COUNTRY MINUTES By Nicole Helget
The Dogs of Oshawa Township Part 3
P
ony, on the brink of labor and birth, didn’t come back. It rained a half an inch the first night she was gone. In the morning, Husband loaded his truck for another music gig, a few days long. “Keep me posted,” he said. After waving him goodbye, I went back to the porch, where one whelping nest sat unused and then into the kitchen, where the other glowered at me in accusation. I had gotten Pony from a student at the community college where I taught. One of my gifts as a teacher was attracting the “early-to-class” types who showed up in the 20 minutes before class when I was in the classroom frantically grading their long overdue papers and tests. Students would arrive and talk to me about their lame spouses, ungrateful kids, peacocking bosses, bills, layoffs, hangovers, probation officers, dads who had one set of rules for their brothers and another set for them, and so on. One of my students talked about the impossible schedule of her job, her classes, her kid, and her dog. “I’ll take the dog,” I said. Rewind, rewind, rewind, I thought. “Really?” she said. “That’d be great.” So, one night after class, I packed up my own kids, drove over to the trailer, and got the dog. She hopped into the backseat of my Chrysler 200 and parked her butt between the boys as though she’d always been there. My kids and I brought her home and pondered a name. She was only five months, but very tall, with lean legs like an antelope. She was shiny black with longish fur, almost like a skunk’s. Her ears were odd. They didn’t hang down like a lab’s nor did they stand up. They 40 • APRIL 2020 • MANKATO MAGAZINE
pointed left and right, kind of like a goat’s. When we let her outside, she ran like a starving cheetah after a zebra. “Whoa,” we said. Husband said, “Pony.” Pony, she became. At first, she had her run of the large farmhouse. She hopped up on the couch. Immediately, I didn’t like that. Despite growing up on a farm, I had not grown up with animals living in the house. I wondered what my mom would think. But I had seen how other normal dog owners on Facebook posted photos of their dogs sitting in chairs and sleeping in beds where people belonged and thought, This is how normal dog owners treat their dogs. Lighten up. When she got off, I stared at the inhuman black hairs stuck to the cushion and became light-headed. I can’t do this. Pony ate crumbs off the floor, which I liked. But she also drank from the toilet and then used that mouth to lick us, which I didn’t. She chewed up crayons, socks, legos, and a vacuum cleaner cord, which I also didn’t approve of. I trained her to stay in the kitchen, only. Where at least I could contain her shedding hair and sweep it up. Some nights, she stood in the doorway, between the kitchen and dining room and stared at us with morose eyes. “Mo-omm,” the kids would say, their little hearts of empathy bursting out of their hand-me-down t-shirts. Of course all of their friends had dogs and cats and gerbils and birds and pet reptiles enjoying the spaciousness of their houses. “NO.” Pony, who can walk backwards, a rare phenomena among animals, would tap back, like a batter stepping out of the box. “You’re mean,” the kids said.
Pony did other things I didn’t like. She ignored her dog food and, instead, stole corn cobs from the neighbor’s field. Hundreds of them. She lay down in the grass, shucked the cobs with her mouth and paws, and ate the chewy kernels. She got fat. I shoved aside the metal vaccination tags on her collar and loosened it, thinking why do you need a rabies shot if you’re just going to diabetes yourself to death. Even her ears and the whites of her eyes looked obese. Corn is really just a starch-delivery system. At night, in the kitchen where we keep our jackets and shoes, Pony destroyed my heels, an orange pair with pointed toes. I wanted to strangle her. But, being a good and responsible and understanding dogowner, like the ones on Facebook, didn’t. On that first drive bringing her home, I imagined how much my kids would love her. How they’d hug her and squeeze her and race her around the yard. But their relationship wasn’t really like that. They’d give her a pat or share a beef stick with her, but they weren’t sweet with her. They treated her in much the same way they treated each other: 10% playful, 10% combative, and 80% tolerant disregard. They’d only come to her defense when I was mad at her. She was one of them. At night, Pony went to bed on a rug in the kitchen. By morning, she was shivering with pent up energy and would sometimes leak pee. I opened the door and pointed out. “Get out.” She lowered her ears, ran past me, and off into the ravine or corn field, dog heaven. Where is she? I thought all morning. I contacted the neighbors. None had seen her. One of our neighbors put up a Facebook posting
