the corner into the road where the surgery is situated, he pulled himself up with great difficulty, licked my face and died in my arms. I have no doubt he knew where he was heading and was determined he was not going to depart this life ignominiously with a needle stuck into his vein. We turned around and sobbed all the way home.
By the time we arrived and built up enough strength and courage to go down to the bottom of the garden and dig a grave alongside Mary’s, it was dark and raining. Tears poured down our cheeks as, wet and bedraggled, we laid him down. A car passed, flashing its headlights on to us. We caught the look of alarm in the driver’s face. We looked at each other. Only that week the crimes of Fred and Rose West had been uncovered, and here we were, digging a grave and burying a body at the dead of night. The situation was so macabre, we couldn’t help laughing. From beginning to end, William had given us nothing but constant amusement. How we would miss him. We vowed there would be no more dogs. The sense of loss was too great.
Chapter Two
Honey, I Want a Chihuahua
Time does heal the sadness, and those resolutions never to feel this bereft again fade and are almost forgotten in the chaos that is middle-aged life with a job to do, late teenagers to guide, nurture and ferry about and elderly parents to support and care for. I had hardly thought about getting another dog as every waking moment was filled with responsibility.
The boys were stuck in a house in a remote part of the countryside which had been perfect for adventurous youngsters, but less appealing when school friends were spread over a wide area of Cheshire and sleepovers and parties became an essential part of their social life. David and I became unpaid taxi drivers and sources of help and information on subjects as widespread as Shakespeare, Buddhism and quantum physics. Our brains were permanently in over-drive whilst, at the same time, dealing with the mundane everyday – shopping, cooking, making sure their shoes still fit.
As they reached 17 and passed their driving tests we looked forward to a little more free time. It was not to be. My parents became increasingly needy of support as my mother’s Parkinson’s worsened, and one day out of every weekend was taken up with the hour and a half drive to Barnsley and back to offer whatever care and cheer we could. By the time the end came for them and I had to face the loss of my parental rock – a gaping emotional hole that still, four years on, I find difficult to rationalise – I was forced to deal with my diagnosis of breast cancer.
People often ask me how I coped with it all, and the only answer is that you just do. Up to that point I had led something of a charmed life – lovely family, great job and the rudest of health, but always, in the back of my mind, there had been a sense that somehow, some day, this presumptuous little working-class lass from Barnsley would be caught out. Life had no right to be this good. I can’t say I was surprised when all hell appeared to break loose at once. Both David and I were permanently overwhelmed and exhausted, falling into bed at night with barely a word exchanged between us and waking the next morning, dreading whatever new trial fate might dish out.
Slowly, but surely, the pressures eased. The grief was less acute as the months passed by. The children did well in their exams and were all but up and off to university, work and travel. The chemotherapy ended, my hair grew back thicker and bouncier than ever and the brilliant doctors who treated me declared my prognosis good. I felt well, and some of the old energy reasserted itself. The empty nest was not the disastrous cavern I had feared.
I began to get used to (and secretly rather enjoy) it, when that Titanic pile of shoes cluttering up the hallway came to an end; when the strains of drum and bass no longer emanated from the bedrooms; when there wasn’t the constant need to be shrieking ‘Turn that music down, will you’; and we could finally choose not to cook tonight’s meal if we didn’t really feel like it. But we were in no way fulfilling the promise we made to each other to take advantage of our lack of responsibilities and get out more – maybe even embark on some travel ourselves. We were becoming middle aged and more than a little staid.
Perhaps it was a necessary period of regrouping after the chaos of the hectic years that we had now tried to put behind us. There is a point in middle age when you realise you are not invincible. You’ve watched your parents deteriorate and are only too well aware that you will be next. Some days we sat opposite each other at the kitchen table and wondered whether, without the children and their future to discuss every day, we would ever again find anything to say to each other that wasn’t depressing. What, we wondered, could replace the youth and energy they had brought to our lives? Of course, we were still occupied by phone calls, emails and the occasional visit, the requests for help and advice and sporadic donations from the bank of Mum and Dad, but it became increasingly apparent that an injection of something we were at a loss to define was necessary to re-invigorate us.
My thoughts, inevitably, turned towards canine companionship. Quite what put the idea of a Chihuahua into my head I’m not sure, as I’ve found myself strongly disapproving of the Chi celebrity culture that seems to have gripped Hollywood. I doubt there’s ever been a dog that’s enjoyed so much publicity since Lassie popularised the collie in Lassie Come Home.
The Taco Bell talking Chihuahua took America by storm, advertising Mexican Fast Food. Reese Witherspoon carried Bruiser – dressed in pink – in her designer handbags in Legally Blonde. In 2008 Beverley Hills Chihuahua was a hot success at the box office. Paris Hilton was rarely seen without Tinker-bell or Bambi. Madonna had Chiquita, Britney Spears sported Lucky and the movie hard man, Mickey Rourke, is said to own seven of the breed.
It’s Rourke with whom I feel most sympathy. A reporter from the London Times described arriving at his small house in New York to be greeted by ‘seven dogs, yipping, yapping and woofing and gleefully tripping over each other’. Rourke talks of the company his animals provide in what seems to have been a lonely and difficult life and his sense of responsibility even towards Jaws – a mean-spirited dog he took home from a rescue centre after it bit him on the lip. It had, he said, been ill treated by its previous owner. And he was clearly broken-hearted when his first dog, Loki, died at the age of 18 just before he was due to appear at the Oscar ceremony after his nomination as best actor.
Rourke says he chooses such small dogs because they tend to live longer and he becomes very attached. There is nothing of the designer doggie in its Gucci bag about him that’s become such a feature of the Paris Hilton school of ownership that’s had such a profound influence on the popularity of the breed.
The purchase of Chihuahuas in recent years has rocketed, despite the ever-escalating cost. You can expect to pay anything from £500 to £2,500, depending on the quality of the animal’s pedigree – the average price seems to be around £1,000. But the British Chihuahua Club’s Rescue Association reports more small dogs in need of rehoming than ever before. The internet small ads sites are full of notices for ‘my cute little Chihuahua … 1 year old … genuine reason for sale’. In other words – ‘Oops … this is a real dog. It’s not a toy. It makes messes in the house and I couldn’t be bothered to train it properly.’ Small dogs are notoriously difficult to housetrain in the early days without constant supervision.
Alternatively you can read into the advert, ‘Oops, it snapped at my two-year-old’ … Chihuahuas are too small themselves to withstand the sometimes casual cruelty of a small child. Or, of course, it could simply be ‘Oops, oh dear, he grew too big to fit in my handbag.’ Britney is reported to have got rid of Lucky after he snapped at her then partner, Kevin.
Strangely, the more I read about the ‘problem’ Chihuahua the more intrigued I became. How could such a little animal be so fêted on the one hand and so demonised on the other? An article in the Guardian newspaper’s G2 section headlined ‘LA’s Chihuahua problem? Blame it on Paris’ reported
