Yesterday my mom and I took a cab out to the Wedgewood neighborhood so she could have dinner with her friends and their assorted children and guests.
My mom has known this couple for years. She takes delight in telling their kids, “I knew your parents before they got married. Your mom was a single gal in San Francisco who had LOTS of dates.” Everybody winces.
Now our hosts are celebrating their 25th anniversary. Mom tries not to think about the passage of time. In those days she had just one solitary cat. Dogs? Fine for someone else. She had absolutely no intention of ever having a dog. Ancient history.
We hadn’t seen most of these folks for two whole years but several guests remembered me….”You’re the one with that wonderful dog.” They didn’t remember my mom nearly as much.
Before Mom went out there, the hosts said, “No dogs during dinner. We’ll shut them up in one of the bedrooms.”
Hah. I ran around with the host’s dogs the entire tme. I snuck under the table and visited all the guests, one by one.
My mom announced, “If you give Gracie any food, she’s yours for the weekend, sensitive tummy and all.” So I didn’t get as much as a scrap of food. But I got heaps of affection: back, belly and butt rubs all day long.
Dogs aren’t like cats. Mostly we get along. The host’s dogs even let me borrow this chew toy. Do I look like I’m having fun?
We went home in a cab. I was sound asleep as soon as Mom gave directions to the driver. She insisted we get off a couple of blocks early for our evening walk. And then it was off to bed, feeling great after all those hugs and rubs…like a 3-hour massage.