favorite things 6: sweet pea

(There is, of course, the story of how and why I adopted Sweet Pea, but I’m going in a different direction with this today.)

Sweet Pea is my dog. She’s a border collie. There is a possibility that she is some kind of mix, but as I’ve gotten to know her better and as I’ve learned more about border collies in general, I’ve decided that she is just totally a border collie in terms of personality and temperament. She’s a beautiful dog — athletic and strong. She’s also insanely smart, kind of bossy, goofy, and kindhearted. So really, she’s pretty perfect.

I mean, yes, there was that time she barfed on my bed. And she snores so loudly that if it’s in the evening and I’m watching something, sometimes I have to turn up the volume on the TV. She has a habit of barking at nothing, and have you ever heard a border collie bark? It’s LOUD and it’ll scare you if you’re not prepared for it, and when are you ever prepared for that? Her breath is terrible. She emits an amazingly high-pitched squeal every time she yawns. She can body-slam me with enough force to knock me over. Between baths, she smells like old Fritos and dirt. When I’m eating, she’ll put her head on my leg and breathe like Darth Vader. Sometimes she’ll lick my pants. (If she met you, she’d probably lick your pants, too.) She has this blanket that she chews on and likes to play with; it’s often damp and gross and she likes to drop it on my feet. She will run her cold, wet nose up my arm. She blows her coat twice a year and fills the house with hair. And she sheds anyway. I can’t remember what it was like to wear something and not have to pick dog hair off of it. She’ll drink out of the toilet and then lick me. She occasionally wallows in things that I’d prefer not to identify. She gets constant ear infections.

She’s afraid of thunderstorms, fireworks, my blow dryer, the vacuum cleaner, brooms, umbrellas, motorcycles, people on bicycles, people mowing their lawns, children’s toys, and snowmen. Oh, also, she’s afraid of the basement. If I go down there to do laundry (which I do) she’ll stand at the top and wait for me to return.

But also she’s a world-champion snuggler, or would be, if they had world championships for that sort of thing. She knows when I’m sick or sad and will curl up next to me. In fact (sap alert), once I was sick and my temperature was getting dangerously high. I was hallucinating and I had the shakes. She curled up on my chest and stayed there until I stopped shaking and the fever started going back down. I hallucinated that she was an angel, and maybe somehow she is one.

I call her Boo, Booger, Dog, Pumpkin Face, Goofy Butt, Monkey, Cow (sometimes she honest-to-god moos and it is hilarious), Spot, and sometimes combinations of the above, like Booger Face, Boo Monkey, Goofy Dog, etc. Oh, also sometimes I use her name. She answers to all of these things, so it’s cool, and I like hollering “Pumpkin FAAAAAAACE!” sometimes. Sue me.

I could go on, even more than I already have, telling you about funny things she does, or the fact that she knows how to open the garbage can, but I won’t. I just want to say that Sweet Pea is my dog. She is my favorite and I love love love her. And I’m going to be done writing this now so I can go give her a big smooshy hug.

The end.