Neighbors & Friends

When you're outside in your sweatpants and curlers on a Sunday morning, it is inevitable that you will run into one of the neighbors. Probably one of the ones you're less friendly with, who will not acknowledge you even though you're pretty sure he can see you standing in the middle of a bare patch of grass in your spring coat, your head covered in crazy velcro loops. Probably it would have been a good idea to take the curlers out and put on real pants and maybe a little makeup before going out.

But when your dog has to pee, he has to pee.

Since he can't go for walks right now, Sam and I spend a lot of time out in front of my building, in one of the remaining squares of grass not torn up by the drainage workers. I'm not exactly sure what they're doing, but it involves digging a trench around each house, and a long one all the way between my house and the next one over. Seriously, it looks like Bugs Bunny took a wrong turn on his way to Albuquerque and tunneled around my yard in circles. There is construction tape everywhere, stretched on wooden stakes along the trenches--but only on one side of each. In fact, now that I look around, all the tape is on the wrong side to protect me. Apparently no one cares if I fall into a two-foot trench and break an ankle in the dark, as long as the trespassers are safe.

Our frequent trips outside mean we've been seeing a lot of the neighbors lately. Not just the nice ladies who helped me move my piano in two years ago, and who always smile and ask about my cats and pet Sam. And not the dalmatian owner on the other side, who is terribly nice and lives with her adult son (he's not just an adult--he's got to be close to 40, and they both work at the same place and share a company SUV; I haven't asked why he moved back in with his mom, but since he walks the dog and shoveled all the sidewalks when it snowed, I have no objections).

There are also the less-friendly people, who look suspiciously (I may possibly be projecting a little) at my too-large dog and refuse to make eye contact with me, even when I call hello. These are the people I'm afraid are going to turn me in for having a dog who's more than twice the weight limit specified in the homeowners' association rules.

There's one woman in particular I'm concerned about. She's an older lady with tight gray curls who lives a few buildings down, and wears an enormous duffel coat and a sour expression while she takes her yappy terrier out several times a day. She used to walk the dog right by my building as I was leaving for work in the morning, and the dog barked at me every single day like I was trying to rob a bank. I would greet the dog anyway, because he's a cute little thing with wiry hair and funny ears, and say hello to the lady, but I got nothing in return.

Fine, I decided, she's just grumpy. She also does not like Sam. As I believe I mentioned in a previous post, her eyes got very large when she first encountered him, and she backed away into the carport as he went calmly by on the leash. When I reassured her (over the noise of her terrier BARKING BARKING BARKING at Sam) that he was really very friendly, she said, "He's just...too big". And that's the only time she's spoken to me.

Sam, as I have said before, is not a barker. He lets me know with one deep German WOOF when he needs to go out in the morning, and he sounds an alarm to tell me that there are workmen outside or a dog walking by, but he's not a recreational yodeler/howler, and he rarely barks at other dogs when we are out together.

So it took me by surprise when we were out one day two weeks ago, and he began aggressively barking, barking, BARKING and lunging onto his back legs, straining at the leash.

I looked to see what terrible danger he was warning me of, be it homicidal maniac, careening car, or stray bear: but no, it was just the woman who doesn't like him, and her tiny terrier, of course. I don't think Sam cares much for her, either. I figured she was just that way with everybody, but then I saw her laughing and talking with the dalmatian lady by the mailboxes. So maybe it's just me.

The other person I was concerned might turn me in to the HOA lives on the first floor on the other side of our patch of communal grass. I got the impression--through a wordless exchange in the dark a few nights ago, in which she stood in her doorway and muttered while Sam peed in the yard (he does this a lot, as you might have noticed)--that she thought I had scared her cats. But then it occurred to me, happily, that under condo association cats are not allowed outside without a leash. Which is a ridiculous rule, to begin with, but her cats spend a great deal of time, free-range, digging around in the dirt and rolling on the sidewalk. They're nice cats; one is black-and-white and quite friendly, though I can't say as much for her owner. But she can hardly complain about my dog without admitting that her cats are also in violation.

So I think we're safe for now.

Sam seems to be feeling better after his two shots last weekend, although he's been sleeping a lot. We're on day 10 of his second month of highly restricted activity. Yesterday I went to the vet to pick up the rest of the antibiotics for his bladder infection. I also bought, at the vet's recommendation, some probiotics to sprinkle on his food. (I had to write down "probiotics" while talking to the vet on the phone before I realized that they are ANTI-antibiotics. I had no idea such a thing existed, but they replenish the healthy bacteria in his system that the antibiotics could wipe out. Incidentally, they look and smell just like beef bouillon and Sam LOVES them.) I steeled myself for the total due, and when the vet tech told me three times that it was really only $30.10 for all of it, I got a little hysterical.

I'll be glad when we're done with all this. Between Sam and work, I've been tired and edgy for weeks now, to the point that I briefly considered feigning illness to get out of seeing an old friend today, who's in town for a conference this weekend. (No, I wasn't actually going to *do* it!) I'm just not all that enthused about driving an hour or more roundtrip to the other side of town where she's staying and which I'm not all that familiar with. Before you judge me too harshly, I have already taken care of that myself: she's a truly lovely person, one of my favorite people in the world, and she's made it all the way from eastern Washington to my city, and I can't muster myself to drive HALF an HOUR to go see her? Did I mention she's traveling with her almost-two-year-old son, and her husband will have the car today, so she can't come to me?

Yes, I'm a bad person. I know. I'm the kind of person who gets a dog that violates homeowners association rules, and who has a teetering pile of dirty pots and pans in the kitchen, and who doesn't want to leave the house to see her friends.