How's it been going for you, this process of shifting expectations?
As it turned out, instead of writing about it I got to experience it ... again. The day was going okay and we were looking forward to our Friday night rhythm of celebrating Sabbath with friends, over Zoom. We were planning to connect with them and then have pizza and a movie with the girls. So Tim took Zola out for a quick walk.
As they walked, they crossed paths with another guy and his dog, and the canines greeted one another. We're not sure what happened, since it didn't look like the dog nipped her, but somehow Zola sliced her ear right on the end. It seems more likely that she somehow hooked it on a bramble, or something. Anyway, it turns out that ears bleed ... a lot!
By the time Tim and Zola got back to the house, she had flicked her head around so much that it was hard to tell whether or not she had other cuts, there were so many bloody patches on her coat. We tried to staunch the bleeding ourselves but, before long, the front of the house looked like a CSI crime scene, with blood spatter all the way up the front steps.
Great, not only do we risk getting stopped by the police for driving to the vet, but there's every likelihood a neighbour will call them in to check on what violence has taken place in front of our house.
Our own vet had no appointments available, so we called through to another local place. They had to send a letter giving details of the appointment and verifying that, yes, we did indeed require veterinary assistance and therefore did have good reason to be out on the roads. Tim printed the form in case the police stopped him, and loaded Zola - still bleeding profusely - into the crate in the back of the car.
As they left the house, I set to with a bucket of water, cleaning product, mop and cloths. As I was discovering and scrubbing blood spots, my mind flashed back to a Christmas Day when Keziah was about 2 or 3. I had taken the dog out for our customary Christmas morning run and she cut right through the tendon up the back of her paw, on a broken bottle. That was quite the bloody mess and it had been equally difficult to get to a vet quickly on that occasion, though for entirely different reasons.
Having cleaned up as much of the blood spatter as I could see, I went inside to change my clothes and shower. The girls and I went ahead with our Sabbath call, and ultimately with our pizza and the start of our movie too. Tim, meanwhile, found himself outside the vet's, queuing in the street with the dog for about 2 hours, standing at an appropriate distance from the other poor souls with their pets.
When they finally returned, Zola had a bandaged ear, held in place by a sort of bandana. The vet had been unable to stitch the wound because of the thinness of the ear at the tip. There was little to be done except to try to get her to stop shaking her head around, in the hopes that the cut would coagulate and stop bleeding. The bandana didn't stay in place for long, but the dressing seemed to hold, so we crated her for the night hoping that by morning the dressing would have done its job.
So yeah, we didn't see that coming.
And you know, what wouldn't normally be that big a deal - dogs get up to mischief all the time - actually felt pretty exhausting, especially for Tim who did the running around. But I guess that's the thing, right? We're all in a season when so many of our expectations have had to change ... then a simple thing on top of it all, like spending Friday night at the vet's, feels far more tiring than usual.
Here's hoping your Friday was less eventful. (Update: things look good this morning and we have a script for antibiotics, in case of infection. Even Zola seems worn out by the whole experience!)
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