I suddenly had the sense that I’d dodged an assasination attempt on my life, that I’d ignorantly settled down for a picnic inside a lion’s den, and, by sheer chance, escaped without a scratch. Here I’d spent the Blizzard of 2008 cracking jokes, deleting spam mail, asking what’s for dinner, treating it as any ordinary winter weekend, while nature, in all its wintry fury (sore, perhaps, over the imminent return of spring?), had declared war on the Midwest, threatening to bury our houses to the shingles, sealing us forever in a snowy tomb. I might as well have had an absent-minded tea party in the middle of the Battle of the Bulge.  ”Pass the crumpets, please.”

Oddly enough, however, a comparison to war may not be far off. Although at the time I stood oblivious to any hints of danger to myself, I did detect a potential threat to our squirrel-sized dog, Phoebe. To put it simply, the backyard is our dog’s latrine. The snow on the ground had already accumulated several inches, enough to bury Phoebe to the neck. This posed a problem, since her fur is the color of snow, and if we had tossed her outside, a snow drift may have swallowed her up, and we’d have to wait till spring, when all the snow melted, to find her again. 

Armed with only a shovel, I dug a WWII snow trench in our backyard. This was necessary to prevent Phoebe from using the bathroom inside the house. While I worked, Jess occupied the open backdoor, keeping an eye out for enemies and, most important, for any deserters, namely Phoebe, who stood trembling in the wake of the path I had just cleared. 

At first, the trench bore a hard line, stopping abruptly a few feet out from the house. But the dog took badly to its cramped design. She touched her snout to the snow and sniffed timidly. With a clump of white clinging to her charcoal-colored nose and with her tail tucked between her legs, she did an about-face and made for the warmth of the house. Deserter!

With perfect military execution, Jess placed herself in front of the doorway, ending Phoebe’s feeble escape attempt. It was back to her Arctic potty. Phoebe did the only thing she could do: she licked the air and turned to face the elements. Just then, an icy, Lake Eerie wind kicked up. Phoebe’s floppy ears smoothed neatly back to her skull. Her tiny, white head rounded into the circle of a cotton ball. Another blast of wind, and she made slits around her oil spot eyes. Her pink underside shook.

“Go potty, Phoebe,” I said. 

She was expected to “go potty” in this?

 To move things along, I improved the design of the trench. I ran the trench around the corner of the house, where I scooped out a small clearing, to give Phoebe more privacy and room to maneuver. It was still cramped quarters, though, but in the end, Phoebe squeezed in several tight circles and did her business.

“Good girl!” I said. Phoebe then scuttled back inside the house. 

Victory was ours. The battle was nature vs. nature (if you consider Phoebe, being of the animal kingdom and all, as nature), and Phoebe had fought a good fight. We laughed at her struggle, at her silly animal instincts. But little did we know the joke was on us, for we stood unknowingly in the midst of the Blizzard of 2008.  

I then went about my usual morning routine thinking about Phoebblicious. This is rather uncharacteristic of me, since I usually like to save my day dreaming for work. Whether it is the cramped cubicle quarters or the drab interior design, all week dreams about being a farmer of sorts has plagued my mind. Yesterday, I had the whole dramatic thing laid out beautifully in my mind. The plowing, the discing, the planting - I’d be out in the open field, the soil freshly turned, listening to God in the sounds or silence of nature, over the soothing rumble of my tractor. A straw hat would look quite nice on my head, sheltering me from the blazing heat. At lunchtime, Jess would come up to the edge of the field where I was hard at work, with Phoebe and our kids in tow, waving her arms, indicating lunch was ready.

I’d automatically have a subscription to Field and Stream, and it would follow that I’d own a gun rack and know the ins and outs of the sports of hunting and fishing. Minus all the back-breaking work that comes along with farming, it’d be quite the good life. We’d live simply, relying on God for a good crop and to make ends meet. Things would only get better in the wintertime when the fields were covered with snow, and Jess and I’d be around the fireplace, drinking a warm drink, not having anywhere to go and…I’m not sure what else. Sometimes I get mixed up with Little House on the Praire. I guess one of us would have to learn the fiddle or something. At any rate, the kids would all be in bed (in their wooden lofts), and we’d be sure to fall into sleepy discussion about sewing or The Farmer’s Almanac and when a good time would be to put in next year’s crops.

When I proposed this wonderful new Utopia to Jess last night over dinner, she responded, more matter-of-factly than harshly,”You married the wrong girl for that.” Afterwards, I had to admit that, although farming actually was in my blood (I come from a long line of farmers), somehow this particular gene missed me. I’m probably not really cut out for it. And that was basically the end of it. So, now I entertain lesser dreams, like Phoebblicious chewing gum.

It was pitch dark, the clock read 3:30am, when the tremors began. It startled me at first, but then the sleep left my brain and I regained my bearings. It all felt too familiar. The restrained jerks, the stiff jolts, the silent struggling - our dog Phoebe was experiencing another seizure, a mild one, but a seizure nonetheless.

Seizures have become somewhat of a trademark for Phoebe these days. She typically experiences one about every other month, and when asked, the vet reassured us that it was common in little dogs (”Toy breeds,” he called her). Their blood-sugar level drops quickly, or something, and that’s what triggers it. It was quite frightening the first time Jess and I saw Phoebe do this, but now it’s become much a part of the routine of caring for her, like feeding her or giving her a bath.

Jess was first to call it, “She’s having a seizure.” She stated this more matter-of-factly than in alarm. Then she moved in clockwork fashion, like a surgeon who sees past the gore of an ER patient to the list of immediate procedures needed to be performed.

“Get the white towel,” barked Jess. She had Phoebe sprawled out on the bathroom floor.

“Where?” I asked.

“In the closet.” In the middle of the night, I had woken up to find myself as Jess’ surgeon aid.

I came back with the white towel.

“Lay the towel down.”

“Why?”

“No questions. Just do it.”

After the towel was under Phoebe, the inevitable happened, her bladder let go. This was the predicted stage 2 of the seizure. Next, after things had calmed down, we moved into stage 3, and I carried her to the dark, dewy backyard. There, she had plenty of room to work out the rest of the shakes. I watched Phoebe finish her business from the back door window while Jess made up a new place for Phoebe to spend the remainder of the night.

From beginning to end, the seizure lasted nearly a half hour. Before I crawled back into bed at 4am, I checked espn.com to confirm my FantasyFootball defeat. It was official. I had lost, and my prize was a dog low on sugar.

Eventually, I started letting our dog Phoebe ride along with me. She soon came to love trash day, and even the slightest rustling of a garbage bag would send her to the the front door waiting expectantly, wagging her tail.

Now we live in a house, and our trash can is in the garage. Good for us. Heartbreaking for Phoebe. Although, Phoebe still continues to hold on to the Sugar Run hope. This morning, I was taking out the trash from the kitchen to the garage. Phoebe came running out of her den - she likes to take an early morning nap - wagging her tail, ready to head out to the Sugar Run dumpster. I told her sorry, not this time.

But, maybe in five years or so, when nearly all hope is lost, I’m thinking we might just have a Sugar Run dumpster reunion. Just the two of us. For old times sake.

When I was a kid I always wanted a dog. But dogs needed a big farm where they could run and dig, and since we lived in town, we were forced to be cat people. After going through two cats in a fairly short span of time – we lived on a busy road – we finally settled on an unfriendly barn cat named Socks, which we called Kitty.Kitty had a disturbing meow that mimicked a sick Pterodactyl, used only for the purpose of letting us know she needed fed. Any other time Kitty was painfully indifferent to our family, eventually leaving us for our neighbors who offered premium canned cat food.

We had only the dry crusty stuff – Meow Mix maybe? On occasion, Kitty would show up on our porch, fatter each time with all the good food she’d been eating. As Kitty’s body grew, her head seemed to shrink, her legs shorten. This added an extra disturbing element to the treacherous feline, but our love for her was unconditional.

“Joe, look! Kitty’s not dead!” my sister Jackie would cry when Kitty appeared once a year on the front porch out of thin air, brushing against the nearest objects and coughing out a meow. No, I thought, it was worse than death; Kitty had a new family she loved more than us.

Then our neighbors moved away and she disappeared altogether.

My youngest sister, Boze - a victim of a nickname that stuck - was probably too young to understand, but Jackie and I were practically devastated by Kitty’s neglect. We grew up sad because of it.

So you can imagine the rainbow of new life that shined on Jackie and me the day we got dogs. Pets that actually liked us! “It was the best decision I had ever made,” announced Jackie one day in the car, her Golden Retriever Grace panting in my face from the back seat. My mouth was open ready to bring up her decision to marry Jeff, but I cut myself off. Somehow deep in my heart I figured that it had already been considered, and it was up to Jeff to be fine with accepting his forever humble place as the second best decision Jackie had ever made. “Just be happy you made the top five,” I could hear Jackie saying. (I’m kidding, of course. No one, I’m sure, could replace Jeff as Jackie’s number one…but it still may be close.)

Phoebe is a short-haired, 9 pound, trained circus dog that bounced off a westbound circus train in a wooden crate one orange, dusky evening – or so I like to believe. The little dog became legally mine (or ours) the second Jess and I said I do. What delights me most is that Phoebe really loves hanging around me. She follows me where ever I go, wagging her tail and wanting to play ball. We’ve become the best of friends, and her cute irrational love for me I gladly take for genuine every time she happily meets me at the door when I come home.

I have grown to take care of her every need. Every day I give her water and food. I let her outside when needed. I playfully tug on her floppy ears as her play-bites turn to gentle little licks. I pet her belly and give her walks – sometimes twice a day.

In case you’re wondering, the point of my story is this: I love my dog.