My Two Writing Teachers colleagues and I are hosting the 16th Annual March Slice of Life Story Challenge, in which teachers from around the world participate by posting a story per day.
This year, the SOLSC gives me a chance to record memories of our little dog, Indie, who died in January. I want to write these down while they are still fresh, so that my family and I can read them later and remember not only Indie, but little slices of life across the years.
It was 2008, and our little dog, Indie, was just over a year old. My husband and I had dreamt of having a dog to go on adventures with, and he was finally old enough to go on a longer hike. We had been walking for days and days, and had already survived thunder and lightning, a day of climbing two steep and rocky trails aptly name Profanity and Hellbrook, and had learned that our packs were waaayyyyy too heavy for such a long backpacking trip.
Lessons learned, we headed out to hike the part of the most familiar part of the Long Trail, crossing Sterling Mountain, Madonna Peak, and Morse, the three peaks of our home area, Smugglers Notch. It was a beautiful sunny day and we were sure the rest of two week trek would be smooth sailing.
When we reached the peak of Madonna, we sat on the chairlift platform to have lunch. Indie was still a baby to us and we cooed and oohed and ahhhed over him, admiring his puppy eyes, and his adorable little mannerisms. Brinton was holding Indie and scratching his belly, when he noticed something strange.
Spread across Indie’s belly were little bumps, similar to insect bites. But—there were bright, fluorescent pimples with orange goo oozing out, forming little crystals on each bump.
“Oh my god!” Brinton shouted standing up with Indie still in his arms. “Look at this! Quick!”
We panicked. We walked around in circles, passing Indie from one to another, repeating “Oh my god! Oh my god! What do we do?! What do we do?!”
Eventually, we sat down with Indie and examined it more closely. I pulled out a booklet that had been included in the pre-packed emergency first aid kit I had packed. I flipped through it and found a small section on pet care. The page included a long list of warning signs for pets — my memory is foggy, but I remember spots… bites… inhalation of mold… infection…
“Hike’s over. We have to get him to a vet. Quickly.”
Cell phones didn’t exist back then —or if they did, we didn’t have one. So we stood up, packs weighing us down, bodies aching form seven nights sleeping through storms, humidity, and a dog keeping us up all night. And we ran, ran, ran, down a trail named F.I.S., an incredibly steep trail.
Indie loved it. He flew down the mountain, like a deer leaping across a meadow. Brinton moved quickly, jogging easily over holes and boulders. Me… I stumbled, fell multiple times, tipped over by the weight of my unnecessarily enormous pack, fell into holes, barked my shins on rocks. It didn’t matter. I clambered my way down as fast I could.
I don’t remember how we found a phone to call Brinton’s dad to come pick us up — maybe the ski lodge was open? Maybe Brinton flagged down someone in the parking lot? Maybe cell phones actually did exist and we had one and used it? I don’t remember, but my father-in-law showed up somehow and drove us to the nearest veterinarian.
At the vet, the doctor was mystified. “I’m going to take a biopsy to see if we can figure this out. May I take photos of this? I’ve been a veterinarian for 30 years in Vermont. I’ve seen everything. But I’ve never seen anything like this. Do you mind if I share these photos with my colleagues? I’m sure they would be interested.” This did not sound good to us. Indie was our baby. The vet took a small biopsy on one of the pimples (god I hate that word), and sent us on our way. we left the office, dazed.
Weeks later, we got a call from the vet’s office. They still didn’t know what it was. Their best guess was maybe a rare spider bite.
Maybe Indie had discovered a new species of insect. Maybe that orange crystalized goo contained the cure for cancer. Maybe the goo contained magic. We’ll never know.
For the rest of his life, we would never rub his tummy without thinking about the time he had the magical pimples.