Day 36 Who’s the Handsomest Prince?

Randee of Bikram Yoga Abbotsford has just returned to teaching after having her second child, and lucky for me, she taught the 3:30 class today. She was nervous, she said, coming back, but she did a great job.

And I so needed it today!

You see, it’s grooming day for my dog and I do it myself. It’s a bit of a job. He’s a poodle, very masculine, self-aware and has more important things on his mind than superficialities like ear-wax, cling-ons and eye-goobers. Important as in squeaky toys and Western union money transfer squash balls.

I’m not a professional groomer, nor have I had any training, but I groom him myself because a) it’s an unpleasant job that can make groomers justifiably impatient, b) he’s an unpleasant subject and c) professional groomers have injured him worse than I ever have, probably because of a) and b).

I have to be in the right mood to tackle the job. I must remain in a Zen-like state, using my best deep breathing, perfectly aware of his incredibly fantastic personality off the grooming table, or I’m liable to bean him in the head with a brush.

Big-Poo (to differentiate him from Little-Poo, who as you might have gathered, is smaller) is a twitchy sort, very responsive to the vibes around him. If he looks out of sorts, and I express concern about it, he immediately adopts an air of deathly illness.

“What?” his look implores. “I look sick? Am I dying?? SAVE ME!!”

He plasters himself against my knees, quaking, until I feel him over and pronounce him well. Then he leaps up, shakes off his terminal terror and goes off to hunt down his squeaky.

For him, the grooming table might as well be a guillotine. He’s tense, uncooperative, resistant, jumpy, everything you really don’t want when you’ve got sharp instruments at hand. I’m sympathetic: after all, imagine someone scissoring around your short curlies. Well, he’s all short curlies.

I go slowly and he tolerates it, trusting me not to hurt him. This is the main reason I can’t let anyone else groom him: I know where all his scars and tender bits are. His flanks, where he’s been clipper-burned and cut, his shoulders where the coyote grabbed him, the side where he ran into a sharp stick, opening up a three-inch gash, chasing a ball of course.

He trusts me, but he still hates grooming. 

Once the job’s done, he’s gorgeous, sweet-smelling — and I feel like I’ve spent the day shoeing Belgian draft-horses.

So 90 minutes in the hot room was exactly what I needed to get the kinks out.

But he’s so worth it!