—curious to see what shape Walter was in, and no doubt, surprised to see me happily trotting alongside him.

  When he got to his room, Walter opened the door and drove the scooter inside. I didn’t wait for his permission to enter—I went where my nose led me.

  Once he put a few things down on the kitchen counter, he reached into the goody bag, and revealed the source of the delicious scent—a gigantic barbeque bone. It was the kind most owners see at the pet store, and say, “Nah, that’s too big.”

  “Here you go, boy, you earned it,” he said, before handing me my reward.

  I did a victory dance, prancing around the living room with my head held up, and the monster in my mouth, before taking it over to the window, where I discovered someone had placed a brand new dog bed. I plopped myself down, straddled the bone between my paws, and joyfully tore into it.

  The afternoon sun was streaming down on me through the living room window, and I had something new to chew. Pure joy.

  19

  The good thing about being around someone who is new to dogs is that you can take advantage of them. I mean that, of course, in the best possible way. :)

  Walter gave me more food over the next week—before Jane informed him that it wasn’t a good idea—than I could have ever imagined.

  One morning after breakfast, he called me to follow him back to his room. Once he got situated on his recliner, he opened a few peanut butter condiments he had taken from the dining room for me.

  “Boy, it doesn’t take much to make you happy, does it?” he said, watching me voraciously lick each on
e clean.

  No, Walter, just something to lick, love, chase or chew, and I’m content.

  When I finished, Walter put the empty condiment containers on a small table beside him, and picked up the newspaper to work on a crossword puzzle. I retreated to my new bed by the window and watched him.

  I quickly picked up that Walter had a habit of talking to himself. Either that or perhaps he felt I could bark out an answer to his puzzle.

  “We’re getting there,” he’d say every few minutes before announcing the part of the puzzle he was working on. “California City where the Pony Express made its last ride . . . ten letters and it ends with an ‘o’.”

  After we completed our first crossword together, this became a routine of sorts, with Walter calling me back to his room after breakfast for a visit. He would always give me a treat, or something he grabbed from the dining room, and then I’d give him moral support, while he finished his daily puzzle.

  Being given lots of treats and goodies was only part of my reward for helping Walter on the night of the incident. He began taking me outside to sit on the front patio, where we watched the world go by.

  SunRidge was located on the corner of a well-traveled, four-lane road, and there was plenty to see. On the corner opposite of us—on the same side of the street—there was a car wash, which included an oil change station, as well as a mini-market. Kids from nearby schools always congregated there. On the corners across the street, there were a gas station and a mini-mall.

  I always loved to look out the windows whenever I visited with residents, curious to see anything that was going on, but now I was breathing the fresh air, while taking in the sights, as well as the sounds, and the smells.

  Walter’s observations were quite different than mine.