December 31, 2010

• Dog.

  

  This is Dog. I got her from a pet store when I was 18. She had been there about a year when I got her – she was in a tiny cage and totally unloved.

  

  It took weeks of handling for her to unroll for me.

  

  Hedgehogs are special, you see. They’re not like kitties or puppies, all soft at first.

  

  They have to make themselves soft for you. You can’t force it, you have to build the relationship first.

  

  Then they are the sweetest, most curious and interesting little pets you can imagine.

  When I first got her, I named her Mallory, after the badass character in Natural Born Killers. She was the fourth hedgehog I’d owned and by far my favorite. She was my little friend throughout every major life event in my young adulthood. You don’t realize the big part your pets play in your memories until you try to imagine the events without them. When my twins were old enough to talk, they renamed Mallory “Dog” because they couldn’t say hedgehog. The name stuck. She’s been Dog ever since.

  

  Hedgehogs live, on average, about 7-9 years. Dog was on her way to being 12. I noticed one morning she was flailing around on her side, unable to steady herself to get to her water. I thought maybe she’d had a stroke. For the next week, every time she got up for a drink, she would fall over. She looked miserable. Eventually I called the vet to see if they would euthanize a hedgehog. They would.

  So late yesterday afternoon I put her in my pocket and drove to the vet’s. The nurse asked if she needed a towel to hold her. I smiled and said no, she was perfectly friendly. And I handed her over, burst into tears and drove home.

  

  So that was Dog. Her favorite thing to do was play outside in her pen, her favorite food was June bugs and her favorite person was me.

  I miss her terribly.

  • 1:04 pm
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