Awful life moments can be mundane and even kind of funny
We can skip the part where he beat me up. I had to get out for the night, and I was taking the dog with me.
Jasper was a mountain cur mix, but to me he just looked like a german shepard with short hair. My boyfriend and I adopted him on a whim during an impromptu trip to Ikea. There was a pet adoption set up in front of the store, and some kids were reaching over the pen and poking Jasper like they were checking to see if he was dead, but he just sat there panting and staring.
We didn’t stand around long to watch. It was 100 degrees out, a typical Texas summer day, so we quickly went inside, bought some furniture on a credit card, and left. On the drive home we talked about Jasper’s demeanor, which became a debate about getting a dog, which slid into us convincing each other that not only would it be ok to get a dog that very moment, it would be a tragedy not to. We drove back and paid the adoption agency $150 as proof that we could responsibly welcome Jasper into our loving home.
...
The alcohol was past the point of giving my boyfriend excessive energy and instead was sapping him of everything. I quietly packed an overnight bag with dog food and a change of clothes, and Jasper and I were off.
By midnight we were hunkered down in my car in a Wal-Mart parking lot. I was furiously refreshing the internet on my Metro PCS, no-name Android while the battery was getting dangerously low, desperately trying to find a motel nearby that accepted dogs. Jasper sat up dutifully in the front passenger seat, never once lying down.
We eventually got to a motel. The sliding doors parted and the air curtain roared. I walked inside and felt my right shoulder try to pop out of its socket while my hand was forced towards the floor.
I spun around, slightly hunched over, one arm stretched out while the other tried to adjust my slipping backpack straps, but I stopped when I saw my dog’s stoic face. That’s when I remembered that Jasper was inexplicably, deathly afraid of linoleum floors. He wouldn’t even go in the kitchen, no matter what kind of food we tried to tempt him with.
Still hunched over, with my backpack now half slung off of my body, I weakly tugged the leash two times “pretty please?” to coax him inside.
Jasper, sitting partially outside and partially on the motel floor mat, didn’t budge. He looked as close to tears as a dog can get.
The sliding door’s wind and fury were getting impatient. I crouched down and reached my arms around Jasper, who didn’t resist being picked up but didn’t do anything ergonomically to help either.
I didn’t know what the night auditor guy behind the bulletproof window thought of all of this and I didn’t care. I had to focus on opening my backpack to get my wallet out while my German Shepherd-esque dog did everything in his power to not lose The Floor is Lava.
That was 15 years ago. I’ve long been out of that relationship and into plenty of therapy.
I don’t know why I think this story’s so funny, but I think it maybe has to do with the fact that it was all a quiet night until it wasn't, or at least that's the way I remember experiencing it.
Getting beat up doesn’t come with a dramatic background soundtrack unless the circumstances happen to work out that way. We didn’t have the TV on or any music playing, and I was never one to scream when it happened. It was grunts. It was frustrated, desperate grunts of trying to break free from his grip, or his grunts of trying to rebalance himself from taking a corner too quickly or bumping into the couch. Just thuds and grunts really. Jasper was never one to bark or growl when it was happening either. He was more of an after-the-fact therapy dog versus a ferocious protector willing to put up a fight. I never once thought to fault him for not trying to stop my boyfriend from hurting me though. All dogs are good dogs, especially my Jazz Jazz.
Then walking out to the car was quiet. We lived in the middle of nowhere Texas, supposedly a Dallas suburb, but it was a newer development, and the other California transplants were smart enough to pick slightly more developed areas nearby instead.
Then on the drive to the Wal-Mart parking lot I played some Jimmy Eat World, really just “A Praise Chorus” over and over again. It calms me down, still does to this day actually. But even then, I had it on barely loud enough to hear it. In the parking lot I had the car off so no music there, and again, there wasn’t a single moving thing in the parking lot. Plenty of RVs sure, but no one was up and about.
Walking to the motel entrance was quiet, and then BOOM or whatever the fuck you call the sound those reverse-wind blowing automatic doors make when they blast you with air. It was the loudest thing that happened all night. Then, in the midst of the roar, there’s Jasper, looking damn well like he was about to cry, leaning away from me and the entrance to avoid stepping on linoleum. Then there were the weak tugs at his leash, still with the roaring doors going, before I finally picked him up and carried him to the night clerk sitting behind the bullet proof glass.
That was the loud part of the night, not getting beat up. I guess it isn't always the big dramatic life moments that have the big dramatic matching background music and vibes. Bad shit happening can be quite mundane actually, and maybe that’s why I think that night was so funny: the physical abuse felt as dull and routine as checking the mail or doing the dishes, but good god those fucking doors were so loud and why, WHY was my dog so afraid of linoleum???