We adopted our elderly Maltese the day before Thanksgiving 2017. Summer looked like a well coiffed old lady, sparse closely shorn white hair with a slight wave, her pink skin showing through. She wore a little red sweater. If she had been a human she would have smelled like tea rose dusting powder and kept a tissue up her sleeve.
I'd never had a dog of a specific breed before. I was taken with her sad story, her owner had passed away, those who had been tasked with caring for her neglected and abandoned her. Her 17 year old companion, Max, also a Maltese, had been so ill he needed to be put down. I needed to take care of this tiny old lady and so I adopted her on the spot without doing much thinking about what taking care of an aging Maltese would entail.
Grooming a Maltese is part of responsible ownership, not just for aesthetic reasons, but for their overall comfort and health. Had I done my homework I would have know that Maltese fur grows pretty fucking fast and is hard to care for.
So our wee dog's sparse fur began to grow. It grew and grew, like kudzu, it grew fast and thick til it covered everything. It cover her eyes. She grew a long beard that would make any mountain man proud. Her little feet became covered over with great tufts of fur. Because her fur is so cottony, it began to knot and mat, and despite frequent baths and brushing, she started to look bedraggled. I've been out of work for seven months. There is no money for dog grooming. I feel like a bad dog mom for saying that, but it's just the truth.
As the weather turned warmer, my tiny old friend was becoming uncomfortable and I couldn't stand it, not one more day. We bought a used set of electric clippers for $3 at a thrift store and we figured we'd shave our good pup ourselves because how hard could it be?
After testing the shaver out on own skin and hair to make sure it wouldn't hurt the dog in anyway, my son set to work, shearing off tufts of Summer's cottony fur. I said, as a mother would, "Don't shave her down to the skin" even though he wasn't. After a couple of minutes I said, as a mother would, "Can I have a turn?" because, like a mother, I thought I could do better. Moms can be insufferably conceited.
Two passes with the electric razor showed my complete lack of barbering skills. I'd shaved her quite bald in two long stripes down her back. Ironic. But one thing was certain, being too warm was not going to be an issue for her at least not for some time.
I admitted my inferior skills and passed the shaver back to my competent son.
Finally, the dog got tired of these shenanigans and would have no more to do with us, and so we called the grooming episode over.
It wasn't until later when I saw her across the room I realized we did not trim the fur on her legs. Like, at all.
There she is, my good and loyal four legged friend, a pure bred dog that probably cost her original owner a fair amount of cash, bald in patches with ridiculously fluffy legs. She looks less like a refined old woman now and more like a Dickensian protagonist, scrappy and scruffy yet still somehow hopeful, and for some strange reason and quite anachronistically, wearing giant fluffy leg warmers.
I'd never had a dog of a specific breed before. I was taken with her sad story, her owner had passed away, those who had been tasked with caring for her neglected and abandoned her. Her 17 year old companion, Max, also a Maltese, had been so ill he needed to be put down. I needed to take care of this tiny old lady and so I adopted her on the spot without doing much thinking about what taking care of an aging Maltese would entail.
Grooming a Maltese is part of responsible ownership, not just for aesthetic reasons, but for their overall comfort and health. Had I done my homework I would have know that Maltese fur grows pretty fucking fast and is hard to care for.
So our wee dog's sparse fur began to grow. It grew and grew, like kudzu, it grew fast and thick til it covered everything. It cover her eyes. She grew a long beard that would make any mountain man proud. Her little feet became covered over with great tufts of fur. Because her fur is so cottony, it began to knot and mat, and despite frequent baths and brushing, she started to look bedraggled. I've been out of work for seven months. There is no money for dog grooming. I feel like a bad dog mom for saying that, but it's just the truth.
As the weather turned warmer, my tiny old friend was becoming uncomfortable and I couldn't stand it, not one more day. We bought a used set of electric clippers for $3 at a thrift store and we figured we'd shave our good pup ourselves because how hard could it be?
After testing the shaver out on own skin and hair to make sure it wouldn't hurt the dog in anyway, my son set to work, shearing off tufts of Summer's cottony fur. I said, as a mother would, "Don't shave her down to the skin" even though he wasn't. After a couple of minutes I said, as a mother would, "Can I have a turn?" because, like a mother, I thought I could do better. Moms can be insufferably conceited.
Two passes with the electric razor showed my complete lack of barbering skills. I'd shaved her quite bald in two long stripes down her back. Ironic. But one thing was certain, being too warm was not going to be an issue for her at least not for some time.
I admitted my inferior skills and passed the shaver back to my competent son.
Finally, the dog got tired of these shenanigans and would have no more to do with us, and so we called the grooming episode over.
It wasn't until later when I saw her across the room I realized we did not trim the fur on her legs. Like, at all.
There she is, my good and loyal four legged friend, a pure bred dog that probably cost her original owner a fair amount of cash, bald in patches with ridiculously fluffy legs. She looks less like a refined old woman now and more like a Dickensian protagonist, scrappy and scruffy yet still somehow hopeful, and for some strange reason and quite anachronistically, wearing giant fluffy leg warmers.
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