When the dog hotel concierge calls to say that our girls have been upgraded to presidential suites, my husband and I are playing Rummikub over surprisingly good old-fashioneds at a park-and-ride Sheraton near Charlotte Douglas International. Included in this upgrade, apparently, is one daily treat of our choosing per child: turkey burger, sweet potato soufflé, Puppuccino, or peanut butter–filled KONG.
Alan’s initial response sounds something like, “We don’t allow the girls to eat between meals, as it upsets their tummies.” But after some aggressive eye contact from me, he revises. “I suppose KONGs would be the healthiest, most active option.”
We wed late, at least by Southern industry standards. He’d weathered one marriage already, while I’d spent the entirety of my twenties and half my thirties teaching high school by day, waiting tables by night, and managing—during any off time—to date half the residents of Greenville, South Carolina.
Sure, we considered trying to have a human baby. Alan would make the kindest helicopter father. I’d make a relatively unhinged, well-intentioned mother. We hemmed. We hawed. I quit the skinny cigarettes I sometimes smoked after dark. Until, one night on the couch, Alan asked the strangest question: “But do you actually want a child?”
“Nope,” I said, without hesitation. “Do you?”
“Nope,” he said, without hesitation, and it was settled.
Now, when formatting our annual holiday card, I caption us arranged on the living room sofa: Happy New Year from our pack of fools to yours! Much love: Alan (47), Mamie (43), Retta (13), and Wednesday (7).
Retta, a black Lab/pit mix who’s gone mostly white in the muzzle since the dawning of her younger sister, often looks out the window, as though toward some former, less ridiculous life. A life where, hypothetically, four-legged creatures might not own turtleneck sweaters with hearts embroidered on the collar. Wednesday, on the other hand, a white pit/Boston terrier mix, with her Bette Davis eyes and penchant for telenovela drama, lives for a photo shoot or TikTok dance.
Retta came into my life in June of 2012. While fishing the Ashepoo River, some college buddies of mine—brothers—found a mange-riddled puppy shivering along the banks. They brought her home, cleaned her up, texted a few pictures to the group: “Anyone want a dog?”
“You can’t get a dog,” my mother said. Her case carried solid points: I worked all the time, could barely make rent and feed myself. What she generously did not include: I bungled most things I got up to in those days, from romance to oil changes to making regular student loan payments. More than twice, I gifted the niece and nephew IOUs for Christmas.
One week later I picked the puppy up from a Chick-fil-A parking lot. Along with the dog came a few leashes, some stuffies, and a care package the college buddies’ mom had built. (The brothers would not, of course, want me to write that one of them cried upon placing her inside my old Subaru.)
Based on the photos I’d intended to name her Hamish, Ham for short, but that moniker suddenly felt ludicrous after seeing her in person, like calling Al Pacino “Trish.” She seemed a little mortified by most everything. She seemed like she might read Anna Karenina for fun.
I moved her into the room I rented from an old friend and eventually settled on Henrietta Modine. Henrietta seemed to give regal grandmother, and I’d been going through quite the Matthew Modine phase since seeing Full Metal Jacket. She was fittingly a strange puppy to raise, not that I had any past experience—whip-smart, terrifically self-conscious, bizarre sense of humor. The Dorothy Parker of pit bull rescues. For the most part she was low-maintenance, easy to train. What other choice did she have? Her single mother worked eighty-hour weeks; going with the flow proved kind of a prerequisite.
There arrived several exceptions to her Spicolian coolness, of course. Take the fact that Retta chewed every pair of shoes I owned save for the black orthopedic waitressing clogs, which, really, who would want. Or the time she unburied a decaying bird and hid it, generously, between my housemate’s pillow and headboard. But her most tremendous prank went as follows: One Sunday in August, our AC had gone out, so I was busy washing dishes in my underpants when Retta approached bearing a gift. In her mouth she gingerly held my shaving razor, the perfect sticklike tool for an easy game of fetch if not for the fact that the blade itself seemed to be missing.
I drove like a maniac to the emergency vet wearing little more than an old Laura Ashley nightgown my mother had given me nine hundred Christmases earlier. Imagine if Little Women and one of the Fast and the Furious films had a baby. It was like that.
Doc wanted to pump Retta’s stomach and x-ray her intestines. Anything, anything, I said, as if I had a dime to my name. They couldn’t find a blade anywhere, and when I stepped to the counter to pay, I realized I’d left my wallet back at the house. I went home to grab it and saw something unusual sticking out from under our fridge: the blade.
For weeks I tried to make back lost money by picking up extra shifts at the restaurant or eating from cans in our dry storage. I was so angry with her. I wasn’t angry with her at all. I couldn’t afford her. I’d give her my last damn dollar. I resented her. I loved her more than anything I’d ever loved. I started a blog about her. It was 2012, what else was I supposed to do? At least nine people read it regularly.
We met Alan—retired Green Beret, businessman, wizard innovator—when Retta was four. He took us on a date in his Jeep with the top down. We weren’t used to the finery of it all, like that Alan lived in a house where the faucets worked. Alan, a cat man, wasn’t used to dogs or dating a woman whose next day off would be three months from this coming Sunday.
Early on, a vet appointment I’d scheduled for Retta interfered with a waitressing shift I had picked up, so Alan agreed to take her. From the lobby he sent a selfie. He wore, cross-body, a bandolier housing treats, poop bags, and (inexplicably) wipes. He’d brought with them her bed and stuffed frog. Retta’s face in the pic seemed a combination: Mortified? Confused? What to do with this level of care? We decided we should probably marry the guy.
Eight years later, we adopted Wednesday, another rescue who had turned up at a gas station. Alan and I travel a bunch, not a way of life I could have imagined several years ago. Recently, our dog sitter had the gall to graduate from the local college and begin her life one state away as a farmer. We needed another option.
To be accepted into the dog hotel’s boarding program, each child must pass a four-hour preliminary temperament test. It’s the pit bull equivalent of rushing an Alabama sorority. We were as nervous as we’d been when the adoption agency visited our home after we’d applied for Wednesday. Would they find our yard too small? Our fireplace outdated? Who the hell knew.
Both girls passed, Retta with flying colors. Plays well with others. Healthy relationship sharing toys. Tends toward impatience with smaller and younger dogs who seem to be roughhousing or having too much fun. “She’s kind of like a cop in that way,” the dog hotel concierge noted. “We’ve begun referring to her as Sheriff.”
The girls sometimes receive report cards. Their handlers send photos during playtime. Retta loves her new friend Simon! Here’s Wednesday waiting patiently for ball! Please do not respond to this number!
I’m not sure, exactly, how this has become our life. Not sure, exactly, how my kid and I went from sitting on the steps of a carport, wondering how we’d pay for the next mange treatment. However we got here, Retta’s really enjoying the perks. Currently, she’s at her biweekly hair appointment, like our grandmas used to have. She particularly enjoys the warmth of that dryer as the groomer combs her silvering fur. She’s thinking this dotage thing ain’t so bad.
