New Girl

New Girl

She tilted her face up to meet mine, eyes pleading, please take me home. Her long silky locks shimmering in the light, and butt wiggling at the sight of me through the bars of the cage, compelled me to ask to see her.

She came to me immediately with kisses. I hugged her and asked how long she had been locked up. “Quite a while. She’s scheduled for euthanasia next week.”

I couldn’t let that happen. She was such a sweet retriever. I asked why?

“She eats everything. Whoever adopts her needs to give her twenty-four-hour supervision. We haven’t found anyone willing to do that.”

As I pet her, she snuggled up against me. I was retired and not a traveler, nor very social. I believed it was going to be easy to keep an eye on her. On the way home with Buffy, we stopped at Petsmart to pick up supplies. Since I hadn’t owned a dog since childhood, the clerk assisted my choices; a twenty-pound bag of kibble, and a huge jar of a soft food called, “Farmer’s Mutt”. The price seemed more for a purebred racing dog that also shepherds sheep and guards your house during its free time. But Buffy had been through a lot. It was a treat.

At the store, she made a beeline for the toys. How cute, she was choosing one. And then, she ate it before I could stop her; squeaker and all. I picked up another toy that was labeled, Indestructible, and a “Kong”, a heavy rubber toy resembling doggy doo. I also purchased a big dog bed, dog bowls, a collar and leash, a tag that read, Buffy, a coffee cup with a golden retriever on it for me, and a dog brush. My bank card company called to tell me there was a suspicious charge of $800 from Petsmart on my account. Yes, it was me. Buffy had eaten three more toys and the whole bowl of doggy treats on the clerk’s counter before I could get her out of there. I was beginning to question my sense of logic.

Once home, Buffy, nose down, hoovered anything on the floor and left a trail of drool along her path, which included the crumbs I neglected to sweep up after breakfast. I filled the water dish and placed it in front of her. She not only lapped up the water but splashed it all over the kitchen. I had to get out the mop—of which she tried to eat. After securing the mop in the closet, I poured some dried dog food in the other dish, placed it in front of her, and stood waiting, sure it would be gone in seconds; instead, she gazed up at me with sad eyes.

“What?” I asked. “They said it’s the most popular and nutritious food ever made.”

She continued to gaze. I sighed, brought out the Farmer’s Mutt, and dropped a scoop of it on top of the dried. She ate it…not the dried. So, she doesn’t eat everything. Now what do I do with twenty pounds of kibble?

Once she was done eating, I tossed the indestructible toy to her. It was gone in five minutes. Every bit of it except for a smudge of its straw stuffing. I worried she would become stopped up from all the wrong things she was eating, when the worst happened. My ring was gone! The opal ring inherited from my grandmother—gone! It must have slipped off when I threw the toy. I looked everywhere. There was no sign of the ring.

Buffy slept unfazed on her new doggy bed with her head resting on a corner she had already chewed. The next morning, she woke me at five a.m. howling to go out. I hated getting up, yet so relieved she was house broken. It was still dark outside, so I grabbed a flashlight, a plastic bag, and rubber gloves. She left a nice, brown, steaming pile to sort through. Here I was, in the middle of the yard, wearing a white bathrobe, holding a light over dog poop while fishing through it with my hands in yellow gloves.

I found stuffing, two squeakers, a sock, bits of leather from the indestructible toy, pieces of the Kong, three teddy bear eyes, and four feathers. Could she had eaten a bird? I swallowed back the thought, and sadly, there was no ring. Every day for a week, every time she went; and she was very regular for a trash compactor, I sifted. No ring. Could I have misplaced it? It was possible. My memory hadn’t been the best the past year.

Then, one day, it happened. Buffy was constipated and miserable, whining and scratching at her rear. She stopped eating everything. It couldn’t be my ring causing her distress, could it? A month had passed by this time, and I had given up searching through dog poo. The neighbors were looking at me as though I was a crazy old bag lady hoarding what the dog was expelling throughout the property.

I took her to the veterinarian. He had to operate. After waiting for what seemed to be several hours, I realized that, even though Buffy ate everything in sight, except for kibble, and costing me thousands of dollars, I wouldn’t have given her up for the world. Her love was unconditional; and mine for her. The doctor finally came out with his hands behind his back to give me a report. He was shaking his head.

“Is she…” I asked.

He smiled. “She’ll be right as rain. Actually, she has amazing digestion for what she eats, but you will not believe what we found.”

My heart raced with hope. I bet he found my ring at last. I held out my hand to receive it.

He swung out his fist and opened it. A diamond tennis bracelet coiled onto my palm.

“Looks to me she swallowed about five carats.” The vet chuckled.