dog days

We have a dog. My parents' dog, Mara (a.k.a. Marty), came to live with us a week ago. Although it is something we've wanted for awhile, the move was sort of spur of the moment when my parents brought her down for Eddie's Baptism and she ended up staying. She has acclimated very well and is truly a great dog - very loyal, protective and moves throughout the house "like a ghost" as my husband says. She never steals or begs for food. She only barks when someone approaches to door or walks by the house. She loves to cuddle and curl up next to me wherever I am seated. She loves car rides. And she sleeps in our bed with us, right between us - funny that not too long ago little Eddie was sleeping there and now Marty is. She is my girl - my baby before my real baby. And she sticks to me like glue, so naturally she is around Eddie a lot too. Every blanket I put on the floor for Eddie she quickly claims by laying down on. So we have had to get used to dog hair on Eddie and all over our house...something I am still not completely used to and still constantly Swiffering and trying to prevent contact between Eddie's skin and Marty's hair. The same goes for her sloppy kisses and licky licky. I know it's only natural that the dog is going to lick the baby, but I still try to put a stop to it, especially because I caught Marty doing something pretty nasty today, something that she has done many times before: eating poop. Who knows if it was her poop or some other wild animal or that annoying stray cat that creeps through our yard daily. But she was full out eating it. So gross.

When I sit down with Eddie on my lap, Marty joins us. Eddie pulls at Marty's feathers - her leg hair that is kept long because she is a show dog. She also is a hunting dog and displays her innate traits as she sniffs throughout the yard and runs through the gardens, getting full of burrs and dead plant parts which she brings into the house, of course, entangled in her ears. Right now we only have two rugs in the house - one in our living room which we hardly spend time in, and one in Eddie's room. The only other part of the house that is carpeted is the basement. If Marty is not sitting on a piece of furniture and has to sit on the floor, she prefers a carpeted surface, so she is always on Eddie's rug and uses it to rub her ears and scratch herself, cleaning herself from all those plant parts. And so they are all over Eddie's room and I have already vacuumed three times this week, which is a lot for me.

The only other annoyance with having Marty is that she will not go outside alone. We bought a house with a yard, something that is hard to come by in the city of Chicago, in part for Marty - of course for little Eddie too. And we envisioned being able to just open the door and let her out. Not yet. She needs us to go out with her and stand on the grass for her to go. Not the coolest thing to do in the winter. I have taken her for a walk every day, except for today because my throat is feeling scratchy. And some evenings we all go for a walk as a family. I cannot wait for spring when the late afternoon walk can become another ritual in our day. It feels good to be a family with a dog, something both my husband and I have always wanted. I feel so lucky to have a good dog and a good baby...actually I should restate that as having two good babies, since Marty is, and always will be, my girl.