A Preview of Parenting

Several weeks ago I told Ian that we should think about investing some stock in the pet care industry. I had just read an article, Why America’s Falling Birth Rate Is Sensational News for the Pet Industry, which highlighted the trend of us job-hunting, loan-burdened, cohabiting 20-somethings turning to our furry babies to replace human ones. Ian and I very happily fall right into this quasi-parenthood. We bought Teddy health insurance, we buy him vanilla cones at Dairy Queen, we send him to daycare, and we've even taken him to get his picture with Santa.

For us, dog parenting is like real parenting “lite.” We still have responsibility for Teddy’s socialization, for his health care, and for remembering to bring his toys when we travel to “Grandma and Grandpa’s.” But we can still put him in his crate and go to the movies on a whim. And, of course, we love that friggin’ dog with our whole hearts. Even with the shedding, the drool, the vet bills (which, btdubs, I’m starting to think he has better healthcare than us), parenting him has been a blessing in our lives together.

However, dog parenting has given us another glimpse into a really annoying part of real parenting: unsolicited advice.

Let me take you through two scenes we encounter with our big pup all. the. time:

At a new groomer checking out:

Groomer: So, what do you feed Teddy at home?
Me: We feed him Purina Pro Plan for Sensitive Skin & Stomach.
Groomer: Gasp! Oh you know that Purina is not good food for him, right?
Me: Well, we’ve tried him on the really high quality foods - I want to feed him those - but he just doesn’t do well on them.
Groomer: Pulls up list of Pro Plan’s ingredients on computer screen. Well I just have to show you this. This ingredient is a byproduct of the brewing industry, this is a preservative...this isn’t hormone-free organic meat from Mount Sinai...

Everyday this week, walking in the shade in front of our building or at night:

Passerby 1: Your dog looks really hot.
Passerby 2: Your dog looks really hot.
Passerby 3: Your dog looks really hot.
Passerby 4: Your dog looks really hot.
...

In these two instances, these folks usually have the correct intentions. In fact, when people comment on Teddy being hot, it’s often observational (“Wow, he must be hot today!”). But it's the critical comments that make me want to get snippy. The wrong words or the wrong tone implies that we’re bad dog parents because he looks hot. Even though they don’t know that we live RIGHT ACROSS THE STREET.

And boy did I almost lose my cool at a critical comment last night. Ian and I were coming in with Teddy after his nighttime walk when two ladies asked us to hold the elevator for them. We did. I even pushed their floor button for them because they were carrying lawn chairs. One of the women narrowed her eyes, tilted her head in judgement, and asked us in a slow, drawn-out question:

"How can you liiiive with a dog like that in this building?"

In spite of her tone, I responded politely: “Well, Newfies are actually pretty good apartment dogs because they’re so lazy. He’s just a big floor potato.”

“Oh, alright.”

Our elevator stopped at our floor, so I loosened my tongue a bit as we stepped out: “... And, you know, there's the fact that we love him. We’re not going to get rid of him.”

The doors closed behind us, and I turned to Ian to say what I really thought: “Bitch.”

More than any fact about Teddy’s life, that he is big and lives in an apartment with us draws the strongest criticism. These particular commenters might think they have my dog's best interests at heart, like the food-mongers and the heat-observers, but they do not. Nevermind that Teddy is not a goldfish. Nevermind that we did, in fact, live in the suburbs with him and even with the big spaces and backyards, he still missed the city. Nevermind that he is a floor potato and, as I type these words, he is engaging in one of his all-time favorite activities: sleeping on the tile by the fireplace.

No, this line of thinking - that only small dogs can live in smaller spaces - is dangerous. As an animal shelter volunteer, I see dogs relinquished because their humans are moving to different spaces. I hear adopters come in and say to me, “I’m looking for a dog, but only a small one because I live in an apartment.” And then I see the shih tzus and poodle mixes adopted the same day they arrive on the adoption floor, while the shepherds and pit bull mixes, cursed only by their size, wait and wait and wait for someone who knows what Ian and I have known all along: dogs don't care about the size of your house, but the size of your heart.

When we got Teddy, we thought he would fit well into our lives. Little did we know that, two years later, we gladly fit into his. I bet it’s the same with real parenting, too.

180 Degrees

Yesterday afternoon I walked a few blocks north of our apartment to the Anti-Cruelty Society for my first volunteer orientation session. Founded in 1899, the ACS is Chicago's oldest animal shelter and runs many life-saving programs for Chicago pets, including an adoption program, a low-cost spay/neuter clinic, a pet behavioral help hotline, and many humane outreach and education programs. You can read more about this wonderful organization here.

I signed up for the Monday afternoon session, which turned out to be pretty sparse with only five attendees.  But I enjoyed our more-intimate orientation because it I got to learn more about the other volunteers, and our time together helped me realize something about myself as well.

As our volunteer coordinator began her PowerPoint presentation, she clicked through to the second slide entitled "About Me."  It featured two photos of a couple of adorable bulldogs and one pretty gray-and-white cat - her pets.  She was using their photos as a family portrait and as a tacit way of illustrating her own motivations behind her work at ACS.

Because we were long on time and short on attendees, our presenter followed-up her discussion of her pet family by asking us about ours.  An older gentleman sitting in the front row, said he had two cats named Grendel, after the Beowolf character, and Jack.  The second lady, sitting behind me, mentioned her feisty Norwich terrier who loves her but not other Norwich terriers.  Then the volunteer coordinator held out her palms towards me and asked curiously, "How 'bout you? Do you have any pets?"

"Yes, I do." I smiled, happy for any excuse to talk about my fur baby in front of a crowd, even a small one. "I have a dog, Teddy. He's a Newfoundland."

She cocked her head to the side and grinned, "Aw, what a perfect name for a Newfoundland!"

"Thank you, yes, he does look like a big black bear." 

I looked down and reflected on the enthusiasm with which the two previous speakers had talked about their pets, and a most significant realization came to my mind and out of my mouth: "You know, it's funny.  I guess I've kind of done a 180 in the past two years since I got Teddy. I used to not care much about animals at all."

...

It's true. Growing up, I never considered myself an animal lover. In college - heck, even in elementary school - if a visitor ever brought a dog to campus or, surprise of surprises, into the classroom, I watched from a distance as my classmates cooed over the furry novelty. 

I thought dogs made for nervous doorbell-rings and awkward moments entering a friend's house. "Off! Off! No jump!" Those were the words that always seemed to greet me at the house of a faithful dog owner.  Of course, I would cover up my discomfort with learned politeness. "Oh don't worry about him. He's fine!" I'd lie, as I felt the freshly trimmed nails of my four-legged doorman scratch my legs and feet.

Cats were cooler, but also more indifferent to affection. The closest I ever came to feeling love for an animal was for my family's cat, Snowflake.  Even today, I brag about his awesomeness, especially to defend the typical cat-shaming by dog lovers. Sure, he sometimes dragged dead birds to our front porch welcoming the mailman with a murder scene, and he hardly ever slept in my bed with me. Even when he did cuddle with me, I'd have to quickly bury myself in layers of blankets to protect my supple skin from his 15-minute-long, claw-wielding, blanket kneading session that would precede EVERY nap he took with me. BUT when I babysat in the neighborhood during junior high, Snowflake walked me to each house, waited for me on the windowsill, and walked me back.  Great cat. Case closed.

But I didn't love Snowflake like I love Teddy today, which has nothing to do with the merits of Snowflake v. Teddy or cats v. dogs.  No, I attribute my pet-indifference to my frustration with the dogs living in my house growing up. Those little terriers didn't always like each other, they peed on the kitchen floor with alarming regularity, and they'd snatch dropped food with the ferociousness of piranhas. My parents loved those dogs. But I only love them for the funny family stories they brought about, like the time(s) we shouted at my toddler cousin "DON'T PICK IT UP!" after he dropped his goldfish crackers off the kitchen table.

So I grew up never really understanding why everyone loved their dogs so much.

Then I got Teddy, and everything changed. The first few weeks of puppyhood were a bit stressful: whining in his crate, peeing on the carpet, and chewing the ethernet cord (true story).  Is he eating enough?  Why isn't he eating?  What did his poo look like?  Did we schedule his Distemper vaccine yet?

But through all of those initial little concerns, I was forgetting the bigger picture: that I was caring for this dog.  I was providing for him because I wanted him to be a part of our family.  

And then something magical happened: a few weeks after we brought puppy Teddy home from Indiana, I went to the bathroom (that's not the magical part).  I walked down the hallway, turned into our bedroom and then into our bathroom. As I sat down to do my business, I turned around to find that Teddy had followed me all the way in there.  I think that's the moment that I really started to love my dog, most selfishly, because I knew how much he was starting to love me.

A few months later I became a vegetarian.  Now I'm coming up on my 1-year anniversary as a vegan. I get email newsletters from West Loop Dog Meetup and vegan chef, Chloe Coscarelli.  On Facebook I follow Farm Sanctuary, Woodstock Farm Animal Sanctuary, Heartland Farm Animal Sanctuary, Humane Society of the United States Farm Animal Protection League, Dogs Are Family, and the Anti-Cruelty Society of course. I've discovered that I care deeply for the welfare of dogs, cats, and all animals.


...

"You know, it's funny.  I guess I've kind of done a 180 in the past two years since I got Teddy. I used to not care much about animals at all," I said to the volunteer coordinator.  "But," I tapped my palm on my heart, "Now I love my dog so much I don't know what I'd do without him.  He is love incarnate."

She smiled at me.  "That's so interesting.  You see, most people see animal shelter volunteers and assume that we care for animals because of some sort of deep personal calling that we've had our whole lives. But you'll be able to relate so well to prospective adopters and their anxieties.  You have such a wonderful story to share."

I wish my story upon everyone.  My second orientation session is in two weeks.

The Kids Question, Part 2: Opportunity Costs

I have pretty faint memories of my Intro to Economics course in college.  The 8am class time rings a sharp bell, but the rest of that course is just a blur of colorful supply and demand curves on the whiteboard, fat textbooks squeezing onto our too-small pull-out desks, and my vague environmentalist concerns directed toward “infinite growth.”  But one memory stands out: the lesson on opportunity cost.  That morning, my petite, gray-haired, lovingly uncool professor taught us the definition of opportunity cost by talking about NBA basketball players.  She explained that if LeBron James had gone to college for four years after graduating from high school, he would have lost out on four years of his gzillion-dollar NBA salary.  For LeBron, college came with a really high opportunity cost, so of course he went straight to the pros.  Thus, opportunity costs are the things you give up when you choose another path.  Or, put in economics mumbo jumbo, an opportunity cost is:

The loss of potential gain from other alternatives when one alternative is chosen.

My professor’s apt analogy not only seared the definition into my head, but also created a Pavlovian reminder of professional athletes’ lack of higher education / extremely high pay every time I watch a sporting event.  

Nowadays, opportunity costs have moved from the theoretical to the practical.  As Ian and I consider if and when to have children, we are critically pondering the emotional and financial costs that accompany parenthood.  Certainly, children come with some hefty opportunity costs like sleeping in, melt-down free trips to Disney World, and, of course, and the actual financial cost or raising a child.  

But whenever I think about the opportunity cost of raising a child, one item seems to have a larger price tag than the rest: travel.  Specifically, living abroad.  As Ian and I consider if and when to have children, the badgering voices of Leslie Mann (Debbie) and Paul Rudd (Pete) in Knocked Up rings loudly between my ears:

Pete: Isn’t it weird, though, when you have a kid and all your dreams and hopes go right out the window.

Debbie: What changed for you? What went out the window? You do everything exactly the same.

Pete: No, I love what I’m doing. But say before you’re married with children you want to live in India for a year. You can do it.

Debbie: You want to go to India? Go to India! Seriously.

Pete: Do you want to go to India?

Debbie: No. You can go.

With my fertility clock a-tickin’, I’ve been ruminating over the “India” question.  You see, many of my friends and college alums joined the Peace Corps or moved abroad for work after we all graduated college five (!) years ago.  I stayed in Chicago, choosing to battle the cold winters instead of the heat in West Africa.  But even with my propensity for heat rash and my penicillin allergy, I can’t help but wonder if my choice to stay is one that I’ll regret.  And the Kids Question has put this India Question front and center because having children is the denouement of the slide into adulthood known as "settling down."

If you want to know why I never joined the Peace Corps, and why I’m not jumping on a flight to Delhi, it’s these guys:

I love travelling, but I love my boys more - and I refuse to see love as a limitation.  But I didn’t quite realize how this powerful love factor plays into the Kids Question until I heard the answer come out of my own mouth earlier this summer.  Two of our teacher-friends stayed with us over a weekend in June, and they both love dogs.  But they’ve hesitated adopting one because they fully intend on travelling the world during their summer vacations.  We enjoyed their company of course, but Teddy thought they were the best house-guests ever!  They wrestled with him and threw his favorite ball to fetch.  They gave him lots of cuddles and pets and loved on him like any dog-lover would.  So during one late-night cuddle session, I looked over at them and just had to say what I’d been thinking all along, “I know you want to travel every summer, but you guys should really think about getting a dog.  Sure, Teddy keeps me and Ian from doing everything we want to do, and he limits our wanderlust.  But it never feels like a limitation because every day with him is an adventure.”

So when it comes to the Kids/India Question, I think I may have answered it in my heart awhile ago.  I never joined the Peace Corps because I wanted to stay in Chicago with my Ian.  I can’t imagine spending a year abroad now without my Teddy.  You might say I’m giving up too much for them.  Call me a Romantic, but when you sacrifice for love, it doesn’t really feel like a sacrifice.  It just feels like the right decision.  

In my book, Love should never be an opportunity cost.  So maybe the sleepless nights are worth it after all.  

Scents & Sensibility

Last week, Ian and I racked up some serious mileage on my parents’ Honda Element.  They let us borrow their fuel-efficient car for our big March road trip, which went like this:  Indy (home) to Chicago (interview) to Little Rock (pit stop) to Austin (wedding), and then we did all 1,200 miles in reverse.  Epic.  A few minutes after checking into our charming B&B in Texas, we found out that (home) is actually going to change to where (interview) took place: Ian got the Chicago job!  So, apart from cutting a rug and drinking lots of Dr. Pepper (created in Texas), we spent the wedding mostly confusing the party guests with our inordinately long answer to the standard introductory question So, where are you from?:  “Well, we lived in Chicago, but we’ve been living in Indianapolis for a year, and now we’re moving back to Chicago.”  I hope our blabbering came off as excitement because, as much as we love being in Indiana and close to my family, we’ve had trouble escaping the feeling the Chicago just feels like home.  But more on that later...

After a week away from Indy, our suitcase had become a clothing battleground, with the forces of Clean fighting for space against the forces of Dirty. I packed one medium-size suitcase for the two of us, and by Monday, Dirty had won.  The clean clothes, neatly rolled into squat tubes, hid under blow dryers and belts while the dirty clothes sloppily squished their way into the nooks of the suitcase.  In a true travel triumph, suitcase had turned into hamper, with the worn undergarments purposefully segregated to the front zippered pocked.

You might think that I would have been bothered by the dirty clothes mixing with the clean ones in my suitcase.  But it didn't bother me at all.  Rather, just like I’ve noticed when I dump the hamper into the washing machine every week, I don’t mind the smell of my husband’s lightly worn undershirts and button-downs.  Actually, I kind of like it.  And before you go accusing me of spending too much time in France, I’ve got science on my side: scent is a pretty powerful biological force.

It turns out that I like the smell of my husband’s dirty laundry because scent and romance are intimately linked.  And the reason I find his scent more attractive than others is because, of all things, our immune systems, as summed up in this Psychology Today article:

Our immune systems are coded for by a cluster of genes called the major histocompatibilty complex (MHC), and everyone, except if you have an identical twin, has a unique set of MHC genes. Your unique string of MHC genes are the genotype for your immune system, and your phenotype, the external manifestation of the genes for your immune system, is your body-odor! And your odorprint is as unique as your fingerprint.

In the now famous "T-shirt" experiments it was shown that specific women chose as most sexy and pleasant smelling T-shirts belonging to men who had immune systems that were different from their own. Because we all possess different MHC genes (and body-odor), for every woman a different set of men will be delicious smelling and others won't be. There's no Brad Pitt of body odor! A woman's nose not only responds to a man's body-odor in terms of his biological suitability, women actually find how a man smells to be the most important factor in their sexual attraction.

Takeaway: always let your spouse buy your perfume or cologne.


And have you ever had a smell provoke a vivid memory?  I have.  In the 9th grade, my dad found an old bottle of cologne that he hadn’t worn in years.  When I smelled it on him that morning, I blurted out, “You smell like England!”  We realized that the last time he wore that particular cologne was during our England trip five years earlier.  Apparently, this smell-memory link occurs because smell and memory are neighbors in our brains:

The olfactory bulb has intimate access to the amygdala, which processes emotion, and the hippocampus, which is responsible for associative learning. Despite the tight wiring, however, smells would not trigger memories if it weren't for conditioned responses. When you first smell a new scent, you link it to an event, a person, a thing or even a moment. Your brain forges a link between the smell and a memory -- associating the smell of chlorine with summers at the pool or lilies with a funeral. When you encounter the smell again, the link is already there, ready to elicit a memory or a mood. Chlorine might call up a specific pool-related memory or simply make you feel content. Lilies might agitate you without your knowing why. This is part of the reason why not everyone likes the same smells.

I may like the way my husband smells, and I usually enjoy the strong memories distinct odors trigger in my mind, but my favorite demonstration of the power of smell happens every night.  When Teddy takes his evening nap, he sometimes chooses the porch or the cool tile in the kitchen.  But most of the time, he sleeps right here: 

Teddy sleeping on our shoes

Teddy Treats

Teddy and I gave these treats away as Christmas presents to our four-legged friends

Teddy loves everyone he meets.  Almost.  Mysteriously, whenever he is spooked by someone, it is almost always a man wearing a hat.  For example, as I sit down to write this post, he is barking quietly at at the TV because Leonardo DiCaprio is wearing a pilot's hat in Catch Me If You Can.  That, or he's upset that Leo didn't get an Oscar nomination for J. Edgar.  Me too, Ted.  Me, too.


Just as confusing for us as Teddy's fear of hatted men, some people are downright terrified of Teddy.  I know, he looks kind of like a black bear, which can be scary.  But, true to his breed, he has an incredibly sweet disposition and never meets a stranger (unless he's wearing a hat).  Admittedly, I take advantage of his intimidating appearance.  I feel comfortable walking in dark alleys in Chicago late at night with him by my side, and I'm happy that he acts - in appearance alone - like a built-in security system for our car and home.

What would-be burglars don't realize is that, if they just gave Teddy the most modest of dog biscuits, he'd probably unlock the door for them.  And if they gave him these homemade treats, well, Teddy would help them hot-wire our car or carry our television out the front door.


I love these treats, too, because the main ingredients are extra nutritious for dogs according to this article.  Plus, they're so easy to make and cheaper than store-bought alternatives.  


Teddy Treats
2 1/2 cups rolled oats
2 eggs
1 cup canned pumpkin
2 Tablespoons peanut butter
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon cinnamon


Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
Mix ingredients together.  Scoop in 1/4 teaspoons onto cookie sheet.  Bake for 30-40 minutes until golden around the edges.
Let cool and serve to your pup!

Rescue-less Rangers

Ever since adopting this guy,

,

my dear husband and I have each grown big, round, fluffy, soft spots for animals, which you can read about here and here.  We over-eagerly shout “cows!” whenever we see them grazing in fields off the highway; we catch and release spiders we find inside our house; and we denounce businesses with “no pets allowed” signs as being “speciest.”

We also try to rescue animals we find in need.  Except all the animals we’ve tried to help don’t actually need rescuing.  Oops.  

Incident 1:  Returning from running errands, Ian, Teddy, and I are driving down a busy, under-construction four-lane road in town when we spot a little brown Daschund happily trotting down the sidewalk.  We make an immediate turn into the nearest neighborhood and walk back to find the lost weiner dog before he wanders into traffic.  Ian searches in the grasses and bushes on the side of the busy road.  I opt to look in the neighborhood side street, where I hear a dog behind a fence barking at Teddy, who’s poking his head out of the car window to watch me look over bushes and under parked cars.  With treats in my pockets and loose towels prepped for the car ride, I circle the street and eventually reach the home of the dog barking at Teddy.  Peering through the slats in the wooden fence, I can see that the source of the barking is a little brown Daschund. Looks like someone needs a better fence.

Incident 2:  We’re visiting a quaint little South Carolina town while on vacation with Ian’s family when we see a beautiful clay-colored dog wandering the main street.  We keep an eye on him while we zig-zag through a few antique shops lining the sidewalks, just to make sure he doesn’t belong to one of the many visitors in town.  After a half an hour of shopping, we’re assured he has no owner, so we attempt a dog rescue before being seated for lunch at a nearby restaurant.  Without our standard dog-treat lure, we’re left to hope that Teddy’s recall words will work for this random dog as well.  So we walk towards the lost pup and shout “Puppy, puppy!” while moving backwards.  He runs away.  Rescue fail.  We drop our heads and walk to meet the rest of the family for lunch.  The hostess overhears us saying, “We tried to call him to us, but...” and responds “Oh don’t worry about him!  That’s Red - he’s the town dog.” Town dog? I didn't realize that we had traveled to Mayberry circa 1956.

Incident 3:  I wake up to Ian standing over me in the bed with an orange tabby cat in his arms.  In my sleepy stupor, I have to remind myself that we don’t own a cat.  “I found him outside!” Ian says proudly.  I bolt out of bed and put Teddy in his crate to cool his over-enthusiastic welcome for the lost kitty.  We put the little cat on the ground of our bedroom to let him explore his new abodes, while I mentally panic that this random animal might stinky pee on our floor somewhere.  We are sans litterbox, after all.  I snap out of my concern to realize that this fluffly little Cheeto is wearing a collar that identifies him as “Abbedale.”  Cute name.  And beneath the cute name is a phone number!  Ian calls and leaves a message on a company’s voicemail.  Weird.  As we wait for a return phone call, we’re forced to entertain the idea of adopting him in case no one calls back.  Abbedale sure is cute, and kitty litter doesn’t cost that much, we think to ourselves.  Plus, Teddy would like the company...  Before we look up how much FreshStep costs, Ian’s phone rings, and it’s the return phone call:  “Oh, that’s Abbedale.  He likes to wander into your neighborhood.  You can just put him back outside.”  So we did.  And now the three of us reminisce about the day we owned a cat for an hour.

If ever the universe tried to communicate with someone, I think it’s trying to tell us it might be time to consider adding a new furry member to our little family.  Because as well-intentioned as we have been in these animal rescue attempts, we just can’t ignore the thousands of homeless animals waiting for their forever homes in rescue organizations all around us.  So maybe it’s time for us to stop looking on the side of the street for lost animals and start looking where they really are: shelters.

Loving My Son

Grab a box of tissues before you click on this link.  It will lead to you to the photos of a fallen Navy Seal’s Chocolate Lab mourning by his casket earlier this year.  Then there’s this one following the landslides in Brazil in January.  And don’t even get me started about the trailer for War Horse.  It looks like Homeward Bound on steroids.  With a John Williams score, I’m legitimately concerned that I might start the ugly cry when I see that in the theaters later this month.

I cannot talk about those photos or accurately describe the War Horse trailer to anyone.  Literally.  My throat tightens up and won’t let the words come out.  The would-be tears swelling behind my eyes paralyze my tongue instead.  The reason for my emotionality is keeping me company as I type these words:

I am so in love with my dog, Teddy.  Just like Navy Seal Tumlinson, I sometimes refer to my dog as “my son,” as I feel like I love him almost as much as parents must love their human children.  I certainly treat him like my child:  I sing him songs; I’ve switched his food three times to find one that doesn’t upset his tummy (we feed him this kind now); I buy him ice cream cones at Dairy Queen and McDonald’s; and I kiss his hairy, drooly face no less than ten times a day.  I love that dog so much that - and remember that my dog is a big, lethargic Newfoundland - I once started crying when I thought he might be sick because he was merely sleeping on the floor (like he always does).  At this point, I cry so easily thinking about Teddy that I could win an Academy Award.  

Teddy may be only a year old, but I’m already dreading the day we’ll have to say goodbye.  Unfortunately, Ian and I have been thinking of his health more critically in recent weeks because my friend’s dog - we’ll call him Rex - is sick.  When she took Rex in for his annual checkup a month ago, the vet found something that the rest of us already knew about her cute pooch: that he has a big heart.  An enlarged one to be exact, and he’s only one-year old, just like Ted.   While we wait for an official diagnosis, our knuckles are turning white from crossing our fingers so tightly, hoping for an okay outcome.  

At the suggestion of Rex’s caring owner, we just got Teddy something better than the fluffiest chew toy or peanut butter-est ice cream cone he could ever imagine.  Because I cry at any splinter of a thought of permanent separation from him; and because I would drain every checking / savings / retirement / sock drawer account I have to save his life, we purchased health insurance for Teddy today.  (Trupanion, per our vet’s suggestion.)

My dad once told me a Native American fable explaining the unique relationship between dogs and humans.  I didn’t really understand it before I adopted Teddy.  Now I understand it too well.  Just don’t ask me to read it out loud.

One day the Great Spirit placed Human apart from the animals.  The Great Spirit then began to open a huge chasm in the earth to make this separation permanent.  Dog looked at Human and then turned back to his animal friends.  The chasm grew wider.  Dog again looked at Human but again turned back to his animal friends.  The chasm grew wider still.  Finally, at the last possible moment before the chasm was too wide to jump, Dog took a mighty leap and forever joined with Human.  It is that way to this day.

I'd like the world to buy me a Coke

I am not an emotional eater.  Quite the opposite, in fact: whenever I feel upset, my (fortunately) limited body issues are the first guests to show up at my pity party, and they’re rude and loud and shout things in my mind like “Oh you’re sad about that silly thing?  Well you should really be sad about the cellulite on your upper thighs.  No ice cream for you tonight.”  If I were more depressed I’d probably be skinnier, but I’m a-ok being happy and a bit plump, thankyouverymuch.

I may not be an emotional eater, but I do have one food addiction: Soda.  Or Coke.  Or Pop.  Whatever you want to call it, all of those words make my mouth water.  I generally prefer brown or clear sodas, so I won’t do the Dew and I don’t wanna Fanta.  But my discrimination ends there.  I like Coke and Pepsi, regular and diet, Dr. Pepper and Mr. Pibb, and root beer and ginger ale.  My favorite drink in the world is a Coke Icee, and I’ve been known to get uncharacteristically cranky at the movie theater if they only have the stupid white cherry or blue raspberry flavors.  True connaisseurs of frozen beverages know that Coke and Red Cherry are the must-have flavors.  I guess you could say I’m an Icee purist.    

But I know soda is bad for me because it has loads of tasty, tasty sugar in it.  So I’ve tried to give it up at least three times before, but the thirst-quenching brown bubbly potions have always drawn me right back in a few days later.  Next thing I know I’m cooing at the Coca-Cola polar bears playing with penguins and smiling at the throw-back Pepsi cans.  I fall for the soda marketing as much as the product itself.  So sign me up for Intervention because I am a full blown soda addict.

Kind of.

Let me qualify my addiction.  I’m not like that guy on Dr. Oz who drinks 14 liters of soda a day.  Hand to the Bible, I don’t even drink soda every day because we purposefully don’t keep it in our house.  But like any good addict, whenever I have access to it I order it almost every time.  This generally means I order soda when I’m eating out.  At restaurants I’ve even convinced myself that I’m insulting the waiter if I just order water - that he/she will be upset to not have the extra $2 tippable dollars on the bill.  Some people enhance their meals with wine; I enhance mine with Coke.  It’s like my meals are symphonies and Coke is the percussion.  Sure you can have a fine concert without it, but we all know it wouldn’t be the same.  

But, folks, my addiction hit a new low last week.  Somebody knocked over my to-go cup of Coke, and I reacted like a drug addict whose lines of white powder just got blown into the carpet by the high-speed ceiling fan.  And all my soda-starved frustrations were all directed at this guy:

Yes, I got really upset with my dear puppy Teddy who got neutered on Wednesday and has since become a destructive beast lumbering into walls and end-tables with his nearly two-foot-in-diameter cone of shame. One of the cone-victims was my Coke, and I reacted like Gollum losing his soda Ring.  Mourning the loss of my sugary Precious to the irrevocable fibers of our living room rug, I dove head first into a the fires of soda-addicted desperation, and I started whining with a ferocity that would make any three-year old proud.

So maybe it’s time for me to turn in my membership at the Soda Pop Club.  I probably shouldn’t love any food as much as I love soda.  Maybe I’ll give it up... tomorrow.

The Carnivore That Turned Me Into a Vegetarian

*I saw a T-shirt at the Indiana State Fair last year that said: "Vegetarian - Ancient trial slang for the village idiot who can't hunt." It offended me even though I'm pretty sure I had a pork burger in my hand at the time.  A few months later in Chicago, I encountered a vegetarian activist outside the El handing out brochures with photos of abused animals in factory farms. Way to cheer me up after a long day at work. But I know you and I aren't like those folks, right? We won't judge eat other for our personal food choices. So I hope you enjoy this post as just another one of my life stories...

When I wake up every morning, I adjust my blanket and reposition my floppy arms before slowly opening my sleepy eyes to see this:

That’s my dog, Teddy, giving me his “Good morning, time for breakfast!” stare.  He’s a 10-month-old, 105 pound Newfoundland puppy with a personality as cozy and huggable as his fluffy body.  And he wants me to let you know that he would love to meet you.

If he wasn’t a dog, his morning stare would creep me out.  It did initially: the first time he woke me up this way I found it so jarring that I jerked my head back onto Ian’s pillow because his huge head was only six inches away from my face.  Even today I never know if he’s been there for two minutes or two hours.

But now I look forward to seeing my Teddy Bear’s face first thing; it’s just a daily reminder of his immortal cuteness.  And, as a recovering omnivore, his stare reminds every morning me why I finally chose Vegetarianism in April 2011.

Before then, I had always called myself an “aspirational vegetarian.”  I had read lots of articles on the health benefits of plant-based diets and seen several documentaries on the ethical and environmental implications of the meat industry and had even gone through a few day/week-long stints of meatlessness since college.  But I shoved all that info behind my conscience whenever I stared at the delicious mushroom-swiss burger on Chili’s menu or smelled bacon crisping in the frying pan.  There’s no denying it: meat is tasty.

We adopted Teddy in December 2010, and four months later we saw Food, Inc.  All I’m going to say is that if you eat food in America, you should see this movie.  I don’t remember many of the facts or persuasive arguments in the film, but I remember seeing the image of a black cow standing in a stockyard.

Then I looked down at Teddy who was also watching the movie (he likes TV), and he looked back at me and smiled. That was it.  They looked too much alike.  I knew I’d no longer be able to eat a hamburger without seeing Teddy’s face in it.  So I’ve been a vegetarian for four months now.  I realize that doesn’t sound like much time, but it’s significant to me because I know it’s the real thing.  Having failed before, I know what it feels like to know you’re going to give up, and I don’t feel like that anymore.

So Teddy is the carnivore that finally made me a vegetarian.  Even though he eats meat and has his own environmental impact, he’s helping me improve my own ecological footprint, and he’s converted me in the most significant way.  You see, as much as I care about the environmental consequences of meat production, I couldn’t stop eating meat because it pollutes our water and deforests our land.  I stopped eating animals because I started loving one, and I can’t eat something I could love.