We finally got rid of the old blue dog bed. First of all, both of my dogs are girls, so it was weird to have one of the beds be blue, just because that was the coziest bed at the store the day we went shopping. Second, the bed had stains on it; whether from Cricket snacking in the bed, or Butterfly throwing up on it in the car, or from Cricket’s unauthorized use of the bed for, let’s call it scratching. It was ugly and dirty looking despite many trips to the washing machine. And Cricket would fight with the bed, and yell at it, and toss it around the room, so really there was only one reliable dog bed, the red one, and Cricket would take it for herself, and leave Butterfly with the upside down blue bed in the middle of the floor.
Grumpy Cricket in her blue bed.
Butterfly, after throwing up in the blue bed.
Not quite big enough for two.
We went to all three Petco stores in our area, and Target, and Wal-Mart, and who knows where else, and found nothing. The beds they had were too big, or too small, the wrong colors, or not substantial enough; and if they were perfect, they were, of course, too expensive.
“This is no longer good enough, Mommy.”
Eventually, we found the perfect dog bed online, where I seem to find everything these days. The bed is really more of a sofa, and it’s brown and cream, which seems kind of dignified, and goes nicely with the color scheme of the living room, and the color scheme of the dogs. If I were a dog, or a small child, I would want this little couch bed for myself. It’s an orthopedic bed, which means it is firm, instead of squishy, and allows for support of aching bones. And it has a bolster for resting tired chins.
Unfortunately, next to this new, wonderful, sophisticated dog bed, the nice, comfy red and tan bed that used to be so admired, looked ratty and small and in need of replacement. And the new, wonderful, sophisticated dog bed did not smell of dog, or food, or even of people, so the girls weren’t sure what to do with it. They just stared, at both beds, and looked confused.
I decided to tempt them forward by placing chewies on the new bed. I put one down for Cricket first, and she took it, and walked away to chew on it. Then I put a second one down for Butterfly, but before Butterfly could reach it, Cricket had dropped her own chewie and come running over to steal the new one. I had to take the new chewy away from Cricket, and place it on the dog bed three more times before Cricket accepted that she was not the only dog in the room, and allowed Butterfly to creep over and pick up her treat, barely letting her paws touch the new bed before she ran away to chew in the hallway.
By the second day, without any further inducements, Cricket had curled up on the new bed to sleep. But it took a few more days for Butterfly to risk stepping up onto the bed. Eventually, when I was busy at the computer, and Cricket was elsewhere, Butterfly rested her head on the bolster, and stretched her tushy back into a corner, and fell asleep.
Cricket’s new bed, no butterflies allowed.
Wait, the red bed goes to Cricket too?
“Where am I supposed to sleep?”
My favorite moments are when each one of the dogs is in a bed, sleeping peacefully, letting me watch TV or type on the computer uninterrupted. But those moments are few and far between. In the meantime, I keep sneaking looks at the new dog bed, and wishing I could get one in my size. I could probably find something big enough, made for a Great Dane or an Irish Wolfhound, or maybe we could just cushion the whole floor!
I’ll have to think about this.
rachelmankowitz 