5/21/20

How the Coronavirus is like Trying to Get your Dog to Go Pee

by Anna Norman

I’m sure you are all sick of hearing the c-word by now. No, not the offensive in America, endearing in Australia “C” word. In present times a much worse one: Coronavirus. Endearingly nicknamed as COVID-19 as if it were some kid on Minecraft’s user name. The fact of the matter is, this sucks. It really sucks. I keep reminding myself of what I have to be grateful for: a roof over my head, access to open space and a medium-energy dog- yet I still find myself riding a mental tsunami day to day. I don’t think our brains were equipped to deal with this. They are equipped to deal with a lot of the familiar feelings that will come out of this: anxiety, depression, loss, but not necessarily a threat so profound yet so invisible. A completely unprecedented theatrical situation that popped the “it won’t happen to us” bubble which keeps our minds at bay. This isn’t war, it’s not just a recession, it’s not violence. It’s something we can’t see, predict, or truly understand. It’s something that puts us in a constant state of waiting with the light at the end of the tunnel becoming dimmer. So that leaves me to beg the question: what will come out of all of this? Maybe the same feeling I had when my dog finally went pee.

About a month and a half ago I adopted a little cattle-dog/polar bear mix that I now call “Juno.” Whilst it may have seemed as a pandemic-fueled decision I had been thinking about it for years. I looked and I came close many times but it never felt right. The dog that was yet to exist even had its own emergency medical savings fund. I don’t have one of those for myself but considering I became a regular at the urgent-care clinic this winter, I might start to consider it. Well after I heard about the upcoming apocalypse I decided there’s no time like the present. I drove up to the shelter right when Cov-Who? was initially hitting Colorado and returned a couple of hours later with a chunky, dirty, but frankly quite cute pooch. A pooch that pooped and threw up in my car on the way home. This was motherhood, I had arrived. 

The little black polar bear turned out to be everything I could have asked for. She loves people, dogs, and kids. Initially, she refused to go up my stairs to my house, she hated the car (still does) and didn’t understand how a collar worked. But all of that was fine. I have no idea where she came from, what her past entailed or what she had been through. The fact that she was as loving and accepting of every being she met despite all that is a lesson we could all stand to learn. But beyond that, she had a deeper rooted issue: her bladder. Never have I seen a dog pee as little as she did. Here was the tricky part, she was house-trained but she would go hours and hours without peeing. No matter how many times I let her out she would just go back inside. Imagine walking to the bathroom and someone is following you around teary-eyed choking out the words “go potty, please go potty.” I would walk away too. I don’t want to get murdered.

The worst of it was at night. I got her in March in Colorado so I wouldn’t describe the weather as balmy. I would follow her around an eerie wooded road in pajama shorts and a giant puffy jacket. Soon my mind would start having flashbacks to that one time I made the poor decision to watch the movie “IT” and I would sprint back inside until it was time to try again. Ultimately after a lot of hopeful wandering and deceitful sniffing there would be that final squat and I would hear the sweet, sweet sound of a quiet stream against the stark night.

It was in that moment that my eyes would swell up with tears and I would let a big congratulatory scream. I don’t know about you guys, but that was the first time I had ever cried over someone going to the bathroom. That whimsical moment was able to flood my brain with dopamine and serotonin and all the other good chemicals. I felt relieved that her little doggie bladder was empty, and it made all the current stresses of the world seem arbitrary. 

My hope for the current and post Coronavirus world is that we can all feel the way I did when my dog went pee. Not only that, but also remember what it was like walking around on those cold nights. Although, Juno has overcome her struggles with the guidance and support of her community (me- I am the village) I never want to forget the simplicity within the circumstance. I hope we remember the unprecedented challenges we faced, situations that turned our lives upside down. I hope we remember how seemingly impossible things seemed to overcome, yet we found a way. I hope we remember the parts of us that were exposed in times of isolation, the strength we found to look at them without judgement and the tools we used from life to understand how to slow down. I hope we can appreciate the smiles when the masks come off. The ability to shake a strangers hand or hug a friend when you see them. I hope we can feel a closeness when we stand within 6 feet of someone. And most of all I hope that if someone you know comes out of the bathroom and you hear that toilet flush, you will go completely insane with joy. 

**I realized I wrote this in the past tense, Juno is still alive and well. I swear.