The Unseeing Eye Dog

As far as I know, the doctors have not located any more broken bones in my mother's body, but that doesn't mean the bad news has stopped rolling in. Manny, my obese puggle, who has been under the care of a canine eye specialist for three weeks, has suddenly begun to bump into walls and finds it hard to locate a treat even when it is dangled in front of his nose. Good for his diet, I suppose, but, as the highly trained veterinary ophthalmologist observed, "that's not a very good thing."

Well, the news about Manny isn't all bad. Odds are he doesn't have a brain tumor; he might very well go completely blind, but he'll live. Tests showed that he appears to have some retinal deterioration disease that generally affects older dogs of the female variety. But Manny, the dog who weighs twice as much as your average puggle, has always been one to ignore conventions, so I can't say I'm surprised he's acquired this strange disease at the tender age of five.

Things could be a lot worse. I write this as I watch the morning news coverage of deadly tornadoes in Missouri, Arkansas, and Oklahoma. I've never even come close to living in any of those places. And even though Manny keeps bumping into walls and other hard objects, he doesn't seem to be in pain and his blackened flattened snout won't show the bruises. He'll still be as handsome as ever.

I will take it on faith that Manny will be in good hands for a few days while I go tend to my broken mother in New York. He's getting better about sitting still for all the eye drops, and the gargantuan pills mean gargantuan globs of peanut butter, which always make Manny smile. And my mother, though broken, is filled with a determination to heal and an inner strength not found in your average octogenarian. Or even your average thirty year old.

Life is good. It could definitely be a lot worse.