Trust Your Dog

A Careless Thought

A Bad Memoir of Little Memories

By: Chase L. Currie

“Sometime you will never know the value of a moment until it becomes a memory.”

-          Dr. Seuss

I’m always worried people think writing has to have some great moral to tell you. Maybe, not so much writing but the story we tell. They have to say something great because the writer has spent time and hard work to put it down on paper. Therefore, there has to be some great meaning behind these odd wee little marks we make with pens, but I’m not sure there has to be, right?

                The other day I was sitting on the steps of this old church chatting away with one of my friend about some crazy stories from my past. None of them had a great moral, other than to make us laugh. None of them had some hidden meaning in them, other than the fact I wanted to share the story.

                I’m saying all of this because the story I’m about to tell has no great moral in it. There is no hidden meaning to the words. Maybe, if I’m lucky, it will make you smile and worse case, you’ll read it and forget about it.

                I’m not sure I am a fan of writing a memoir –

                It has too much to do about me for me to want to truly write one –

                But my friend the other day, the one sitting with me on the steps, said I should.

                I can’t say I will.

                I’m almost sure I won’t, but instead, I’ll write little blogs about nothing important. These “memoirs” will be memories I can pull from my past, some touching, some funny, but all true. Sure, some of the names might be changed, but everything happened – not always to me, but it happened.

                One thing which happened to me was a dog my family had named Spencer. He was a half-wolf, half-Siberian husky

 and was the whole family’s best friend. He would meet me every day at the bus when I got off it. My bus driver started to pack treats to give him. He would wake me up to go to school by running into my room and burying himself under my pillows. My dad would belly laugh every morning at the sight of my dog’s butt sticking out from under my pillows as I tried to stay asleep.

                It never worked.

                It always made my dad’s morning.

                We loved him, still love him, and we still miss him.

We got him when I was five or six for about forty bucks. He had been taken from his mother two weeks before he should have and had been the shyest dog I have ever met. He sat in the corner of the living room, staring at the wall for about a week. We would set food and water near him. We would talk to him when we came into the room, but we waited until he was ready to come around us before petting him or playing with him.

                Soon, he started to roam the house, checking out each room, each person, becoming a part of the family. He watched our friends come and go into the house like they lived there – some of them did, and after a while, he became a part of life.

                Spencer would meet everyone at the door, check them out, and be happy to see us. He would sit against the wall of the living room, keeping an eye on everything going on in the house. He would sleep between my sister’s room and my mother’s room at night, dead in the middle of the hall, where he could keep an eye on the whole house.

                Every now and then, he would escape going for a long run into the neighborhood. He found out other people had dogs he could go play with and found the chickens down the road in which he could kill, but that would be a different story to come. There is more to it than Spencer simply killing the poor chickens.

                As I grew up, my friend and girlfriends started to come over more, and Spencer started to hang around me more often, keeping an eye on me. I could always tell which friends he liked or trusted by how quickly he left me alone with them. If he didn’t trust them he would stick by my side, never showing his teeth, and never raising his voice.

                (He only bare his teeth in angry once with me around, another tale, for another time, I’m afraid.)

                But one night he did something I was not sure how to interpret.

               

                It might have been this night it happened, or it might have been a night extremely like it which is why it is getting mixed up in my head. But either way, we – my friends and I – were outside chilling on the steps, talking, and goofing around. Of course, I was smoking and had Spencer out there with me for two reasons. The first, he wanted to be a part of the group. The second, if he were out there with me then my parents wouldn’t come outside to see me smoking.

                One of my friends – who’s name I will keep out of this – was standing in front of me. He wore a long black trench coat like those you would see in The Matrix. Goth culture was in its full swing when I was in high school. The Matrix had been out for a few years, all three of them I believe, and Marilyn Manson, Korn, all the nu-metal bands were taking over the zeitgeist.

                So, my friends – the weird and odd kids in my high school –

                Along with the gamers and nerds –

                Were my people. We had hung out. We played, and we all came over to my place for LAN parties when I had them.

                We sat on the steps to smoke cigarettes, thinking nothing of tomorrow. Spencer spent a lot of time out there with us lying at my feet not caring about me filling my lungs with poison. But on this night he stared up at my friend in the coat, cocked his head tp the side, and then rose to his feet.

                I and the other people on the steps watched him circle my friend a few times.

                Odd, I remember thinking, he looks like he is about to –

                He slowly lifted his leg, staring up at my friend – who did not notice –

                And if a dog could smile, Spencer would’ve had one from ear to ear.

                The yellow urinate flowed freely from my dog right onto my friend’s coat. Everyone on the steps couldn’t help it but burst into a wild storm of laughter. My friend realized what was going on jumped from where he was standing to scream and yell at us as much as he did at Spencer.

                Spencer slowly lowered his leg, walked back over to me, and laid back down like it meant nothing to him. I swear – even though I know he didn’t do it – shrug before closing his eyes to take a nap.

                I don’t remember what was said. I do remember we laughed about it for a bit too long making my friend’s face turn a bitter red. All he kept saying was,” We are never talking about this, never.”

                We didn’t talk to him about it. All we did was laugh when he was not around – mean? A bit, but what else could you do. My dog peed on him.

                I guess I should have taken that as a sign, turned out that one friend wasn’t the best. We ended up walking away from the friendships months later. I part of it was my fault, some of it was his fault, but it was for the better at the end, and I should have trusted my dog when it came to my friends and –

                Anyone he peed on.