If you’ve ever tried to buy Christmas tree lights the week of Christmas, you know it’s a fool’s errand. The store shelves are bare of white lights. The clerks think you have beanbags for a brain when you ask where they are.
“A little late in the game, aren’t you?” they say before pointing out a strand of cough-syrupy red lights long enough to wrap the Empire State Building. Or a box of twinkling snowflakes that look more like sickly amoeba.
“Christmas is ruined!” you say.
If you’ve ever tried to buy Christmas tree lights the week of Christmas, there’s usually a good reason. Like only half of your tree is lit — the top half. The bottom is dark and bare — illuminatingly naked.
If you’ve ever tried to buy Christmas tree lights the week of Christmas, it can mean one thing, and one thing only: there’s a new dog in your house and she ate the lights.
Yes, ate the Christmas lights. I’m expecting to find bulbs “deposited” all over the backyard.
Her name is Lily and she’s been with us just over two weeks now.
She’s not quite a puppy, yet not quite an adult. It’s that awkward, uncomfortable “tween” stage when she wants to test the waters, rebel, take the car out for a drive, and says things like, “Yeah, well, you know, like … all my friends are eating lights …”
She’s a mutt — a hodge-podge of breeds that have been delicately stirred in over the years. Her brindle coat is muddled and run together, as if someone painted perfect tiger stripes on her, but then she ran out in the rain. On her nose there’s a thin white line running down the ridge before it trails off like the painter lost interest, or got drunk.
Her ears topple over at the ends, and she has brown eyes that could melt ice. At night, she snores like an old man, and thanks to a cold, she spent the first few days walking about the house sneezing and draining her nose on the floor. Ever cleaned up dog snot?
She was potty-trained quickly, but we couldn’t teach her to cover her mouth when she coughed or sneezed.
She hasn’t quite grasped that she has no traction on hardwood floors and slides like an ice skater into walls and furniture while chasing toys.
Oh, and she doesn’t have a tail — which makes her part bobcat. My daughter thinks she looks like a dingo or a hyena. She called her a “hy-hena.”
Lily was a stray, picked up and brought in to the Pet Center from the wilds of the county. We spied her amongst the other cages the first day she was put out for adoption. She looked lonely and afraid, but convinced we were meant for her. I could tell by her eyes. She sat quiet and patient as we walked by again and again. She was sure we were the ones.
The sweetest dog. A friend of the world. Great with a 5-year-old who has longed for a mutt she could call her own. They chew on each others’ toes and sneeze on the furniture.
My house is now filled with the sounds of Christmas and, “Lily, NO!”
Lily, don’t chew on Shamu. Lily, don’t chew on my running shoes. Lily, don’t balance the checkbook. Lily, don’t terrorize the chickens. Lily, stop exploring the house at two in the morning. Lily, don’t use a fork to butter your toast.
A neighbor told us a trick to keep an animal off a sofa or from misbehaving. Friends had done it with dogs, and a horse. When the critter did something bad, instead of scolding her, they would freak out. They would fall on the floor and writhe around like they had been struck by lightning. They said it worked.
So when Lily hopped on the sofa, my wife tried it. She freaked out. Fell to the floor, faking that she had been shot through the heart by this act of betrayal.
Lily thought she had killed her. She jumped down and rushed to her aid, licking her face, apologizing profusely. Like a paramedic, she checked her up and down.
Sweetest dog in the world, and hasn’t been on the sofa since.
There’s something special about a dog in the house at Christmas, even if it does come with a half-bare tree and a trail of light bulbs in the backyard.