Leaving for school means leaving behind friends, family and familiarity, but perhaps the most heartbreaking thing I had to leave behind was my very best friend, the light of my life, my little schnoodle Tillie Bean.
Anyone who knows me knows how much I love my dog. Not only is she consistently the background on my phone, but there is also a framed photo of her resting just beside my bed in my dorm room. While I’ll admit that my attachment to my dog can be somewhat extreme at times, leaving her never gets any easier. She’s the one thing in this world that likes me the same, no matter what I do.
And while I know and repeatedly remind myself that she doesn’t have the same feelings I do and really doesn’t care as much as I think she does when I leave for school, I’ve compiled a list of some of the things I wish I could say to my puppy. Oh, and just to reassure anyone reading this article that I am in fact, sane, I asked my friends for some contributions along the way.
1. I don’t want to leave you, but I have to.
However irrational it might be, it would give me such peace of mind to be able to explain to my dog why I have to leave her for so long. I acknowledge this would mean we’d have to develop some type of language that actually allows us to communicate, thus opening many doors that we just don’t have the time to get into right now, but I wish I could tell her that I have every intention of returning home to her as often and as soon as possible. Yes, I know this will never happen, and yes I know it probably wouldn’t make any difference but it would make leaving oh so much easier.
2. Please never stop wagging your tail when I walk in the door.
There are few moments in which I experience as genuine and immediate of a rush of happiness as I do when I walk in the door to my house and see Tillie Bean adorably leap-running and sliding to the door with her little nub of a tail furiously moving back and forth. While my parents are always excited to see me, they don’t always feel compelled to run to the door to greet me.
3. Do you like me as much as I like you?
Okay, wait, maybe I take this one back. If the answer’s no, then I really don’t want to know that. But I do wonder sometimes because, realistically, there is no way I am as cute to her as she is to me. I do not have adorable puppy dog eyes or a brown mustache surrounding my snout that makes me look like some type of professor. I don’t play with her whenever she wants and I don’t always take her for walks when it’s negative degrees out.
4. Please sleep in my bed always.
I know you have the choice to sleep anywhere in the house because, if I’m being honest, you’re my master more than I am yours sometimes. So when you choose to sleep in my bed over the others, it automatically makes my life better. There’s nothing happier than waking up to you trying to get your eye goobers out of your eyes with your paws. It’s also nice to have company when I decide to sleep until 12:30 everyday over Winter Break. I mean, our parents can’t be mad if we both do it, right?
5. You’re the biggest diva I know.
As tiring as it gets trying to keep you from jumping on strangers and pawing for attention from them, I know that you’re just a diva living in a world of peasants. I’m nervous for you, though, because people who don’t know you don’t like that you scratch them until they pick you up so you can lick them. We look out for you now, but we won’t always be there to help you. Remember the little people, Tillie Bean, no matter how hard it might be.
6. I know if you had thumbs you’d take over the world.
Seriously, I know of very few organisms on this planet that can convince people to do things for them the way you can. You manage to get your way 98% of the time and I can only dream of the things you might be able to do if you were so gifted as to have opposable thumbs.
7. I know if you could talk, you'd give better advice than Oprah and Doctor Phil combined.
No matter how bad the day was, I can always count on you to make me feel better. You are the most therapeutic thing out there and I know that if you could talk, you could give me the best actual therapy. I just have this feeling that you get me and I need you to know how much I appreciate that.
Cheers to you, Tillie Bean.
