All you could ask for - #118

A shit, a spa, a kiss.

It was all Buster’s fault. He was a black lab and the antithesis to his breed. Where other labs were friendly and gentle, Buster was mean. As a kid, I would walk across the lawns in front of my shed and behind Liz’s house to weave around to her casual door. Not the front door her mother was struck by lightning in front of (twice), but the door that used to go to nothing off the old farmhouse kitchen that they’d since built stairs to. It’s where friends came inside. 

But Buster did not consider me a friend.

He laid on the stairs like a hellhound, still as a gargoyle, eyeing the property for danger, for threats, for 7-year-old girls. The only advice anyone ever gave about Buster was country advice: he’s all bark, no bite. Just don’t show him any fear. You’ve gotta show him who’s boss. You, all 40 lbs of you and him, all 70 lbs of him. 

I tried, in the gentlest way I knew how, to act like Buster was just playing a game. Talking to him, being friendly, doing my bravest to summit the steps to the kitchen. But Buster bared his teeth, and I stilled. Buster started to growl, and I stepped back. And when Buster lunged, I ran. Buster got a hold of my arm halfway around the back of her house, and I started screaming. My brother came running with a baseball bat, all 80 lbs of him. 

That was it for me and dogs. Until Cooper.

I’d only just started seeing Ben when I got a flat in the Santa Monica Mountains. I’d already fixed a previous flat on the ride and didn’t have what I needed to fix another. I called Ben to see if he was around, but he wasn’t. He told me if I could get to his house up there, I could take whatever I needed. So I hitchhiked to the house with a plumber and waiting inside was Cooper.

Cooper threw all 22 lbs at my face, aggressively licking every bead of sweat he could find, and he would not take no for an answer. Ben also told me he was all bark no bite, but the difference was I trusted Ben. So I trusted Cooper. And five months later, I moved in.

Cooper changed my life. He changed who I am. And Ben and I spent what felt like every waking minute with him. We took him on every trip, to every holiday, to both our jobs, to every lunch date, to every patio, to every party. He slept in our bed between us every night, and he stayed in bed for an hour after us every morning. We called him The Police, not just for his black and white, but because every time dogs started barking at each other, he would insist on getting between them. “Hey! Break it up!” we’d yell in the little gremlin voice we’d given him. And he was a gremlin. You could flip him on his back to tickle him and he’d let out the gurgliest growl with a face so full of malintent that it genuinely scared people — the same people I’d been before. But Cooper never hurt anyone in anyway other than heartbreak.

Once in line at the Malibu Pier for a special breakfast, Bill Burr and his wife were one couple behind us in the queue. He pointed at Cooper and said, “now that’s a cute dog.” And we’d do our Bill Burr impressions for years pointing at Cooper wherever we were saying “now that’s a cute dog, ok? Everybody walks around saying oh my dog he’s my baby he’s the cutest— no. you ain’t seen cute, lady, ok? This, this is a cute dog.” 

We saved Cooper twice, but the third time was a charm only for death. The first time, he was dognapped right from our driveway. She took him hiking and then took him home, no care to knock on doors or check for a microchip. We posted about it on social and then so did everyone else. The post was shared over 1000 times, including by the woman now in charge of selling the house he was living in. Someone following her saw the post, and that someone called us.

“I have your dog.”

“Can you send us a photo?” At this point, scammers had tried three times already to say they had him, but we’d need to send money first.

“It’s definitely your dog.”

We met, absolutely hysterical, in a Topanga parking lot. It’s the most Cooper ever licked my face. 

The next time we saved him, you’ll remember. Cooper had started fainting, and I started driving to Fort Collins to take him to the experts. He had congestive heart failure, pancreatitis, and pulmonary hypertension. The summer before, he’d done a 60 mile backpacking trip. It happened so fast. 

But the next six months slowed down. We felt him dying in our arms in June, and then one day, the day we were set to give up, he started eating. And he ate and drank and ate and drank and begged and jumped and ran and barked and he was better. We bathed in it every day, we drank it and rolled in it and cherished it. We hiked all his favorite trails and went to all his favorite places and made all his favorite things. And then on my birthday, our deal with death began to unravel. 

This was my first time being with a pet when they passed. As an adult, every other pet has been ripped from my arms, sliding through my hungry fingers with disease and violence. Every time grief has been guided by anguish and anger. But this time, grief comes earned. Cooper was two months shy of his 13th birthday — a good, long life for a dog. A never long enough for their person. Cooper spent the night cuddled between us in bed, and he started the day by taking a massive shit on said bed. We carried him into the shower to hose off his butt with warm water, and then did Cooper’s favorite thing in the world: getting blown dry by a 35-year-old blowdryer my grandmother gave to me a few years before she passed. We carried a warm and dry Cooper to his favorite bed. The cats gathered around, perched on a bench nearby, and as Ben and I sat on the floor comforting our very best friend, he fell asleep forever. 

Now, every day is a day without my dog. Snoots died on January 13, 2023 and Cooper passed on January 12, 2024, closing out the year of hardship. Astrology tells me that come January 20, my life will dramatically improve as Pluto removes itself from something or the other for the first time since 2008. Desperation can make a believer out of anyone, and it’s the thread I’m hanging onto, that the pain and arduity of last year will stay there.

But I’d be remiss to not compare the paired griefs. Snoots was a robbery. Cooper was a gift. At a ripe old age, after traveling the entire country, living in Tennessee, Brooklyn, Minnesota, Topanga, and Colorado, after being a commercial star and a social media sensation, after working in bike shops and tech hubs, after the winning the hearts of every person he ever saw in his little drug rug, Cooper got to die by having a massive shit, a spa treatment, and kisses from every creature in his life in his favorite place he’d ever lived.

What more can you ask for as a dog? What more can you ask for for a friend? 

I cradle my hands on my now bulbous belly, telling a story to a baby just starting to listen. I say I know it doesn’t feel very good in there right now. I know you can feel me heaving and reeling. I know you can feel me curled up like you, a fog over the kinetic energy you were used to, but I promise you baby: this grief is worth it. There will be so many pains I try to protect you from, to teach you about before they teach you, to guide you toward the versions that stretch you and bend you but wane before they break you, but not this one. 

Because this grief isn’t really pain — this grief is merely what happens when love passes through the veil, when you give your love for someone to take with them. And it’s worth it.

Love you forever, Coopman, my Squishbutt. Thank you for being my dog.

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Shangrilogs is taking a little grief break. Thank you for understanding.