Punk

“But Vito is only nine. And dumb-witted. The child cannot harm you.”

- Signora Andolini

The Godfather II           

            In four hours puppy class will be in session, and my stomach hurts.

             Because of Vito’s ridiculous behavior when we’re there, I now realize the two are related.

             I asked Brian to call the teacher and lie to her that Vito and I will be absent because I’m in the hospital with abdomen pains. I asked him to say that while the doctors aren’t sure what I have, they know I’ll be hospitalized past the remaining class dates.

            But Brian is one of those annoying ethical types. He said he wasn’t going to lie. He said I should talk to the teacher and tell her my concerns. I told him to get me a baseball bat so I could slam it into my appendix, bust the sucker, and give myself peritonitis.

            “Then you can call with a clear conscious,” I said in a huff.

            It’s not like the teachers are mean. They encourage. “Don’t judge your puppy against the others,” they say. “All puppies are unique and progress at their own rate,” they reassure.

            But I have eyes. I can see Vito – with his playful disobedience – is the class bad boy. Vito is quite nice at home, but when he gets around his peers, he becomes a punk.

            Even Mia, his Golden Retriever girlfriend and classmate, finds him annoying. Two weeks ago, he went too far with her. He had recently lost some puppy teeth, and his gums were raw. He jumped on her and his mouth bled all over her beautiful auburn coat. The instructors removed Mia from class and gave her a scrub down. Since then, Mia will barely look at him.

            At the beginning of class last week, we practiced “heel.” The first couple of times Vito walked next to me like a champ. But by Round 3, he got bored and acted up. While all the other dogs trotted next to their owners like they were conjoined twins, Vito either hung behind and nipped me in the butt or pulled ahead and yanked my arm.

            We had only been in class five minutes, and he gathered negative attention like a wolf at a gingerbread man convention. 

            The teacher pulled us aside.

            “In this class we don’t train your dog,” she said. “We train you to train your dog.” Basically, she said I was a wimp, and that Vito made himself the leader of our pack.

            After our talk with the teacher, Vito got worse. Even though he’s housebroken and had gone outside right before class, he urinated twice on the classroom floor during the session. He slipped out of his collar, which was attached to his leash, and he ran haywire around the room, which incited a near riot among the other animals.

            While this happened, I put in a 9-1-1 call to the Dog Whisperer. He didn’t pick up. No matter. I doubt even he could have gotten control of the situation.

            After we corralled Vito back into his collar, he barked incessantly. I couldn’t even hear what the teacher tried to say to me.

             We made absolutely no progress; in fact, we have probably gotten farther behind because now it seems that Vito thinks he is pack leader of the class.

            I have some advice for our teacher: get a fake illness and call in sick next week.