The Most Painful, Yet Cathartic, Car Ride of my Life

Mumsy and I, thankfully, have an incredible relationship. I think she's always known I was a bit outside the box in the way that I did things and thought about things, and being the last of 4 I had plenty of time getting dragged around to the other kids activities to spend by myself and lean into that.

I feel that's why she wasn't shocked when I started doing what I did in the rental house my sister was the landlady for. You see, Mumsy would travel to England for 4 weeks a year to spend time with her mum and brother. In these 4 weeks, you would think a normal 20 something year old would take advantage of the empty house and have weekly parties and trash the place.

I did half of those things. The second half.

The first year Mumsy went away, I ripped down a wall and made it a bench. I felt the kitchen with a full height wall was just too closed in, so I took it upon myself to fix that. Ripped down half the wall down to the sink splashback, moved all the electrical wiring and redid the switching (I'm a sparky, chill out) and made a timber benchtop...well my brother did (he's a chippy, chill out) to plonk on top. Not going to lie, looked fucking awesome, and the house was better for it.

Then the second year rolled around and I upped my game. I redid the lighting throughout the entire house to LED downlights, I installed heating vents to the master ensuite and bathroom, an exhaust fan to the toilet, sensors to the front door and garage and a floodlight for the backyard.

Oh yeah, then I went and got a $75 greyhound from GAP. That's where this story really starts, I just wanted to toot my own horn for when Mumsy reads this.

Considering how much alcohol I've consumed, and how much weed I've smoked (I feel like this might be Mumsy and the Fat Man discovering that little titbit - apologies) it's either a minor miracle, or shows the effect he had on me that I remember the exchange like it was yesterday.

GAP would advertise cat friendly greyhounds, and they would be gone before I could get a look in. Not Compton. In hindsight, maybe a red flag, but fuck it. I sent off asking about him, and I was in the roof space of the men’s room toilet in the Sports Bar section of the Royal Hotel in Koo Wee Rup while I was doing the renovations there when the reply came through. Come on down on Saturday and meet him, and if all goes right, you can take him home that day.

The greyhound ownership went from nothing to everything just like that.

On the Saturday Milena and I tracked about 90 minutes away to go and meet this dog. Walked in, quite busy, introduction formalities, and they walked up to him.

I shit you not, he was in the absolute back corner, couldn't get further away if he was mates with Elon on a Mars trip, cage. Probably a red flag in hindsight, but fuck it.

Now they're pretty fast and loose up there when it's busy. I'd love to tell you that the first meeting was some shared heavy realisation that there was a possibility we were about to be in each other's lives for days and years to come, but instead when they introduced us, and I crouched down and got eye level with him to say hello, she basically told me to stand up because they don't like that. She then tossed us the lead, and said take him for a walk around the lake and see how you go.

This dog made it 20 metres, if that. Stopped dead in his tracks, wouldn't walk, wouldn't move an inch forward (red flag...) and we both somehow came to the immediate conclusion of "absolutely we're taking him home today" (...fuck it)

Love in our hearts and a skip in our step, we then realised that Compton did not know how to climb stairs in the office. So, with a pen in her hand, Milena signed the paperwork while I wandered around out the front, and then off we skipped to head home for the rest of our lives, when we realised Comp didn't really know how to, or like getting into a car...so after a shove up the arse, we were homeward!

I won't bore the mundane details of new dog partnership; everyone knows the giddiness it entails when they've lived it. The first trip to the pet shop to buy beds and toys and foods and treats for your new goodest boys and girls. The first few nights of teething pains learning cues (mainly toilet) of your new best mate and working out how they operate, with them doing the same to you - although greyhounds are a touch different. Give them a couch and they couldn't give a shit about until they do.

You cherish those mundane details of extravagance beyond measure, but what stops you in your tracks is once the shine wears off, and what comes after that.

Being a fresh A Grade at the time, in a business I was helping to grow into what it is today, I was a work fiend. I didn't really have any responsibilities outside of that. No kids, just a girlfriend and living at home, so Mumsy could let Comp out if needed. Early mornings, late evenings, and the thing that you truly are never prepared for is when you walk in the door. Every day it's like he was seeing me for the first time in a lifetime. Every day sprinting down the hallway to greet me, sniffing every smell, loving every pat. The unbridled joy that I used to feel made the day seem redundant. I forgot what I had done, because the love coming at me was overwhelming in the greatest way possible.

Now, with that excitement did have some issues. Large dog - long tail - narrow hallways. The landlady still lets me know about that.

Then there were the daytime toilet indiscretions, and unfortunately Mumsy would always arrive home before me. We came to a fair agreement for that however, he was to stay in the garage (where he had a bed and blanket) with the rear roller door up for toilet time. Then we would just hope that he wouldn't run away when the garage went up in the afternoon to park the cars. He never did, and the plan worked perfectly...until he decided he liked the taste of plaster and began gnawing at the wall. Fuck me the landlady has never let me forget about that.

There was the moment that the aforementioned tail length got the better of him. After getting it stuck in the oven door handle, and me having to rip it out when he was squealing and trying to run off, he actually took the tip of the tail off. You know what's not easy? Trying to chase a dog and them think you're not trying to play. Onto my bed he hopped ready to throw down! Tail wagging faster than the speed barrier could handle! All with blood pouring from the wound. Blood. Was. Everywhere. Now, Mumsy and I kept it pretty level headed. We saw and understood the mess but knew that could wait. We loaded him in the car to get him to the vet to get fixed up. What I failed to remember was that my girlfriend was coming round that night. I don't think I've ever had so many calls and messages in short succession in my life. And considering the murder scene looking room, me not answering the first couple wasn't a great look. Not to worry though, lobbed off some tail, still had plenty to spare, and the blood stains were removed. Don't tell the landlady that one - all's well that ends well right.

Now Comp and I weren't inseparable. I was still middle 20s, and he was not a going out and about dog. That 20M lake walk? Yeah, that distance didn't grow for a very long time. But what I did know was Comp was mine, and I was Comp's. This didn't apply to everyone. Compton liked approximately 4 people. Me, Milena, my mum and Milena's mum. Everyone else, he would ignore. Unfortunately, this meant that I did have a blanket policy of "hey, don't walk up and pat him, especially if he's lying down". Now, unfortunately, a few of my mates decided to test that theory, and came out worse for wear. They'd come to me looking for sympathy, and I'd simply be the old man tapping the sign telling you exactly what not to do after you've dang gondunnit. Compton was a sweet dog, but as so many greyhounds are, he was mistreated for so long (he was 2 when we got him), that some scars were never going to heal for him. The worst of these situations was unfortunately the first time we found out about this trait of his. Milena bent over to kiss him goodbye as he was asleep, he startled, jumped, and bit her to the side of the chin. It was earth shattering. Obviously my first instinct was to tend to Milena, and get her sorted. We got her cleaned up, and Mumsy chucked her in the car to go to the hospital. Obviously, dogs can't talk to you, but I knew Compton was actually distraught about what he'd done. It was a lifetime of pain for him taken out on one of the humans he cared most about. I was sick to the stomach with possibilities of what we were going to have to do with him, but that had to wait. I had Milena to go and care for.

A few stitches and antibiotics later, and a new found penicillin allergy diagnosis, and Milena was all mended. She was amazing about the whole situation. The rift between them couldn't be denied, but neither could the connection they had formed beforehand. Time heals all wounds, and thankfully on this occasion, it was the wound on her face, and the one in her heart…wowee, what a line. Could write for a daytime soap.

Comp was there for everything. He was there when I started leaving at 4:30 in the morning and getting home at 8 at night so I could work on our house we were building. He was there for every drunken night stumbling in at whatever time. He was there reminding me every day that it was 6 o’clock and it was dinner time – he was like the Play School Rocket Clock knowing when it hit 6 o’clock. He was by my side when Mumsy and I had our first proper spat, and spent the last 2-3 months living together in honest toxicity that was a making of both of our doings, to the point where I moved out one Sunday when she wasn’t home. I think every family has those moments, and I’m thankful Mumsy and I buried the hatchet after spending time apart and realising we did enjoy each other’s company. There he was in our new house with no grass in the backyard during winter, so I was taking him out to the nature strip before bed in the freezing cold for him to piss and shit, which he never fucking did in a hurry. He was there when I went into an adoption place to simply enquire about a dog, and left with a new cat, who is staring at me while I type this.

And then Comp was there when we got George. Good lord George. George has a heart as big as his guts, and seeing how he has half lab, those guts aren’t small. George loves love. He was a rejected farm dog, which I understand because he’s currently sprawled on the couch on a blanket under a heating vent. He wasn’t built for the farm. Unfortunately for him, his love wasn’t built for Comp. Well not immediately anyway. First night, all I wanted to do was make sure George was ok. Being a curious dog, he started sniffing a touch too close to Comp. A swift nip on the nose later, George was bleeding, as well as sneezing…blood…onto my new house walls, but what George learnt then was that he was Robin, and Comp was Batman, and that was the law of the house.

For as nervous as I was about having my first child with Compton around, even though I’d never tell anyone or let it show, I feel it goes to show the heart that Compton did have. We never had so much as the slightest issue with him and the kid. He would always come up and say hello, and off he’d go. If he was on the floor and saw the baby coming for him, he would take it upon himself to remove himself from the situation and go somewhere the baby wouldn’t be able to get him. We also thought of it as a fantastic life lesson for Iggy as he grew. Let sleeping dogs lie. I really feel like not enough kids are taught how to respect all dogs, and that not all dogs are friendly. In a weird way, Compton actually helped us teach Igg one of his first core life lessons.

He even started coming on family walks with George, when we would go to the wetlands and I could let him off lead and watch him cook. Possibly my fondest memory of Comp is watching him run. When a greyhound opens up and starts going in a field, not contained in a racing arena, it’s genuinely one of the most beautiful things to witness. The speed and precision of their movements all makes sense for the way that they are built. Seeing it, it almost makes you understand them more.

Another pregnancy on the wish list, and the realisation that where we were was changing in a landscape that we didn’t like, paired with wanting something more, we embarked on the next chapter of the journey and sold up our first house, and moved into a temporary home whilst settling on our now built forever home on our acre of beauty in Bunyip. In the new house we had plenty of walking tracks, and Comp was now a fully fledged family dog. We couldn’t leave the house for a walk without him. It showed the growth that he has made. Unfortunately, and this is possibly the absolute worst, most horrible segue that I’ve ever made, at the time, it wasn’t the only growth he had made.

Having Iggy in the bath one night, Comp was in the bathroom with me, and while I was patting him like I would always do, there it was. A lump on the end of his ribcage. Not going to lie, I spiralled immediately. I was trying to tell myself that had always been there, and that maybe it was just a fatty growth, but I knew. I told Milena and she tried to re-assure, but I think she knew as well.

Vets, tests, all of them. I didn’t give a shit what it cost. I just wanted an answer, until I didn’t. Much like the roof space of the Koo Wee pub, I remember it. A call as I was about to start slashing the long grass up the spoon drain on the block.

It was the principal vet, and he didn’t sugar coat it. Cancer. I don’t recall exactly what it was, but I remember looking it up and seeing it was most common in girl dogs (Compton was very much a penis wearing citizen) and small dogs (Compton was very much a “would probably kill an old lady if he barrelled into her” size dog). He explained everything to me while I was in a haze, and said he wanted to take a few more tests to see what they were dealing with. I was numb, so I just kept slashing until it was dark.

The further tests revealed it was a fairly aggressive cancer, and at his age, surgery and treatment wouldn’t be worth it. I couldn’t agree more. For everything he went through in the first 2 years of his life, there was no chance I was subjecting him to that for the last however long he had left. So, we went about enjoying every moment we had with him. He lasted another 9 months from memory, to make it to his 10th birthday, and to see the birth of our second.

Then came the night. I had noticed he was a bit off from when I got home from work, but mostly brushed it off. As the night went on however, the realisation dawned. He couldn’t get comfortable at all. Which for a greyhound is almost unheard of. As he started pacing, he picked up a limp, and worst of all, he came over to me and looked me in the face, and I knew that what I had to do was the thing I never hoped I would have to. We made the call, and Milena’s parents came round to watch the kids, and we had to go and do the thing.

This is the car ride. I was crying the whole way to the emergency vet. And it wasn’t even because of what we were about to do, it was because of what was happening. The pain had taken over. He couldn’t stand, but he couldn’t sit. He was panting and howling as he went around in circles in the boot of our Rav. The whole way there we were begging him to just try and sit down and stay down, but he couldn’t. After what felt like a lifetime, we arrived. I carried him in, and they administered him some sedatives to help with the pain. Eventually we were ushered into a fucking broom cupboard almost, as the 2 rooms were occupied. There, we watched 8 years of the life Milena and I have built together go to sleep for the last time. It hurt, but not as much as I thought it would. That’s the catharsis. Even though it hurt, we knew we were doing the right thing, and anything other than that would have been crueller to the first family member we had.

Those vets don’t miss, and after paying a $450 tab, and lying about his weight for a cheaper cremation, we went for the quietest car ride I’ve ever taken. By the time we got home, we learnt that Angus, a new born at the time, had shit on Milena’s dad. That softened the blow for a bit.

But that’s the thing about losing a pet, and it’s something I tell people when they do. It fucking sucks, and it fucking sucks for a really long time. Getting home and not having that excitement to meet you (sorry George), not waking up to the dog that literally slept in a bed next to mine for 8 years, not having the annoying 3AM wake ups to go and wee. You miss it all and it all fucking sucks. But over time it gets easier. Eventually something in your mind shifts to thinking of the good and dumb times, rather than wallowing in the sad.

To this day I still think about Compton most days. I wish he had the chance to cut loop after loop around this acre. But as always, you have to appreciate the time you got, not wish for the time you didn’t get.

An ode to Compton – the goodest boy.