William Snesrud of CrossDove Writers
Here we are now a solid two months down the road from picking up our new bundle of household joy – Frosty, our Maltese puppy – and we have had our first run in with remorse for leaving him behind for a weekend.
Now both the wife and I have been gone for a couple of days at a time during these summer months while leaving the other in charge of the puppy. So we both have been given the experience of the joy and excitable love Frosty gives when we return home from our short trips.
But leaving for a short weekend getaway, the both of us were having to do something for the first time – give up control of watching our puppy to somebody else.
The vet that we take Frosty to just happens to have what they call a ‘Pet Resort’ to lodge people’s pets while they may be out of town and that seemed to be the logical choice.
Yes, we have some good friends who also have lodging facilities just north of our hometown by maybe 15 miles, but since we were going the other direction upon leaving for our getaway we decided to give the Pet Resort a shot at taking care of our Frosty.
Their rates were reasonable with a standard indoor suite running at $20 per night stay, while the indoor/outdoor suite costs just a notch more at $25. If you really want to spoil the family pet you can reserve the luxury suite for $30 per night and get a room complete with a 24/7 live camera feed, playtime in an indoor/outdoor playroom and a small bed for the pet to sleep on.
We choose the indoor/outdoor suite for the two-night stay just to give Frosty the opportunity to wander outside on his own if he so wanted. This suite did come with a little cot for him to nap or sleep on and we obliged him by bringing along his favorite blanket for napping so that he could have a sense of home.
Now due to Frosty still being such a young pup, we also choose to spend another $10 per day for some ‘personal playtime’ with some of the staff members.
Maybe the best part of the leaving Frosty at the Pet Resort was the ‘picture messages’ they would send out each afternoon to assure us he was doing okay and having a good time. Trust me, those pictures (which they would take and send without any extra cost) on Friday and Saturday in the late afternoon were a big help as we found ourselves suffering from much heartache without having Frosty under foot.
For a guy that has never really had a dog or puppy, I never realized how quickly and deeply my affection could develop for this little white fluff ball of fun we call Frosty, but it did and has, which meant our entire drive to the getaway was filled with clouds of heartache and wonder as to how our precious little guy was doing.
Since our marriage is one of those blended family things, and without ever having a kid that we would call our own kid, Frosty has become the kid we never had, and I can not only say I feel, but also have seen the seemingly refreshed sense of attachment my wife and I have now due to this white ball of fluff.
With that saying, if my phone kept a record, and maybe it does without me knowing how to check for it, of how many times I checked my messages or copy of the pic they had already sent – I am sure it had to have reached an astronomical number.
We topped part of the getaway off by making a pinkie swear bet on which of us he would come to first and seem the most excited to see when we returned home. The bet was for the one receiving the second amount of return excitement to buy a round at Dairy Queen and was made over dinner at Milano’s in the heart of Kansas City’s Crown Center Plaza. And for those who may be curious, neither of us could declare victory as Frosty immediately went crazy with excitement at a new person, a complete stranger that was also waiting to pick up their dogs, when he was brought out from the back to come home. So apparently the next trip to Dairy Queen will be paid by the one who gets to the counter first with the billfold/wallet open.
Needless to say, we did make it through our weekend getaway and despite our extreme emotions of missing Frosty we still managed to have a good time.
One more thing, the folks at the Pet Resort went out of their way on Sunday as just before we arrived to pick Frosty up, they were giving him a quick bath (at no extra cost to us) due to him getting just a bit muddy since they had some major rain while we were gone and of course like any little kid would do – Frosty seemed to find the muddiest part of the play area.
As the new week arrives and we move forward with getting back into a changed but yet regular routine, it is just good to have that early morning greetings of paws smacking my knees, followed by a jump into the chair and a paw smacking upper back rub and highly motivated morning kisses from ear to ear and hair to jaw.
If only we can get a better handle on that potty-training thing – only time will continue to tell.
With that – hugs, prayers, blessings & happy thoughts from Grumpy Gramps
(Copyright@2018, CrossDove Writer – no part of this may be printed, copied or used without written permission by CrossDove Writers and Grumpy Gramps.)
CrossDove Writer 