How Much Is That Doggy In The Window?

One of my childrens’ favourite pastimes when at the mall, is to visit the local pet shop. Amidst the Ooo’s and Ahh’s you can hear a broken-record droning… ‘We are just looking, no! For the umpteenth time, we are not getting another pet!

‘But he’s sooo cute!!’

It has not been long since Christmas, tell me honestly how many parents have fallen in the trap of buying a cute puppy for their kids?! Don’t get me wrong here now, I love animals, truly I do, the toilet-trained, child-trained, parent-trained, obedient, no hassle kind. How many of us have thought: “We want to teach our children to be responsible” - so the most common practice on the face of the earth to fulfill this purpose, is to buy your child a pet.

You bring the little fella home, all warm, cuddly, helplessly and irresistibly cute – yes,
The kids squabble over who is going to hold him; lavishing oodles of love and care, almost smothering the poor puppy to death with their eagerness.

All the way home in the car, you are reminding your children that a puppy is not a toy but a responsibility – you will need to take real good care of it – feed it everyday; give it water everyday; give it a bath; clean up any messes it makes – the lecture goes on endlessly. Yes, yes, of course we will they chorus.

Then there is the naming ceremony, each family member giving their brainstorm of different names. You wouldn’t believe the kind of names kids come up with! You finally settle on a name that at least won’t turn your face beetroot-red every time you say it or having every poodle and mutt running in your direction when you call the family pet.

The first few days go by just fine, the nights on the other hand, bring you back in time to when you brought your first child home from the hospital, only this time its whimpering and howling at you. Barely a week passes and the novelty begins to wear off. The puppy makes a mess, the big poopy stinking kind. You remind your daughter to clean it up. EWWW!!! I’m not doing THAT!!!! You insist… so she reluctantly begins to clean it up using a whole roll of toilet tissue (remember to add that to your ‘How much it costs to have a Dog’ list). Your daughter then holds it at arms-length with her face screwed up in utter disgust and promptly disposes of it while dramatizing for several minutes afterwards as to how absolutely ‘gross’ and disgusting it all is.

Most often than not, you the parents are the ones who end up cleaning all the messes, usually being the first ones to wake up, you are greeted with dozens of little ‘landmines’ all over the floor, more likely having already stepped on one on route to the bathroom! When you’ve had 18 years of wiping dirty bottoms and a toddler still in nappies/diapers, who needs puppy mess to add to your endless list of responsibilities?

Then comes training time, the mad rush and panic when the puppy starts making circles on your favourite rug making a beeline for the door, whilst the puppy is dropping ‘bombs’ everywhere you are the one holding it at arms length this time….You are teaching the puppy to respond to your commands, with a hundred echoes of ‘sit’ ‘stay’ ‘come here’. When teaching the dog its name, the puppy ends up chasing its tail with all the confusion of its name being called from all different directions.

When your kids go out to a youth meeting with their friends, who is left to ‘baby-sit’ the pets? Mum and Dad of course, who else! In this one incidence, I was home alone with our 5 year old, 2 year old, the 2 puppies and the baby goat. I ended up literally wrestling both dogs and goat, trying to keep them off each other. Imagine a tangle of legs, arms, and hooves trying to keep the animals out and the littlies in! And the kids (not the goat kind) wonder why, when they finally get home, they see a very frazzled Mum muttering under her breath…Never again…no more pets….arggh.

You pass the window of the local pet shop.

Aww!! Aren’t they cute!!!!



Copyright 2006. Rebecca Laklem.