Confessions of Stan the Dog

This morning Grandma's cousin brother came over. He is the head of the local police unit. He was looking sort of serious and sort of amused. He and Grandma sat down with some tea. From what I could hear apparently that guy from the internet limped home in big drama and his mom thought he was dying and must be rushed to ICU. She was on the phone to the police asking that Grandma be arrested for murder (her son's death being imminent) and what are they going to do about it? According to Grandma's cousin brother, when he went over there to check out the situation, the fellow had one small bruise on his face and the dog bites had not punctured the skin (mental note: bite harder). According to cousin brother it was procedure that Grandma come down to the police station but she was assured that all this would be smoothed over in the family. Even now the rickshaw wallahs were all pointing this guy out as having being beaten up by an old lady.....the sooner this all went away for him the better. Before Grandma left, she went over to the dentist's wife room and tapped. She heard a surly “What?” from the room and proceeded to tell her to make some biryani in the rice cooker and take it over to the dentist for his lunch. Surely she could handle that? Grandma said she would be gone some time and couldn't make lunch but everything was there in the kitchen. Grandma left with cousin brother. I laid down in the hall, bored.


Pretty soon the dentist's wife came out. Now I don't call her Mom as 1. she hates dogs 2. Grandma doesn't consider her family (Grandma told her sister that it was the injustice of the universe that she couldn't take her back as a return to the bride store as she was so useless). She went into the kitchen and I heard her mumbling to herself. She called Grandma Old Bitch! And she said No One Tells Me What to Do! Now after it came out that she was having an affair, she has been working from home and rarely leaves her room. I can hear her in there on the computer all day, all that tapping is enough to drive a dog nuts. Grandma says she should change jobs as the internet got her in the mess she is in but I doubt she cares what Grandma says. Anyway, she is banging around in the kitchen and gets out the pressure cooker (Grandma's favorite pressure cooker!) and not the rice cooker. She started browning the chicken (I get all excited: chicken!!) and then throws a lot of other stuff in there and closes the lid. She is mumbling she is never going to get everything done today and goes back to her room and the computer. The pressure cooker is now making a lot of noise and the whistle is going and my ears hurt and I go hide under Grandma's bed. Pretty soon I smell burning and I come out and bark and bark and bark! She rushes out of her room and is yelling ****! ****! ****! And takes the cooker off the fire. Now Grandma has always said she is such a bad cook she could burn water....again the brilliance of Grandma has been reinforced. Anyway, the dentist's wife gets the pressure cooker open and billows of smoke come out. She looks in.....****! ****! ****! And in a moment of deluded brilliance she dumps all this black food in my dish. I am thinking am I actually supposed to eat this? Is she crazy? She is at the sink scrubbing like crazy trying to get the black out of Grandma's favorite cooker...she seems pretty frantic. When she sees I won't eat that biryani she hides it in the bottom of the trash. She looks at her watch and panics and calls the local hotel for a takeout and rushes out. Well, no lunch for me. I sigh. I go lay under Grandma's bed with all the junk she stores there (the maid is always grumbling about that). I am hungry. I am hoping that Grandma gets back before they find my dead emaciated body under the bed, my sunken eyes turned to the door as I gasp my last breath. Why aren't there laws about this in this country? Surely a dog of my caliber demands care and attention? Pretty soon I need to pee. Dentist's wife has forgotten about this also. I pace around and finally go out on the back terrace, under the wash, over by the drain, just like Grandma has trained me in emergencies, and I pee. I go back under the bed to contemplate my death. After about an hour the dentist's wife comes back and goes out on the back terrace to get some clean underwear and steps in my pee. She is cursing me: I hate dogs! Why do I have to live with that old bitch's dog! She goes to her room to wash off her foot and shower. While she is in the shower, Grandma gets back from the police station. She is in a good mood so I know all is well. I am so happy I am barking and jumping...I am so happy to see Grandma. She says the magic words: come on Stan lets get you some lunch. She gives me a fried egg and some Pedigree. When the dentist's wife comes out of her room Grandma asks her anything happen while I was gone? No Amma she says...it was quiet.

 

Stan wonders why men never get it: dental threads are always in married life!

 

Today Grandma announced: Stan, we are going out....I need a tuneup. This week has been a bear and a half! So she clips my lead and out we go around the corner to the hairdresser's. Grandma has been going to this lady for years. They have the mutual respect of equal combatants and old friends. A few years ago Grandma woke up and decided she was sliding into the past not the future and she was going do something about it. She had gone over to get new eyeglasses and the clerk, a new young guy, kept showing her frames that threw her into despair. One pair she avowed looked like ones that Gandhi's wife wore, another that Gandhi ji himself wore. She wanted some pretty new frames but apparently this kid could not envision her in them. That got her scared. Now Grandma and her sister had laughed about how getting older is a constant state of maintenance to keep from sliding even faster into the abyss, but this new development took out the humor.


Shortly after that, Grandma woke up one morning and decided that she was going to cut her hair. She thought her hair was hanging back there like some skinny old cow tail and she was damned if she was going to walk around sporting a skinny old cow tail. So she went to the hairdresser's without telling the family. The hairdresser was pretty surprised at this new hair cutting announcement and asked her how short she wanted it. Well, Grandma announced she did NOT want it like Kiran Bedi's! The hairdresser asked her did she think she would actually look like Kiran Bedi? (I saw a slight smirk from her well covered. Although the men in Grandma's family are quite handsome (like the dentist) the women are not so much.) Well, no I do not said Grandma. But what if some gunda sees me from the back real quick and really thinks I am Kiran Bedi and whacks me on the head? And besides, who is silly enough to think they are going to attack corruption in India? I don't want to look like a fool! So they balance the war between modernity and tradition and end up cutting Grandma's hair to just below the shoulders so she can tie it back. Now the hairdresser asks do you want to touch up the color also? At which point Grandma makes another announcement: she doesn't want that old Indian color that looks like shoe polish, she wants the French stuff! So she gets that also and goes home to shock the family (again).


Today Grandma and I go over for a touch up of the French stuff and for a facial. I am glad that Grandma is fighting that slide into the abyss. The hairdresser does that touch up and then Grandma and I get on the table for that facial. My job is to lay on Grandma's purse so she is free to enjoy her facial without the worry that someone will flick something when she least expects it. I can look very fierce you know. So during this facial the hairdresser starts talking about the latest news in the neighborhood. One might call this gossip but the hairdresser has information accuracy to the extent that some have wondered if she was in the CID. She mentions that a certain unnamed dentist was caught the other day by the husband of one of his clients and that he followed her to her work and there was a big showdown. Apparently he had been alerted from some mysterious sms he received on his cell as to the time and location of the latest assignation. It had apparently been sent by an anonymous person from the local internet cafe. Grandma snorted at this. Well, all in all, this had been a good trip to the beauty parlor. Grandma returned home to take on the newest battle on the home front. I had a good lunch and a nap out on the front terrace.