
I have decided that I really do love winter. For one thing, it is the first season I recall after having moved into this new home a little over a year ago (it was really Autumn...Halloween to be precise...but it was all such a blur and a tumult it wasn't until December, when we actually closed, and Bill actually joined me here that the memories begin to clarify.)
I like how the landscape is utterly changed...more things become visible...it's spare and clean (well...when it isn't muddy after a thaw) and I like down comforters and boots and scarves and chamois shirts.
As always we reveled, ever so briefly, on New Year's Eve at Al and Sue's in Easton Connecticut. Pat and Barb were waylayed by Pat's bad back, but managed to come for breakfast New Year's Day (I keep wanting to write "Sunday"...that New Year's fell on a Friday this year really threw me.) We had to leave Missy at home and I fretted about her virtually every minute we were away. We raced home Saturday, getting back about 6 p.m. and threw open the doors of the house, hoping she was inside (where we'd asked not one, but two neighbors to put her if they saw her running around, as she is wont to do.) Alas...no Missy, but moments later, after calling her name off into the fields she came racing down the road out of the dusk. Safe and happy to see us.
The next morning, I got up and went to the store to get the paper. When I returned, Brewster greeted me at the car door per usual...and there was blood on his head! Bill was standing in the door and when I asked if he knew that Brewster had blood on him, he replied saying that Missy had been hit by a truck!...and had taken off up the road. The blood on Brewsie's head had been from his trying to comfort (I know, I know...I'm anthropomorphizing...but it sure seems like tenderness) Missy right after the accident.
She's fine now, but it was a tough day of monitoring her and trying to find an effective way to manage her pain. Nothing was broken, fortunately. The only wounds seemed to be minor...a cut on her lip, a small, almost invisible cut over her
eye. She was limping and favoring her right side and she was clearly pretty shaken up by it. I think she did her usual dodging of cars, and wasn't paying attention and didn't factor in the trailer this particular car was towing...so when she dodged the car, she was caught by surprise by the trailer and that's what hit her (according to Bill.) It still chaps my ass that whoever it was didn't have the decency to stop and at least check and see if she was alright (we know it was a red truck, towing a snowmobile trailer...if I see that person I promise they will get a piece of my mind.)
Let's be clear here, too...Missy is partly to blame, too, since she thinks nothing of going up to the farm or the barn and taking the road to do so. We are forever trying to coax her out of the road, which she seems to see as her personal domain. It's how we initially came by her as a matter of fact...she brought the other neighbor dog, Teddy, the golden lab, down the road with her.
Right after she was hit, she did what dogs who are injured do....she ran off...up the road, to who-knows-where? So I got back in the car and drove up the hill calling for her and found her on the porch of the farmer (her actual owner, but who doesn't seem to care about her one way or the other). There was no one home. She was just lying there on the porch...so I went up and ran my hands over her...she seemed to be fine except for a little blood on her mouth and eye and even that wasn't so bad.
She was definitely dazed and a little confused. I started thinking about shock. She has never allowed me or anyone to pick her up and she has steadfastly refused to get in the car (which is why we had to leave her when we went down to Connecticut ...thank goodness this didn't happen while we were gone!) or allowed us to put a collar and ID tag on her so if something like this happened, at least she could be identified and someone could let us know (you hear that red-truck-with-trailer!?!?)
I had a coat in the car, so I went to get that to cover her and keep her warm to prevent shock. As soon as I approached her with it she stood and literally seemed to warm to the coat...so I decided to go for it and just try and pick her up and put her in the car. She didn't struggle at all and allowed me to carry her to the car, open the door and put her in the back, much to my amazement. I got her back home...she didn't know how to get out of the back of the car, so I had to lift her out, which was probably best for her anyway. She immediately went into the bedroom and got on our bed. I called the vet, but there was no one in except the emergency operator...it was, of course, not only Sunday, but January 2nd. She seemed fine so we weren't really too concerned about getting her over there. I had run my hands over her rather "roughly" so I could feel if there was anything broken (or to see if she reacted). And there was nothing like that. Her only tenderness seemed to be the right front paw, and even that she allowed me to handle rather firmly to see if I felt anything broken. She was so good...she was obviously in pain but she let me check her, and a couple of times actually hurt her inadvertently during the day. The two of us spent the day on the bed with her pretty much. Brewster circled around, licking at Missy's face, and we just watched her breathe. She looked a wreck, her entire coat suffering from what looked like "bed head"...and when she got up and moved around she was stiff and tentative and sad to watch.
No surprise, slowly over the day, she seemed to get more and more sensitive and more sore. We finally decided to give her a naproxen (we figured she is about 60 - 70 pounds...it was a 200 mg human dose) and it seemed to do the trick. Within the hour she was much more spry, able to move, started eating and drinking...and this morning all is back to normal, except she is still limping slightly. Bill opened the door for her to go pee ...and she immediately headed out on to the road, following the double yellow line all the way back up the hill to the barn, for a visit.
We don't think we'll take her to the vet. We would if we thought there might be even a slight chance there was something wrong we couldn't see. But a) she really isn't our dog, even though she lives with us, sleeps with us and is fed by us. She belongs to the farmer technically and legally. And b) it wouldn't be cheap to take her in...it would no doubt involve x-rays at a minimum and we would rather not go to that expense right now, as much as we love her. Be assured we would do so if there was the slightest indication that it would be in her best interests to get checked out.
She's running up and down the stairs today, jumping on and off the bed. Eating her usual meal and generally looking and feeling her old self.
All is back to normal. Whatever that is. We have a full tank of oil and a fireplace that keeps us warm. The Yule tree is still up and sparkling but as soon as that comes down, the gray hard cold of January will prevail again.