It's a Dog's Life

Scott and his daughter and Charlie come calling at about 11 o'clock.

You can imagine the jangled nerve endings...both in Scott's car (including Charlie's) and in my house.

We find ourselves all in the kitchen at once. My kitchen which is the size of most people's bathrooms.


Everyone says "Hello," and I suggest we give the little tail wagger a little more room to wag by moving into the diningroom.


And here is where the beauty of the moment begins.
We are all on the floor, in a sort of circle, including Scott, who is keeping Charlie contained to the extent that he can be.
My kids are immediately in love with "Char-Char" and my daughter is regaling us with all that she has learned from her The Language of Dogs book, which is guaranteed to make her a dog whisperer.
Charlie is a real sport, licking and snuggling up to each child and giving each of us a way to talk to each other:
My daughter notices his scratching; Scott's daughter explains Charlie's habits.
My son asks what breed Charlie is. Scott answers and asks what kind of dog they have at Lars' house.
I ask Scott's daughter how her cheer competition went, and she tells me it was great, and then Scott has a video of her magnificent tumbling on his phone, which my daughter watches, and ingnites a high pitched conversation that covers cheerleading, nail polish, video games and Justin Bieber before they scramble up the stairs to my daughters room where they endeavor to find more things in common. (like the fact that they are both unbelievable slobs).


That leaves my son to monopolize Charlie without competition and to sit a little longer talking to Scott. Mission accomplished.

Things could not be going better. Scott is on the floor, eye-level with my son and they are having a real, genuine converstation with each other. A conversation that thankfully, bears no resemblance whatsoever to J.'s typical conversations with my son, which focused on three topics ad nauseum:

1) His enduring if not completely smothering love and adoration for me (Bo-ring!)

2) Advice that a boy his age really should not hit his sister (No sh**, Sherlock, and guess what else? The Beatles broke up!)

and 3) Some bizarre esoteric piece of trivia that we are all supposed to be very impressed that he knows, especially my son, who is enormously hard to impress. (The world's largest kazoo ensemble probably wasn't even interesting to they guys playing the kazoos.)

It is entirely natural. A beautiful thing.

And I am racked with guilt.

I spent more than three years committed to a relationship with J., and tortured my children with it for more than half of that time. J., when all the warts at last came out, ultimately turned out to be a fraud, and a taker and an obsessive, controlling nut who constantly decieved me and took advantage of my feelings for him under the auspices of "partnership." And my children knew it almost from the start, but trusted me and wanted my happiness. And I dismissed their quiet complaints that J. blew his nose at the table and skeeved them out, or coughed like a TB patient, or smelled like he'd been smoking, or they just didn't like him. I let it happen.

And now, I am replaying all the warning signs and troubling red flags that should have been heeded and still come back to haunt me, and trying hard to find away to forgive myself; to repent for the kids.

I look at Scott, sharing a belly laugh on the floor with my son because Charlie has cracked the universal male joke and has unleashed a toxic, noxious fart, and my brow begins to unfurrow, my muscles relax.

I may not completely forgive myself, for what I must have put the children through, or for being a stupid, blinded by love fool to have let J. consume my life and much of what comprises it, but I may be able to make amends. To the kids and to myself.

I am at the starting gates of a stretch of life so warm and rich with rewards, so fun and full of laughter, so effortless and easy to live that it makes memories of whatever came before it immaterial and perfunctory. A win for us all...Scott's, mine and ours.