Bulldoggy

I am Doodlebug, King of the Olde English Bulldogges.

Me:  Okay, settle down time. Come on, boy. Come on, Sweetie.

Doodlebug:  Nope. I’m fine right here.

Me:  No, you’re not.

Sweetie:  We just doing us, Lady Human.

Me:  You’re doing bulldoggery, which is ten times worse than being bulldoggy. Now come on in the other room.

Sweetie:  I think not. What are you doing now?

Me:  I’m trying to pick you up. It’s like wrestling an 80-pound concrete block.

Sweetie:  Cool!

Doodlebug:  Try to pick me up, Lady Human.

Me:  No, you’re a 75-pound rock. What’s going on?

MoonCat:  We are doing the bulldog thing.

Me:  You, too?

MoonCat:  Yep. Pack member. I have to start sometime.

Me:  Well, I guess I’ll just have to take these cheese crackers with me then…

Doodlebug:  What? Crackers? Wait for me!

Sweetie:  Crackers? Why didn’t you say so? Crackers change everything.

Doodlebug:  Okay, everybody. Bulldoggery is cancelled…well, postponed at least.

Copyright 2022 H.J. Hill All Rights Reserved.

I am Doodlebug, King of the Olde English Bulldogges.

Sweetie: What do you mean “king”? I don’t remember voting for you.

Doodlebug: No vote necessary. Facts are facts. I’m in charge of the pack which is everybody.

Me: Uh, beg to differ. Number one – I am in charge. Number two – I am not a bulldog, thus not a pack member.

Sweetie:  Awww, Lady Human, you are one of us even though you are not nearly as good-looking as we are, but you can’t help that, I know.

MoonCat: Meow. Me, too. Pack member.

Doodlebug: Yes, even though you are not now and never will be a true bulldog, join in.

Sweetie:  This is getting out of control. What next? Chickens? Monster lizards? Bugs?

Doodlebug:  Chickens…I dunno…maybe, but I definitely draw the pack membership line at bugs. They don’t listen to instructions, and they try to take over everything.

Copyright 2022 H.J. Hill All Rights Reserved.

     I have dreaded writing this post for a whole month. No, I have dreaded it longer than that, maybe for years.

     Stella passed away one month ago today. She went fast, quietly, in her sleep. Her legs were relaxed.

 Had she been standing, they would have been in a running position, the way they always looked when she would chase a squirrel.

     Later that day, I came across a cartoonish sketch I had made of her years ago in the same running pose. The caption read, “Flying Stella: I can’t feel my feet touching the ground.” And I realized that had become for her quite literally true. Fly, girl, fly. See you later.

Copyright 2022 H.J. Hill. All Rights Reserved.

I am Stella, Queen of the Olde English Bulldogges. LADY HUMAN!

Me: What’s wrong?

Stella: It’s HORRIBLE! No, no, calm down, Lady Human!

Me: I’m not the one who needs calming down, girl. What’s the matter?

Stella: THAT! Shhh! Don’t let it hear you! It’s a MONSTER!!!

Me: Oh, it’s all right. That a Texas Spiny Lizard. She lives in the yard, has for quite a few months now. I call her Little Buddy. She eats bugs…

Stella: You’ve been letting a monster live here? Have you lost your mind?

Me: She may look like a dinosaur, but she won’t get any bigger than a foot long and she won’t hurt any of us. We aren’t bugs.

Stella: Speak for yourself! How do you know she won’t take one look at me and think ‘Oh, there’s a big fat bug for my supper. Let me take a chunk out of that.’ Hmmm?

Me: Well, for one thing, she’s already run off. Now, if she were 10 feet long and peaking over the fence, we might have cause for concern, but Little Buddy will never get anywhere near that big…

Stella: Lady Human, stop giving pet names to monsters! Unless that name is MONSTER!

Copyright 2022 H.J. Hill All Rights Reserved.

Me: Happy Birthday, girl! You are 9 years old today!

Stella: Does that mean I can drive a car?

Me: No. That’s not ever going to happen, no matter how old you are.

Stella: Unfair. I watched you the other day. It’s not so hard. Now that I’m 9, can I pick out my own food?

Me: No, I think we should stick with the healthy stuff you already eat.

Stella: So what good is it being 9 years old?

Me: Well, humans like to think that we are a year wiser.

Stella: Lady Human, you know as well as I do that humans are silly creatures who think all sorts of crazy things. Wiser? Where’s the evidence?

Now, let’s get down to birthday business and talk seriously about cheese and peanut butter crackers.

Copyright 2022 H.J. Hill All Rights Reserved.

I am Stella, Queen of the Olde English Bulldogges. Lady Human is being quiet. Too quiet. Swat a fly! Tell us to “cut it out!” Say something!

Me: Sorry, girl. I was just thinking about someone I used to know.

Stella: A human? Do I know them?

Me: No, he went away long before you came. I learned last night that he has passed away and he was a young man. I’m pondering.

Stella: Passed away like Wiggles passed away?

Me: Yeah.

Stella: Are you sad? You feel to me as though you are.

Me: Yeah, a little. Mainly over missed opportunities. It had been so long since I saw him or spoke with him and I thought my feelings now are silly at this point and don’t really matter. But I was reading about grief last night from a book by C.S. Lewis. He said, “Whatever is matters.” It helped me.

Stella: C.S. Lewis…was he a bulldog? He sounds like one.

Copyright 2022 H.J. Hill All Rights Reserved.

I am Stella, Queen of the Olde English Bulldogges and even I know it is not a day for sunbathing.

Miss Sweetie: But I want to.

Doodlebug: I never sunbath. It wastes valuable exploration time.

Me: There’s not going to be any of that either today.

Doodlebug and Sweetie: Awwww!

Me: Y’all, it’s headed for 108° this afternoon. Outdoor activities are curtailed.

MoonCat: I never sunbathe. I lounge indoors. Far more civilized.

Miss Sweetie: But what if my sun goes away?

Me: Not much chance of that happening this week.

Stella: Or ever again.

Copyright 2022 H.J. Hill All Rights Reserved.

I am Stella, Queen of the Olde English Bulldogges. Lady Human, blow on the air and make it cooler.

Me: That is not one of my gifts, girl.

Stella: Turn on the twirling thing then.

Me: It is on.

Stella: Don’t try to fool me. It is not going as fast as it can.

Me: Oh, all right. One more notch up. But don’t try to steal the covers if you chill down in the wee hours of the morning.

Stella: Wee hours? Is that why I have to get up to go outside and potty in the dark? Why didn’t you just tell me they were called that? That solves the mystery.

Copyright 2022 H.J. Hill All Rights Reserved.

I am Stella, Queen of the … yawn … Olde English … yawn … Bulldogges.

Me:  Are you worn out?

Stella:  I’m just going to take a little nap for maybe all afternoon, maybe until tomorrow.

Me:  Must be nice.

Stella:  It is.

Me: It takes a lot of energy to be you, doesn’t it, girl?

Stella:  Yup.  Being me is a full-time job.

Copyright 2022 H.J. Hill All Rights Reserved.

It has taken me two full days to get up enough gumption to tackle this and write about it.

At 10:08 a.m. on Friday, March 4, 2022, Wiggles passed from this earth, exactly one week after her 8^th birthday.

Wiggles loved the outdoors. She came to us when she was just over a year old. She had been a country dog. The man who owned her decided that he wanted a motorcycle and selling the dog would help him get to his goal faster. My son’s friend put them in contact with each other and my son bought Wiggles. About two weeks later, Wiggles’ previous owner was killed in a one-vehicle accident while riding his new motorcycle.

Everybody liked Wiggles, even non-bulldog people. That was not always true of other dogs. Wiggles never picked a fight, but she never backed off from one either.

She was active and quick. She loved to sunbathe on pleasant days.

Recently, she had started standing for a long time and staring, but I thought nothing of it. There is a lot to stare at outside. Then, on Friday, she suffered a huge seizure. Her whole body was trembling.

I stared into her face. Her eyes were closed. The trembling stopped. She opened her eyes, looked at me, then closed them again, and went. It was so peaceful that it took me a few minutes to realize that she was gone.

“One last look,” as my son put it.

I believe in God, the Creator of all. I also believe in the revelation of heaven and eternity as presented in the Bible. There was a time when I did not think that applied to animals. I know better now. God is not an annihilator. He used the bulldogs to teach to teach me that. (I am a slow learner.)

I also believe that the LORD restores. The next time Wiggles looks at me, we will both be fully restored and there will be no more last looks.

Copyright 2022 H.J. Hill All Rights Reserved.