ElderBitches

"Oh my god, Laura!" my best friend wailed, "We're going to be thirty this year! WE'RE OLD!!!"

"First," I replied dryly, being rather closer to the Big Day than she was, "I'm pretty sure thirty is not old. And second, would you really want to be sixteen again?"

The truth of the matter is that, in spite of all my cultural conditioning, I've been looking forward to thirty. I've come to the realization that being an Adult is mostly whatever I decide it is. For example, I've decided that Adults get to wear whatever they want. So if I want to wear running shorts and dog tee shirts, or a bikini top with capris, or a pencil skirt and high heels - then I will, and I can. Because Adult. I can buy that fancy collar if I damn well please, or take a day just to go hiking in the woods with my dog(s), or impulse adopt that bulldog if I want to. Age appears to have its privileges, and I've found the balance of freedom, ability, lack of interest in pleasing the majority that comes along with being thirty to be quite enjoyable.

I've heard that in some homes, little dogs enjoy special privileges. But with both Rubi and Piper edging up to ten years old, here at the Horde House, we have ElderBitch Rules. For example, ElderBitches can have cake for breakfast if they want to. They can also sleep however they want, because dignity is something that happens to teen-agers and people who never really grow-up and therefore care about what others think.

In fact, if Elderbitches want to sit on the table, well, who are they hurting, really?

ElderBitches get to play outside with their big orange ball as long as they want.

Because if she hasn't killed herself yet, she probably isn't going.

Also: Fuck bushes. Those assholes.

If fact, if they don't want to give the ball back at all . . .

I think there comes a point for every good dog owner when they realize that their friend has more years behind than ahead. If you're lucky (and we are), you've already put in the years of training that a little relaxing of the rules now won't make much of a difference (well, unless you're the table, I suppose).

A friend of mine once posted that she loves the stage she and her reactive dog are at: they're not doing any official "training" anymore - not BAT, LAT, CAT, DS/CC, or R+/P-. They're just having a conversation. I love that stage, too, when you and your dog are finally communicating on the same level. It's where Jai and I are right now, and after struggling so long to figure out what we needed from each other, it's a relief to be able to respond to one another so naturally.

It's not where the ElderBitches and I are.

The girls and I have reached the Old Married Couple stage. We've had so many conversations that we've run out of things to say and now go straight to reading each others' minds. We might not always like what the other is thinking, mind you, but more often than not all we need to do is look at the other before we start grinning at the amazing ridiculousness that is our lives. We have grown into each other, like trees planted too close together.

I know that there is a day coming when I will no longer have Piper and Rubi to read my mind for me: when their tree-like strength will no longer be here to support me. And I know that day is coming much sooner than I would like. But that day - it is not today.

And that is reason enough to celebrate.

When I am an old woman I shall wear purple

With a red hat which doesn’t go, and doesn’t suit me.

And I shall spend my pension on brandy . . .