The sun has finally returned, and so has my energy. Seriously: it’s been about one degree and rainy every single day since I’ve returned to Paris. Sure, it was summery back in March. But in July? We’ve been huddled under a down comforter every night.
Anyway. Today was nice. Jolie and I celebrated by taking two long walks instead of our usual one, and when Nick came home he decided that we should take a third. Even the fact that Jolie vomited–twice–after guzzling the water that the nice liquor store owner ran to get for her couldn’t put a damper on the day.
What might (at least in theory) is that we don’t seem to know how to pronounce our own dog’s name. We’ve been saying “Zhoe-lee”–like Angelina. And when people look baffled, we hit the first syllable harder: “ZHOE. Lee.” And then they still walk away thinking that her name is Julie.
The problem is, of course, that Angelina Jolie’s American fans are not French. And “jolie”-the-adjective is actually pronounced more like “zhaw-lee.” And now it’s really difficult to make the transition.
We thought at first that people just didn’t like her name, and so were in denial. At least our gardienne‘s sister loved it: “I hate when people give dogs people’s names,” she huffed. “I like when they call them Rex, or Max, or whatever.”
I didn’t have the heart to tell her.
“What do they call dogs in America?” she asked concernedly. And how the hell does a person answer a question like that?
Given my limited vocabulary, I decided to go for the safe answer. “Mostly people’s names,” I told her, shaking my head sadly. But I swear, Aunt Priscilla: if I hadn’t been caught unawares, I would have told her all about Schmoo instead, and I have no doubt that she would have approved.
In the meantime, whatever-her-name-is has gotten really aggressive about her guard-doggy-ness. It’s kind of cute when she growls warningly at the DVD tray, but the hysterical barking through the door at the gardienne‘s sister when she delivers our mail is getting kind of old, especially since I’m generally thisclose to a blissful nap at that exact moment.
And tonight, after we finally got her settled down next to us at the restaurant (around the middle of dessert), she went all Cujo on the waiter when he moved the menu blackboard from our table to where the latest arrivals could see it. She even lost it again when he came back to give us the check: she didn’t know what exactly the guy had stolen from us, but she was quite sure that it was up to her to make him pay.
I even noticed her sitting in the doorway of the bathroom while I showered this morning. My mom told me a while back that that is something that dogs do: when they sit at a threshold, they are watching out for you. She also mentioned that the dogs who do a lot of that have shorter lifespans: the stress of always taking care of their pack puts that much of a strain on them.
I was thinking of that when I peeked out from behind the shower curtain and saw my puppy’s back. I wouldn’t've been surprised to see her front: she usually takes full advantage of any opportunity to steal our clothes and lick them into submission. But there she was, staring out into the rest of the apartment…and she was still there after I shampooed, and while I was rinsing the conditioner from my hair, and the thing is that I started worrying about her.
Was her blood pressure high? How tense does a puppy have to be in order to be vigilant–say, in a place where they tend to feel really comfortable to start with? Is she losing days from her life, or is it more like minutes? And how many hours are being shaved off of my life just as a result of my worrying about her stress level?
When I finally stepped out of the shower, she was gone. I casually strolled through the apartment, shortly discovering her stretched out in a tiny patch of sun in the bedroom.
I confess to mixed feelings about that.