Sometimes you just want to curl up with your memories...sometimes not
The Mooks sometimes wonder why I am attracted to really old men...not in that faggoty way, but I like them...not in a faggoty way. It's because of Frank.
Thankfully, life at the puppy mill was soon over for me when, one day, a pickup showed up and some high-haired lady got out, chose five or six dogs and bustled us all into cages in the back of the pickup and on to her pet store. Luckily my sister, Ceecee, came with me and we were even in the same cage. We curled up together for warmth. I didn't tell her about the horrible things I had seen at the puppy mill because she was just so happy to be out of there and I didn't want to spoil it for her.
At the pet shop we were kept together in a larger pen than we'd ever had at the puppy mill. We were fed and watered as soon as we got there and once a day the lady with the high-hair took us out for a walk. It was okay. The price marked on our pen was $700 for me and $500 for Ceecee. They were going to get it too.
A couple of days later and a few days before Christmas this woman came into the store. She was all gorgeous: trim, blonde, boobs out to there (fake) and an inch and a half of makeup that would have taken a month to lick off. She was wearing very tight pants which rode up, back and front; some people call them stink-pants. (Call me old-fashioned but I don't think a woman's trousers should clearly outline her clit.)
She wandered about the place for a bit but I got a feeling and, sure enough, when she saw me and Ceecee she came right for the pen, picked me up, checked my gonads (to see if I was the male) and yelled out, "Daddy is going to love you!" She went back to the front of the store, bought about three hundred bucks worth of dog-crap. While Blondie did this, I started saying my good-byes to Ceecee. We cuddled for a little and I hoped she would find a good home. (Months later, when I was living with the Mooks, they would read the Lost and Founds to see if anyone was looking for me; they weren't but there was one ad for a white, female, Jack Russell with brown ears. I know it must have been Ceecee.)
Then, off I went in Blondie's car, packed in a traveling case she had bought, sitting in the back seat with all the dog-crap. The trip wasn't long enough for me to get sick. In a few minutes, we were getting out at an apartment block, she was ringing a buzzer and was being buzzed in. At the door we went to on the first floor, and before she knocked, she took me out of the case and held me. When the door opened there was this ridiculously old man standing there and Blondie said, "Dad! Merry Christmas!" and thrust me toward the old man who took me and immediately held me close and as he said, "Thank you, Karrlah," he cried a little. (Karrlah...yup...that's how she spelled it. Changed it legally and everything.) After she hauled in all the dog-crap, she left in a mighty hurry.
In a way I don't blame her. Her high-fashion-perfume was a bad match with the smells which filled the apartment: aged cheese, cabbage, cigarettes, feet, lots of other vaguely organic things and old sweat. In fact, these magnificent smells followed my new owner around everywhere—even outside.
His name was Frank and I loved him on sight.
My life was simple with Frank: we walked many, many times a day as that was his only exercise and his only exposure to the outside world. He wasn't very neighbourly, telling me each time I shat, "Try to do it in the middle of the sidewalk...trying to get dog-shit out of their $500 sandals is all these fuckers deserve." So I obliged. At home he would play with me for a little, feed me quite well, snacks were abundant and then he'd settle in front of the TV with me on his lap and comment the shows. Or, rather, bellow at them.
"The worst thing that could have happened to the Republican Party is that fuckwad George Bush! How is it that the fuckwads never get shot!" Though Canadian, Frank was an ardent American-style Republican. "I have no time for Canadian politics, Little Fellow; it's for faggots." Little Fellow is what he called me most often, though my name with him was Reeg (short for Regent, not Regis).
When Barack Obama started to rise in politics, Frank went ballistic. Not because he hated Obama but because he admired him and he hated admiring Democrats. "He may be a darky, but he does have brains," he would say grudgingly. "And he's 100% politician. Haven't seen one of those since Clinton."
Most of the time, though, he just yelled at the TV...during everything. We could be watching Survivor and he'd lose it, "What the fuck does that stupid homo think he's doing—does he really fucking think he's going to get away with that! That little twat will tell everyone he's plotting." Note: For Frank all men were homos, all women were twats. Simple. So American Idol, for instance, was one vast parade of homos and twats all, Frank insisted, singing off-key. I'd yodel along with the singers and Frank would laugh his ass off.
At night I would sleep with Frank in his bed and I'd cuddle up under his chin, into his unshaven face, and he would hold me really close. I had never felt so safe, wrapped, as I was, in all those magnificent Frank-smells.
Karrlah visited rarely but always brought food for me and Frank and then skedaddled so that was okay. I never liked her and, let me tell you, Frank did not much like his daughter's stink-pants. ("I can see if she's ovulating, ferchrissakes!") But Frank reserved all his hatred for Karrlah's husband: Brian (pronounced Bree-an, don't you know). "You want to talk homo, Little Fellow, that guy has all his holes filled on a regular basis, I'm sure of it." The picture I got was that he was rich and snotty and had absolutely no time for his father in law.
I would soon find out this was the case because during one of his television rants, one night, Frank had a stroke.
Time to take a break. The rest next time.
