I remember days years vacations holidays birthdays by the bad mood I was in when we got on I 95 headed for Maine, Florida, Wherever. A meltdown on Christmas Eve left me silent and withdrawn on Christmas day, or Easter was not pastels and light but tears where nobody could see me hiding in the basement bathroom.
Stress. It’s a funny thing and sinks in like a stain that permeates thoughts and heartbeats and words that stumble and jam up rather than coming out in pure expressions. Between my brain and my mouth the evenly spaced letters fall over a cliff and are rearranged in a demented heap of nonsense at the bottom.
How in the world will I take care of Lily? I have not yet felt that relief of knowing she’ll survive. That bright face with its glistening eyes and eager panting are a challenge rather than signs of happiness. In my mind is a voice: can you run enough to make her happy? Can you teach her enough to satisfy her intelligence and need for a task? Is she happy in the basement with Hershey and Bandit but Bandit scares her?Am I worrying too much? Why can’t it be like the bar where you fix a bad day with a beer?

Everyone slows down to look at Lily as I run along with her down the street.

Where are your other two, one neighbor asks.

Can't do all three, I tell him. The little pug always gets his own special walk meant for dogs with short legs.

In the woods, however, we all run with recklessness and laughter while racing our shadows that scatter with the leaves. I have my footholds where I skip from one large smooth stone to the jagged peek of another, across a fallen and crumbling tree and beneath hemlock bows where I crouch and trip on a root.

This morning my right hand slapped at the ground and saved me from a hard landing.

My ankles hate me, and I have twice picked and picked and sweat over slivers in my fingers lodged there with force when I tossed a stick.

She sleeps under the stairs where shadows cool her and the spiral steps wind over her head.

Tomorrow as I rush to favorite spots in the woods where I glimpse light reflecting off Lake Zoar reaching through the forest, I think of the strange impish and elusive things that folklore casts into the woods. Fairies and gnomes lurk behind trees and under stones. Why does a relaxed mind create unlikely things? Late Thursday as I close the bar I'll say goodnight to my own inventions. As I set the alarm I return the bar to the spirits.

Since bludgeoning something is satisfying, but not a solution, Jerry starts swearing. Something peed on the couch.

Had he come home, poured a bowl of cereal, and walked past the couch, talked to it, looked at it, or just admired its welcoming shadows, things would have been fine Tuesday night. Instead, he sat on the couch with his cereal balanced in one hand and a drink in the other. The welcoming shadows were pee stains.

Jesus, she drinks half the toilet and then does this, he said. He means Lily. I am apologetic, but how do we fix this? I know dogs are not scheming conniving things, but to choose the couch requires whatever snippet of rudimentary planning tools that dogs may have. The couch. When nobody is looking. Squat and pee. A LOT of pee. A whole toilet worth of pee. That inventive sequence is designed for something, but what? Are we not letting you out enough? Do you want the couch for yourself? Do you want to mark your territory? Does the upholstery offend you?

In the last few weeks one of the dogs has been sneaking in a bathroom visit there on the cushions, and we don't know who. We have theories. Is it Lily? Hershey and Bandit have never before enjoyed the warm sharp aroma of their own urine soaking the spot where they rest their heads. Ozzy? We doubt it since he reigns like a heavyweight in one corner and snarls if anyone wants his spot. But why would Lily suddenly begin peeing on the couch, soaking through the fabric and under layers right down to the foam?

Her ass is finally cleared up and without the incontinence she feels adrift? Poor dog needs an ailment to feel normal?

At 10:32 at night I abandon a freelance project for a load of laundry. After reading snippets of one friend's adventure from state to state, I leave him on the streets of New York to narrate without me listening anymore as I trade in his words for a tumbling rusty colored heap in the washing machine. I am waiting for the pee to rinse out.

Running my hands down Lily’s sides is like trailing my fingertips through sand. Her fur is thick and catches gently underneath my nails as my hands travel a smooth path from her shoulders back, no longer skipping like a stone across prominent ribs.
Her neck has filled out and we don’t call her Big Head anymore, which is what Jerry’s daughter Erica named her. Poor Lily was so scrawny that her width and height came from bone alone. Her skull beneath withered flesh looked huge stuck at the end of her flattened sides. She doesn’t lay down with a succession of thumps as her knees elbows hips and head drop to the floor to rest. Now I hear a sigh and the tinkle of her tag resting on the floor tiles
She has added 20 pounds, and enough energy to go on and on, long after I have stopped throwing the stick and turned around to go home.
Still getting up and out early. Still trying to burn the energy she accumulates from sleep and full meals. Still trying to run the puppy out of her when I get home from work. We both put a couple miles on our shoes then go with Hershey and Bandit into the woods after sticks and to drop on our bellies in the vernal pool. Ozzy explained to me recently that, as a pug, he is not interested in long walks in the woods, on the beach, or anywhere else that involves taking lots and lots of steps. My legs are really short, he seemed to convey by standing still on the back patio, then turning his stubby little body and returning to his corner of the couch.

Sitting down Tuesday I see the messy tableau of a coffee cup markers notes and scraps and an instruction book all at rest where I left them scattered Saturday. Feeling like a layered image I am at once here now overlapping myself where I sat Saturday, shuffling the same junk around to make room to think about Lily.

What I see out here is the same as the tumbleweeds of thought stumbling around inside my skull. I go through moods the same way. When I was angry last time, all those characters were in there and waiting to rouse and dust off their dirty clothes and resume the argument. Same rants and gripes and worries, just as intense and unresolved as I had left them.

Good for me. But Lily is better. I can rush around my life skipping from one mood to the next like they're bus stops, but Lily is getting better.

Outside this morning before work she drags a chewed up stick and drops it near my feet. Looking down I see my own scrawny ankles surrounded by the gaping slippers that Jerry leaves by the chair. I am standing in two tan corduroy rowboats. Reminds me of the time my brother and I rowed out and somehow lost the oar locks. Heavy as hell they sunk fast and the wooden oars floated off. I got in the scary water with tree limbs hidden in the murky weeds waiting to snag and drown me. I jumped in the water filed with slithering monsters and kicked like a frog to push us back to the dock. Years later in a canoe I would step toward the shore and dump my date in the shallows. Oops. We drove toward home and saw the campfire across the lake. I knew my brother and his friends were there. I thought I could manage the canoe.

I thought I could manage standing outside in the early sunlight while Lily squatted somewhere, but when I dragged my hair out of my eyes I saw she was gone. I heard her over the hill, leaves rustling. Lily! Nothing.

Without panicking I ran inside and grabbed my hiking boots.

Hair up and boots on I ran into the forest and Lily was already headed back home. Wow! We were going to end up in the woods anyway. Hershey came with us and 20 minutes later I was home again and on the phone to work. Her food won't be ready for 20 minutes, I explain.

Mixing the enzymes and stashing her dish, I feed the other guys. Good morning Ozzy Hershey Bandit and cats I hate you, you rotten noisy smelly cats. Stop waking me UP!

It's warmer out now and with the windows open the cats jump up and down from the sill and meow meow MEOW.

After work we're back in the woods again with all of us this time. Bandit is tethered to me with his old leash. No more running off and making me frantic. I turn to look for Ozzy and he is gone. Sticks and snarling and Bandit tugging then Hershey running into me from behind we eventually get back home.

Is Ozzy with you? Yes, Jerry says.

Back to the paths and stones and shadow of a hawk rippling across craggy earth. Lily Lily Lily likes to flop on her side, twist onto her back with her legs sticking out and look up at you with giant white teeth and her tongue out.

Thank you mom and dad and aunt for contributing to the Lily Fund.

Lily flops on her back and where her legs and belly meet I can see her skin is withered like an empty, crumpled plastic bag. She is still reassembling herself into complete flesh and bone and I pet her happily.

You must feel great! How do you feel? You saved her! My parents and friends have said with so much excitement. But I am the party pooper and feel like the beast who takes hope and joy like marshmallows and blows them up in the microwave. I am like the messenger of terrible news for the three-year-old who comes downstairs on December 26 and sees remaining gifts beneath the tree: sorry bud, Christmas is over…

Now the task of insurmountable work unfurls. I need to get a grip on a dog finally waking each day with a body pleading for exercise and a chance to run chase jump surge and dash in zig zags across the uneven and tricky forest floor. From the leaves today jumped out a branch like a finger to stab my boot as I rushed downward and really needed a sure step to catch myself. Close. Really close.

Thank God for my forearms, elbows and right hip. Without them to break my fall I might have hit the ground. Those scrapes and bruises are fine. It's the stupid ones that wake a sleeping rage and urge to smash whatever I can reach. As in, I really hate hitting my head on a cabinet that I left open. I think Jerry hates it more than I do, because he did not leave the cabinet open. Thank God again, that people can't die from blame.

Jogging Saturday and I hear a really little girl's really squeaky voice say Doggy! Her hair catches sunlight from the side and shimmers, while creases of shadow streak the other. She sees Lily trotting along and sticky little fingers wiggle. Dog!

Ask if you can pet her honey…her father crouches down and reminds her.

Oh, she loves everyone! I tell him. Mom crouches down too and I squat behind Lily so I can see the little girl who loves the big funny furry thing with a giant black nose. Little fists clutch fur.

The bar. Bless these dollars dipped in whiskey and flavored with brandy and beer. I need them. How many times can I thank the owner for the extra work and the chance it provides to pay Lily's bills?

She needs her enzyme powder mixed with every meal. Is there any other way, a coworker asks. No. Well, yes. I can chase down a fleeing pig and tear out its pancreas for Lily to eat. Everyday.

I have stood at this place before where I am smaller than the looming blades of grass beside me, staring up the rocky climb where the Emerald City of promise and fulfillment at its top is so far away it's like the green light miles in the distance. No chance you'll make it.

Memories drip from my hands like egg whites. Walking down a fluorescent hall at work as the public address bellows a name, I strain for balance.

Lily went from 43 pounds to 60 pounds. Seventeen pounds in two weeks. I strain for balance.

Easter tomorrow. We'll be in the woods.