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A Story of A Dog
Isn’t it funny how you can completely forget about something you cared about if you allow enough time to pass? You never realize that you have forgotten it; you just assume that is what comes with growing up. You forget the things of your childhood. It’s not as though you block it out; you just go on with your life and don’t look back. Even the biggest things that occurred in your life at the time seem so minor now; you wonder how such a little thing could have been such a big deal. You can remember when you were a child you made a vow to never forget and always keep that one thing of the highest importance.
One summer out of boredom, I was rearranging my room and throwing away old junk that I hadn’t used in years. (A skill taught to me by my father who didn’t much care for the sentiment of things, a skill that I sometimes regret when I have a need for that one thing that I thought I would never use again.) My things were everywhere, on the floor, on every flat surface and even spilling out into the hall. I grabbed a big black trash bag and started to shove things into it, so they could later be given to the Salvation Army. This seemed to get the job done faster. Before long, I wasn’t even thinking about the stuff I was throwing in the bag. I cleaned underneath my bed in under a minute. I thought that would conclude my dumping frenzy, but my reading chair caught my eye. It’s an old, oversized, green chair with a wide seat and sits at an angle in the corner of my room. So there was a decent sized gap where balloons that I would have had floating around in my room would deflate and sink behind it. So I reached over the back and pulled everything out and was about to stuff it all into the already full trash bag but I saw that there was something there that couldn’t be thrown away. Along with all the deflated balloons was a stuffed dog I recognized immediately. It would be hard for me to forget that particular coloration of black, brown, and white. My younger self would have been shocked to find Maxie hidden behind my chair and forgotten. “How could I have, after all that we’ve been through?! He deserves better treatment,” I can see myself saying as if he were alive.
On Christmas morning, my parents woke me up for the big day. Katie and I ran into the living room eagerly looking to see what Santa Claus had left for us the night before. The room was beautifully decorated with a Christmas tree and many presents underneath it. The stockings above the fireplace were filled to the brim with all sorts of neat things. There was also a little pile of gifts that Santa Claus had left for my sister and me. Even with all those other presents my attention only went to a single object.
The moment I stepped into the room, I spotted a stuffed dog and screamed, “Maxie!” and ran to him. It didn’t even take me a minute to figure out that the dog belonged to me, to name him, and to pick him up and give him a big hug. I was amazed that Santa Clause knew that I wanted a dog. I had wanted a dog ever since I went to my aunt’s house. A few months before Christmas I was introduced to a basset hound named Maxie. The moment I saw him I fell in love him. While at her house I would not part with Maxie. I would grab him by the collar and walk him around the house. I would lay next to him and use him as a pillow or I would just sit next to him to pet him. So on Christmas morning while the rest of the family happily opened their gifts, I was content with playing with Maxie. It was a while before I could even look at the other presents that I had received. From that day on, Maxie and I were inseparable. I would take him to daycare and to the playground. Maxie and I loved to play on the swings and I would spin him around on the roundabout. We would eat together, and he slept in my bed. We were the very best of friends and together we went everywhere. But for a forgetful two-year-old, this could be dangerous. As much as a child can love something, they can easily set it down, forget about it, and walk off.
One weekend, the saddest weekend of my life, Maxie and I went with my mom to run some errands. When we got back Maxie wasn’t with us. I got panicky. Where has he gone? Did he not come with us? So many thoughts were swimming around in my head. I went running around the house looking in all his favorite spots but I couldn’t find him. I searched outside, in the yard, in the playground. But the playground was empty. My mom called all the places we went that day, and none of them found him. Maxie was lost. I was inconsolable for weeks. Maxie didn’t know the way back home, and I wondered what would happen if a stranger got him. The thought was unbearable. I didn’t even have Maxie for a year, and now he was gone completely from my life. My mom tried to cheer me up. She told me that someone else probably found Maxie who would love him just as much as I did and that they would both be happy. This did not make me any happier. All I wanted was my dog back. But I knew that I would never get him back. A couple months went past I was still sad about Maxie not being with me but not as much as before. Besides, my birthday was coming up and family was coming over for the holidays. School was also getting out, so there was nothing but happy things heading my way. When my birthday came, I was even happier when I got my last gift. Though it did not look like the Maxie that was lost, the spirit of the old one was within this new Maxie. We were with each other all the time again, but now I was more careful and didn’t put him down and forget about him. Every thing was back to normal. I even dressed him in a vest and one of my dad’s ties so he could come to church with me.
One dinner, my parents said that we would be moving. Maxie and I were both sad that we had to leave home. But we helped pack up our things for when the moving van came. Maxie was not one of the things that I packed up in a box. He was always my carry-on and always by my side as we moved from state to state.
The summer before sixth grade, I moved to Arizona. I was entering middle school, and I was not about to bring Maxie with me to school. I was too mature to do that. Although he still slept on my bed at night, it was starting to become very apparent that I did not need Maxie in my bed at night anymore. Every evening, I put him right next to me and held him tight, but in the morning I would wake up and find that he had fallen onto the floor. After awhile, I started to push him off deliberately just to make more room for myself. It got annoying when he was in the bed with me at night. So I put him on my reading chair. But again, while I was reading in that chair Maxie got to be bothersome. Though the chair was wide, he still seemed to be getting in my way. So I put him on the top of the back of the chair where he was out of the way. Maxie fell from the back of the chair, and I didn’t even take notice. Just thinking about what my younger self would say about me forgetting Maxie behind a chair. How she would act as if it were alive. As I look into those two glass eyes, I see some sort of sadness. I don’t know how many years he was behind that chair, but it must be really sad to be unwanted. It must be really sad to be forgotten. It’s so amazing how such an important part of my childhood could be so easily be forgotten. Article provided by 
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