A Place in Heaven

I knew something was wrong in the time it took me to walk from the bed to the back door. The small brown dog was dancing at my heels and the cats were circling around my ankles and crying for their breakfast but there was no sign of the black dog. I found her lying in the middle of the living room, not moving and looking a little dazed.
When I reached to pick her up, she yipped sharply and snapped. I got her to her feet but found she couldn't put weight on her back leg and was carrying it at an angle. I hurriedly tended to the other animals and then packed her into the car for yet one more emergency trip to the vet.

Doc saw her at once and determined that she had dislocated her kneecap. He gave her an injection and gave me some reassurance then laid her on her back and stretched her legs. After some pulling and massaging - and some serious resistance on her part - the kneecap popped back in. Common as dirt, he told me, happens all the time in smaller dogs. She was already better enough to growl at me and bare her teeth at him.

I have to confess that there was a moment - just a fraction of a second, really - when the house was quiet and the cats were freely walking around, no chaos, no noise - when the thought crossed my mind, Why treat her? I could get used to this. It was a shameful and selfish thought and I immediately felt guilty but not guilty enough to avoid the follow up thought, maybe it's hip dysplasia at last.

It's not that I don't love her, I do and dearly, but she has been a trial. She's hyperactive, dangerously agressive,
fiercely jealous, and more stubborn than a pack of mules. She chases the cats relentlessly and once took a chunk out of Nick's tail when he was sitting in my lap. At the slightest sound from outside, she explodes with panic and goes into a fit of hysterical barking. She's a fear-biter, anxious, tense, demanding, possessive and manic. She's been through three sessions of obedience training, every training collar made, every diet and every available drug. The final diagnosis has been brain damage from her year long fight with a condition known as puppy strangles. Any owner with a lick of sense would've had her euthanized years ago, still I can't let her go. It feels like punishing her for something that is not her fault, like killing her because she won't behave properly and I can't bring myself to do it. So we go on. She breaks and mends as does my patience and my love for her and there are days when I feel we are both assured a place in heaven.