www.LifeWithBuck.com

      This is Stella. She appears here today not so I can write some saccharin  blog about her. Generally those stories about adorable Snuffy’s antics in the park nauseate even me, and I’m a die-hard dog person. If you’ve got stories about a big mongrel dog who leaves drool stains all over your pillow and whines when he hears the jingle of car keys, I’ll listen.

     And this is not an “Ode to a Dog” blog. Stella is very much alive.

     No, Stella appears here today by popular demand. Believe it or not, she has a fan base all her own, and for the life of me I can’t figure out why. She’s developed this following over the course of her life, which has been either 8 years or 11 years, we can’t remember which. Her age is the source of an ongoing debate in our family, one in which people try and peg her age according to what they remember watching on TV and whether or not Stella was present at the time. For instance, someone will say, “I distinctly remember watching The Ben Stiller Show and having Stella on my lap. Google the show and you’ll come up with Stella’s age.” But then someone else will dispute this by saying, “That’s impossible. You weren’t old enough to stay up for Ben Stiller, so your memories are false.”  And the debate rages on.

     How ever old Stella is, she is apparently unforgettable. Behind the scenes of this blog, there have been phone calls asking as to her whereabouts, emails demanding her face be shown, and accusations that I have purposely left her out of the blog because I dislike her.  I DO NOT DISLIKE HER. The fact that she treats me like a sorority pledge has nothing to do with why she hasn’t been mentioned in my blog. I will allow, however, that her disdain for me may possibly have somehow been in my subconscious while I’ve been writing. But by devoting this blog to her I feel that I’ve more than redeemed myself should that have unconsciously been the case.

     Stella is a member of the Old Garde, which is to say she arrived at the tail end (pun unintended) of June’s Reign (1993-2001?). June was our Basset-Labrador mix, and she ruled over our German Shepherd Jimmy, and our Basset Hound Audrey, and then Stella to a much lesser degree . Because as dogs go, June was a bossy matriarch who suffered endlessly for being born more human than dog. June’s frustration over being born with this cruel affliction manifested itself in the form of  micro-managing and criticizing. For this reason, I always introduced her to visitors as “my Nana.”

     Stella being dog number four (We had an enormous, fenced-in, shady backyard to which they had total access at all times, including my LL Bean hammock to relax in, and a big back porch to crawl under, so please don’t go getting any ideas this dog pack was cooped up in an apartment.) and a freakishly small  puppy even by Chihuahua standards, one would naturally assume she’d be low girl on the dog hierarchy. Not so. She’s never been low girl in her life. June’s response to Stella’s bid for top dog status was to ignore her.

     If you know me, you know I have hundreds of pounds of photographs that I have taken over the years and it has come to my attention that Stella is in an inordinate number of them. The number of photos I have in relation to how ever old Stella might be, is completely out of whack. 

     And that’s because everyone wants their picture taken with Stella. She is like Kate Moss. And while Stella and I are in many photos together, it is not for the same reason as her fans. I am not one of Stella’s fawning sycophants, and I admit that I use her as a prop. There is a photo of Stella and I that Buck took 18-months ago when we moved into this house. It is Clint Eastwood-esque, and a rather flattering shot of me, which in itself is rare, as I generally do not photograph well. I have been accused of exploiting this photo over and over again hundreds of times for everything from my AIM avatar to the contributing writers’ profile in international magazines, to my business card and personal stationary; all for the sake of vanity and not giving a damn about how Stella looks in the photo. And you know what? It’s true. Here, I’m running it again and anyone who doesn’t like it can just SUCK IT.  Because I will keep running this photograph until the day I die, and even then I will run it because it will be my obituary photo. Then it will be my In Memoriam photo, and so on.

     I have nine million photos of Buck with Stella. Something readers could not know is that whenever I take Buck’s photo for this blog, which is almost daily, he only agrees to it if the first shot includes Stella. So I go along with this and allow Stella to be included in the shot. And here is where it gets sticky, because it is without intention that I have never used a single photo of Buck that included Stella. This past Sunday for instance, I had fully intended on using a photo taken with Stella. I resized it, loaded it onto Flickr, and then promptly forgot about it.

    It was not deliberate, and I have no excuse as to why I didn’t remember to use it. It just totally disappeared from my mind. But as a result, Stella’s fans (other than Buck) have begun to grumble. “Where is Stella?” they want to know. “WHERE IS STELLA?” Stella, Stella, Stella, Stella, STELLA.

     Well, Stella Freaks, here’s a whole blog about her. And to show there’s no hard feelings, here’s some Stella Trivia you might be interested in. 

13 THINGS YOU MAY NOT KNOW ABOUT STELLA

     1. Her middle name is Marie

     2. When I initially brought her home at five weeks old, Buck wouldn’t speak to me for two days. He denies this now.

     3. If Stella and I were both drowning, he would save Stella, then come back for me only if there was time after he’d secured Stella safely on shore.

     4.  She is always on the wrong side of the door.

     5. To get her to eat every night, Buck has to cook chicken for her and then pretend to fight her for it. Snarling, growling, the works. Otherwise, she would never eat anything.

     6. She speaks something that sounds eerily like dolphin. When she’s doing this, we call her “Dolphina.” And she answers to it.

     7. She’s made at least three round-trips cross county,  sitting on Buck’s lap with her head out the window the entire time he’s driving.

    8. She’s afraid of nothing. 

    9. We’re afraid she’ll get picked up by any of the hawks who circle overhead, so we never leave her outdoors unattended.

   10. She hates the sound of a doorbell, even on TV. The Dominoes Pizza ad drives her insane.

   11. One time when I leaned over to kiss Buck, she jumped up and bit me in the face. She’s like that rabbit in Monty Python and the Holy Grail. [@ Buck - If you so much as consider editing this out or screwing with it in any way, shape, or form, I will put Stella on the roof and hide the ladder where you'll never find it. Do you think I'm kidding? Just try it. I will leave her with a bowl of water, though. ONE bowl.]

   12. Stella has a sexual appetite that Sydney, our Poodle-Bijon mix, finds intriguing. I find it infuriating and repulsive and wonder when the hell is she ever going to stop going into heat?  I call her a little slut. Buck calls her a party girl.

    13. Stella has been the source of many arguments between Buck and I but the worst was when he accidentally figured out what I was really saying every time I left the house and bid farewell to her by shouting, “Bye, C U Next Tuesday.”

     But I love Stella, I really do. It’s she who does not like me. I knit her several sweaters every winter, complete with beads and sashes onto which I’ve written in calligraphy: Look At Me, I’M STELLA-FUCKING-MARIE.

     And I sleep with her glued to my side every night, even though it makes me uncomfortable and I haven’t had a decent night’s sleep in 8 or 11 years. I can’t even make up for the lost sleep during nap time, because as soon as she hears the click of my electric afghan, she comes running from as far away as a quarter-mile just to leap on top of me and position herself directly over the heat cord. But do I complain? NO. Who would I complain to? Certainly not Buck, who won’t hear a negative word spoken about Stella.

    I used to complain to my mother about Stella, but my mother loved her more than me. When I called my mother and told her how I’m the only person Stella has ever bitten and that she bit me in the face, my mother laughed and laughed at this “anecdote” and said, “Stella is such a little rascal. Put her on the phone . . . “

     That is a true story.

     Another time I tried to complain to my brother about Stella. I was in the throws of a soliloquy about how she now refuses to stand up and walk if her nails are even the slightest bit longer than they were the day before, and how I have to use her special “cat scissors” and sing Thank Heaven For Little Girls in a very soothing voice while I clip them. My brother interrupted me and in a very annoyed tone said, ”Awww, what’s wrong with you, Wendy, that you can’t take care of one nice little dog?”

     Only my sister has ever provided me with a sympathetic ear about Stella. My sister knows the score. When my sister (now known as GardenGirl50) invited my mother to live with her, my mother brought Sherman, STELLA’S BROTHER. Though Sherman and Stella have the same parents, Sherman was born a few years earlier than Stella. But family is family, and my sister is all too familiar with the charms of that particular Chihuahua lineage. If I ever thought Stella was quirky, Sherman was a hundred times worse. Sherman would only eat his meals while under a blanket on my mother’s bed during the 7PM  showing of Seinfeld. There was something about the cast of Seinfeld chattering in the background while being cajoled to eat a plate of Chicken of the Sea tuna hidden under a comforter that smelled like Downy Fabric Softener that would spark his appetite. Yes, Chicken of the Sea and only Chicken of the Sea. And he had the breath to prove it.

     But every time my sister tried to complain about Sherman to anyone, her words fell on deaf ears. Including mine, I’m sorry to say. I had my own problems over here with Stella, I couldn’t offer any concrete solutions to the problems she faced with Sherman. “Listen,” I told her, “I got my own fucking problems. Right now Stella has me dancing the watusi on one leg while singing the Alpha Kappa Gamma anthem in Greek. All for Buck’s entertainment, mind you. I feel like Hell Week is never gonna end . . .“

     So yeah, my sister provided me with a shoulder to cry on and I gave her nothing in return. I have no excuse except that Stella does, at times, make me crazy enough that I can’t be held responsible for my actions.

    And there’s nothing I can do about it. Buck loves Stella, pure and simple. I’ve tried to figure out what it is he loves about her. I’ve asked him what he loves, and his answer is always, “Everything. I love everything about her. Don’t try and understand what me and Stella have. She’s my girl, and she always will be. So fuck off.”

     That’s how it is with Stella. She’s the popular girl and I’m the wanna-be. She’s led a charmed life, pop stars should have so many fans. If I had as many readers as Stella has fans, I’d die a happy woman. With an airtight will that stipulates my obit must run with that photo of me and Stella.

Technorati Tags: humor, Buck, Life With Buck, Chihuahuas, German Shepherds, Basset Hounds, motorcycles, miniature motorcycles, Indian replica, quirky dogs, dog photos