It feels like we’ve been tossing in the tempest, caught up in a life twister, for weeks. Nay, months!
Normally I run at 70% efficiency, sickness took me down to 40%. I regained some health points just in time for a long travel weekend (write up to come when my head is back on my shoulders), and oh, by the by, finish ALL THESE THINGS NOW.
It’s tax time so I have to review our return before signing off on the ma-hoo-sive payments to state and federal.
SoFi finally got off their collective posteriors and sent our application through underwriting after requesting additional documents in a dozen back and forth emails. (Hint, professionals ask for everything they need at one time. Clearly and in complete sentences, not half sentences and in ones and twos.) ((Second hint: professionals get the name of their own company right and don’t call it Sofee.))
Naturally, right before we left town, I had to URGENTLY sign and initial 78 pages of initial agreements. Guys, I started this process at the beginning of January and it’s been radio silence for 14 weeks. Now it’s life or death urgent. Of course!
Then I have to pay for an appraisal: $575. That same day I get an email: schedule it IMMEDIATELY. Bear in mind, we’re on the road. Then SoFi comes back asking for MORE documents and nags me for them when they’re not uploaded in 48 hours. Man, look.
While that’s going on, our estate planning paperwork came back almost completed and needs to be reviewed so I can schedule a signing. I refused to drag myself to a lawyer’s office when I was sick, there’s something about law firms that make me feel like I have to look like I’ve got my shit together. So, note to self, find time for reading another stack of serious business.
Meanwhile, PiC has been laboring mightily searching for cars. The last of the three prospectives were so close to the right fit, enough so that we thought he’d have to buy the dang thing right before we flew to Washington, but they were all half a state away. It was nearly a relief that the prepurchase inspection revealed about $3500 of repairs, ignoring the non-critical ones, so we couldn’t agree on price.
He and I had agreed that if it fell through, though there is a cost to our time, the cost of paying for a vehicle that only sort of fit our specifications was both too much frustration and money. We’d rather wait and get the closest possible fit.
With all these things weighing on our minds, and traveling to a fly-away Con with LB for the first time, the watchword has been: frantic.
Friday morning, of course the energy checks I’d been writing were cashed and my body could not pay up. So, tucked back into bed after a wearing morning ended with a sleeping LB nearby, I sent him off for a run while I answered some household and money emails. Rent’s in. Baggage problems. Taxes. Etcetera.
He sat down next to me, unreadable expression on his face.
I nudged. Go work out.
He sat.
Sighed.
Said, I hope you know you can ask me to take on some things. Even if it take me longer.
Confused.
He said, you make a lot of this (our lifestyle) possible.
It’s true, what he says. I do massive amounts of work managing our income, savings, spending decisions so we can have what we need and some of what we want. Planning for a possibly long future, planning for our family in case of the worst possible circumstances. None of it’s exactly FUN, in the sense of confetti bombs and popping balloons, but it’s a comfort to know that working my butt off isn’t squandered on someone who just wants what he wants and devil take the hindmost.
I guess what I’m saying is that a metric ton of weight on your shoulders doesn’t feel quite so heavy when you have a partner doing his share and reminding you that you’re not alone in your share either. And it makes an enormous difference that he wouldn’t for a split-second consider undermining the work I do for our family because he wants something that’s greater than our budget can currently bear, in the same way he wouldn’t take it for granted that he’s financially set because I manage our books.
It’s nice to have a quiet hour in the eye of the storm before it takes us up again.
:: Do you feel like your contributions are appreciated? Are your affairs are in order or on track to be in order?
Life, death, and taxes, my friends. But unlike the other two, taxes happen on schedule every year.
And this year, boy o boy am I not so ready.
Life doesn’t discriminate
Between the sinners and the saints
It takes and it takes and it takes
And we keep living anyway
– Wait For It, Hamilton
In 2014, I started using a CPA to put together the return itself. I still compile all our financial documents and a spreadsheet listing everything, including our itemized deductions, so really the CPA just has to plug the numbers in and advise me on the trickier parts like the investment property.
It feels absolutely silly in retrospect to feel guilty over hiring it out but it was hard to fight the feeling that as the Family CFO, I was abrogating my responsibility by doing so. Of course I could do it myself but I don’t have that kind of time to spare, and the headache was getting to be too much. See? Even now I feel like I have to justify the decision.
Never mind. This year, I’m extra grateful for making that decision because what we’re looking at would have been much worse at the butt-end of 20 hours of tax agony.
It’s a long story, and I can’t get into the specifics of it, but we have an on-paper only “income source” from a family thing, from which we don’t derive any true income. This year, there was a huge one-time income bump that we wouldn’t see but, of course, would impact our return. I knew we’d owe something. That part I was braced for.
The other part, the first draft of the return, staggered me. No, let’s be honest, it knocked me on my ass. Might have actually stopped breathing for a few solid minutes.
We would have had a modest tax refund this year from both state and federal. Instead, the bill totals up over $13,000. It’s not that we failed to pay quarterly taxes, this is truly a one-time thing, and it won’t be a problem going forward after this year. That’s cold comfort in a cold spring, but payment is due on April 18th this year, so, yay grace period?
We’ll have to use our long-term savings to pay that sucker, which sucks, but at least we can swing it. Meanwhile, let me sit down and put my head between my knees until the world stops spinning.
Have you filed? Are you likely to get a refund or a bill?
I wrote a response to Nicole and Maggie’s question: How do you balance the importance of your salary with the importance of your partner’s?
But the site wouldn’t accept my comment either because WP.com is weird or I went way off track and it’s judging me. Whatever the case may be…
I’ve been single longer than married and that heavily influences my answer, as much as peering into some key past experiences.
My salary, Version 1.0
Just after high school, I started a minimum wage job full time. My parents were skeptical, college was due to start in a few months, but trusted my judgment juggling work and school.
Sidebar: Lucky for them, and lucky for me, that I took that job. It kept us afloat for the next four years.
A friend of a coworker was in her mid-40s when she joined our staff. It was an entry-level, no experience required, training on the job situation. She had no work experience. In her late teens or early 20s, she married a man who made the money and wanted a good looker on his arm to bear him children. Her job was to make him look good by looking good, raise the kids, and have an acceptable hobby or two to keep herself entertained. Her job benefits were a roof over her head and food on the table (that she cooked, of course).
At some point, and before he replaced her with a younger model, she realized she wanted to actually live a life while she had any hope of one. Giving it all up, she went to work for the first time and sank like a stone. I was in charge of training her and it took months for her to learn all the things people have to learn about the workplace, many years later than they do. Eventually even she, who was hardest on herself, was proud of how good she’d gotten.
In truth, I don’t think it’s just one single decision, it just looks like it. Over those 20+ years, she would have make that decision more than once not to work. But the sum total is that she trusted him to take care of her, and didn’t consider the bargain a poor one, until it was quite late.
Kids were not an option back then but for sure I didn’t want to be a stay at home me. My temperament was not suited for childcare. Mom was more than ready for grandkids but my mind, body, and soul needed to hustle and earn. Besides, I had more than enough to take care of: Mom and her illness, Dad and his badly hidden depression, Trainwreck Sibling and his multitudinous mistakes in life.
By the time PiC came into the picture, I’d been on the grind for what felt like a lifetime. 80 hour work weeks, school, family, my plate was full, stacked atop another full plate, and precariously wedged between a thumb and a finger while the other hand walked the dogs. Fresh at a new job and out of school, “only” working full time now, my earning power was laughable. Rather than wanting to lean on him, my pride was pricked. Until I could match, and overmatch, his salary, I didn’t consider us on equal ground.
We had widely disparate backgrounds and it mattered.
I hated that I was the poor girl from the poor family that had never had money while he came from a real upper middle class family that was quite comfortable and had never gone without a meal. Months before we met, I was still living off my puny earned wages, eating one meal a day, and our economic class differences burned.
It didn’t matter to him, it never mattered to him, but it did to me.
He didn’t know it for years because it also felt like a shameful weakness. So I buried it, and I earned. And I earned. I negotiated and earned some more. There were many other good reasons to do that, and they were much more important, but looking through the view of the relationship glass? I needed to make my way in the world, I needed to blaze my way, to prove my worth to myself before I would allow anyone, any man, or any man’s parent, question my worth, ever again.
I’d dated boys whose rich and racist parents weren’t shy about telling me that I was less-than-worthy, “because the Chinese are far better than the [insert any other Asian race here]”, and damned if I was going to let that shake me again.
I’d had a crawful of being demeaned and it taught me a simple lesson: if they didn’t respect you when you had no money, that’s not respect now that you do have money. (But go get the money anyway.)
My salary, Version 3.0
I went after the money for a lot of reasons. Survival. Self respect. Confidence. Achievement. Pure buying power. Investing power. Security. Most of those reasons still apply now. It’s less fraught, though.
At this stage of our money journey, PiC’s and my salaries are both respectably high and nearly on par. Together, we can afford our lives here, we can save, and take care of family. On one salary, we would survive but things would be much less pleasant. One salary would have to outpace the other by at least 50% before we’d even consider relying solely on one salary. I’m not sure what we’d decide at that point.
Philosophically, I still value earning power as an expression of my worth more than not. It gives me a competitive edge in the workplace but, mostly, it should be left there. PiC values it as an expression of money in the bank and the ability to buy foods and things. That’s better than the other way around, I expect.
How about you? Do you associate your worth with your earning power? Would you feel comfortable relying on a partner if you had that option?
I hate the phone. I hate talking on the phone. I hate making calls. I hate waiting on hold, all of it. But darned if I won’t get over all of that in a right hurry to save myself $515.
Here’s what happened.
I had some fillings last December and the hygienist and receptionist encouraged me to get everything done in 2015 so everything would be covered by my annual deductible. I know, I know, the dentist in December, does anything scream poor planning! louder? When I have my act together, I visit the dentist in March and again in September for twice yearly cleanings and avoid all scheduling disasters to do with holidays, school being out, high season at work, all of it. 2015 was not the year of any part of my act being in the same vicinity as any other part of itself. Thus, I found my way to the dentist’s chair, garbling away, in December.
Post-filling comes the billing ordeal.
I’m not afraid of dental treatments but I sure do hate what comes after.
The secret I learned the hard way about dental insurance and billing waaay back in ought-2: Unless your insurance pre-approves all of your expected treatments, do not pay the estimated patient owes amount before your treatment is done.
Heck, don’t even pay it immediately after treatment if they haven’t already pre-billed the insurance or gotten pre-approval. They really want you to do. Every dental office here in California that’s taken our basic Delta Dental plan has patients sign a quote agreeing to pay anything the insurance doesn’t cover. If they can get you to pay the hundreds in advance, promising to reimburse you when the insurance comes back, then you’ve adhered to the letter of that agreement, but they will not adhere to the letter of theirs and you will be out of luck.
This is what I mean
Delta Dental (DD) has negotiated rates and set percentages that they’ll pay for every service. After a visit, Dental Office (DO) sends me a bill, and bills DD. The submitted claims are reviewed, DD determines both what they’ll pay and what I should pay, then mails me their statement.
My twice yearly exams are covered 100%. Patient pays column says $0.
My xrays are covered 100%. Patient pays column, again, says $0.
My filling on surface 30 was done in the last 2 years, so DD won’t pay them for that. Patient pays column says $0. DD’s notes say:
*You’ve already been paid once in the allowed 2 year timeframe for that, so we’re not paying again.
**DO may only bill what DD lists according to their pre-established agreement.
My fillings on surfaces 20, 22, 28 were approved and paid at 80%, leaving me with the other 20% to pay.
All told, DD said my bill was $95. Meanwhile, DO is over here sending me a bill asking for $610.
Now, according to my agreement with them, disregarding all else, I was responsible for $610 because DD didn’t cover it. However, because they accepted my insurance plan with the accompanying rate plan and rules, they are first subject to billing according to those rules. My plan specifically says they cannot charge me anything that DD doesn’t agree with, even if it’s something DD will not pay. If DD says they won’t pay it but I must, then DO may bill me.
Back when I was 20 years old and didn’t know about the DD to DO agreement, I thought I had to pay up in full so I did. My poor wallet. Much older, and a little wiser now, I know better.
Somewhat reluctantly, on the principle that this is the year 2016, should we not be able to handle all our bills online without having to talk to a person yet?? I called DO and asked to speak to someone about billing.
I politely suggested that we go over the discrepancies between the bill they sent and DD’s statement. Would you believe that before I could finish pointing out the problems, the office manager was striking out charges left and right? That’s right. She knew they were trying to get around their agreement with DD by billing me the full amount and was quick to rectify this, but only after being called out.
Line by line, we fixed all the “discrepancies”, and lo, my correct remaining balance was $95, NOT $610.
Protecting our cash: all part of a good day’s work.
Does your health or dental insurance work similarly or is this a quirk of California providers? Are your dentists reasonable and not scary? Do they recommend work too often? (PiC thinks my dentist always wants to be billing. He may be right.)
Late Note: This isn’t to demonize dental providers, mind you. The same one that got me to pay over hundreds that I shouldn’t have was also the one that cut their costs to only their own costs when they were aware that I had been laid off and was paying everything in cash. So they have their good and bad, in somewhat equal measure.
Although my instinct was to reject that truism, it may be true. We all care deeply about something in our lives. Sometimes we care about those things more than our own lives, sometimes they mean more to us than our principles.
Sherry and I were chatting about money as a tool for manipulation. Her extended family has ways they manipulate family members using money and so does mine. In most cases, I’ve gotten a very small dose of the Controlling Juice, but it’s bitter enough to inform my independent streak which has grown a league and a half wide.
My parents were a mix of traditional and non-traditional in their approach. They instilled in me a sense of responsibility using filial piety, but it was an example, not an expectation. “Big Cousin bought his mom a house because he loved her, wanted her to be comfortable, and because he could afford to. Not everyone can do that so it’s good that he’s been so responsible with his money that he could.”
Showing your love was important, but being sensible was much more important to them. They cherished the salt dough handprint made in kindergarten as a gift as much as anything I bought with my red envelope money. Thanks to those conversations, I knew everything they did for me was out of love, not as a down payment for retirement (and some parental obligation to keep me alive). And everything I did for them was out of love for them (and out of my self-imposed obligation to keep them off the street). Neither of us expected money from each other.
But the idea of bragging rights that Sherry described was absolutely part of the mainstream culture and there was talk in the community of how I was taking care of my parents. No one said a word to me directly, it simply became obvious when I hit 25, “marriageable age”, and suddenly people I’d never met before were coming over for tea and a visit.
It was all a ruse to introduce me to their sons. “This will be a good daughter in law,” they said, “she would take good care of us in our old age.” As if there was no more to me as a person and a potential spouse than my ability or willingness to support my family. But they’re an older generation, maybe there wasn’t anything more important to them.
Obligations, everywhere I looked. Thus, any offer of money is looked at not as a gift, but sideways and scrutinized for intention, strings, and expectations. Is there any situation in which I need money badly enough to take it as a gift rather than taking out a loan?
So far, history says “no.” There’s no situation where I would want something badly enough that I’d take a lien against my integrity for it. If I need it, and can’t afford it, I find a way to pay for it. If I want it, and I can’t afford it, too bad. End of story.
Why so stubborn?
Two reasons, same experience
Number 1: Mom’s family. Immediately after her death, knowing that their behavior to her had been despicable, and was going to be public knowledge now that she was gone, they desperately wanted to look good. In our culture, the way they could fake it would be to pay for her funeral. That way, after treating her like dirt beneath their feet during the worst years of her illness, they could say “Of course we loved her, we paid for her funeral and everything!”
The price tag on “saving face”: $7,000
They harassed me endlessly, from the moment they knew I was coming back to arrange the funeral, to the moment the funeral began. CLASSY.
I didn’t consider it for a second. I also didn’t give them the courtesy of an answer. I just ignored them and wrote the check, letting the few sane elements of the family tell them to Back Off. A few of them went a bit further and pointed out that, money notwithstanding, I’d always taken care of my family. It’d be a cold day in Hell that I’d accept a handout from them, even if I went into debt in the refusal.
They were right, of course.
I didn’t go into debt but nothing would have convinced me to give them the satisfaction and I don’t regret it for a millisecond.
Number 2: I grew up poor. In most cases, money gifts within closer members of the family are just part of cultural traditions and mean nothing more than well-wishing. But in cases where there’s great disparity between the giver and the recipient, “gifts” become “charity.” And like it or not, charitable giving is considered a virtue, charity acceptance is not. By the same token, someone who gives to charity is good. But someone who needs charity is looked at through a different lens, one where they’re judged, and found wanting. I learned quite early on, there is so much stigma around accepting help that I wasn’t willing to ask for help of any kind.
What if the situation had been different?
What if she was still alive and they offered money for her medical care, money that I couldn’t afford at the time? I’d already paid over thousands to fix her terribly painful dental situation. I’d already paid hundreds of thousands for their living expenses, over the previous ten years, and that’s after I’d paid several tens of thousands of their debt. All of this before my salary reached $60,000, annually.
What if they had offered me enough money to buy her good health insurance?
What if they had offered me enough money to ensure some level of stability, as a hedge against my ill health, loss of income, and homelessness?
For nearly two decades, I’ve dedicated my life to save, invest, and plan for the worst possible scenario. We’re not free and clear yet but that self reliance and drive has gotten us pretty far down the road. Ten years ago, though, it wasn’t clear if and when I’d get clear.
What if I’d been offered an easier way out that could have saved Mom some suffering, for some unspecified obedience or compliance, all those years ago? Would I have swallowed my pride and taken it? I hate to think that I would cave but in hindsight, knowing that my best efforts weren’t enough to help her, the smart money is on YES.
What if it was an outrageous amount of money?
Barring the scenario above, the highly unlikely theoretical in which my mom’s family cared enough about her to offer me help to help her (they didn’t), what if the situation was less about your need, and more about the amount?
What if it was millions? Billions?
There’s a point at which our instincts must be to start rationalizing how much good you could do with that money, isn’t there? I know mine starts to say, with $5M, you could do a lot of good. With $5B, you could do a whole lot more than that. You could, for this outlandish amount, put up with the price of [something really annoying].
Or substitute “do a lot of good” with whatever it is you’d want to do.
Would it be worth accepting the money with one hand, and a possible shackle on the other?
If we’re talking purely in currency, how big would the bucket of money have to be for you to willingly walk away from what you believe? What would you be willing to sacrifice, or tolerate? If we’re talking about valuable gifts not calculated in currency, like good health, what would you think, then?
Anyone watch the Grammys last night? I didn’t get to watch in real time but my heart thrilled knowing it was happening – our beloved Hamilton was playing the Grammys! #Gram4Ham – We Won!
Then I kicked rocks because their performance reached an even wider audience, thus making it 10,000 times harder to get tickets. And I’m about to do my own plug to make it that much harder for me to get that #Hamiltunes #Ham4Ham love. Because I’m selfless like that.
If you’re a money nerd, this is for you.
If you know the hustle and grind, this is for you.
If you’re an immigrant’s kid relate to the immigrant experience, this is for you.
If you love the spirit of freedom and independence, this is for you.
If you just plain love catchy music, this is absolutely for you.
How does a bastard, orphan son of a whore
And a Scotsman, dropped in the middle of a forgotten spot in the Caribbean
By providence, impoverished, in squalor, grow up to be a hero and a scholar?
The 10 dollar
Founding father without a father
Got a lot farther by working a lot harder,
by being a lot smarter
By being a self-starter
I’ve said it before, I think Hamilton is sensational. It’s not just clever, it’s smart. It’s funny without sacrificing gravitas; it’s culturally present; it’s engaging and, though there is obviously some creative license taken, it’s American history on the stage.
I’ll call Lin-Manuel Miranda the genius that he is in my tone-deaf world where my own baby reacted to lullabies with a “ehhh maybe don’t sing me to sleep momma” face. Let’s just not forget all the craftsmanship that went into bringing Alexander Hamilton to life.
Hamilton was an immigrant (“…bastard, orphan, son of a whore and a Scotsman…”) with vision, ambition, drive. He served as Washington’s military aide, then became our first Secretary of the Treasury, facing down detractors in Washington’s Cabinet to create a strong centralized banking system, making enemies as fast as he made friends. He fought for the US Mint, and he made the repayment of the national debt his first priority. (That’s for us money nerds.)
Thomas. That was a real nice declaration
Welcome to the present, we’re running a real nation
Would you like to join us, or stay mellow
Doin’ whatever the hell it is you do in Monticello?
If we assume the debts, the union gets
A new line of credit, a financial diuretic
How do you not get it? If we’re aggressive and competitive
The union gets a boost. You’d rather give it a sedative? – Cabinet Battle #1
For the hustlers and the grinders, those who work their butts off, not for fame or glory but to get the job DONE? Hamilton was your guy.
Alexander joins forces with James Madison and John Jay to write a series of essays defending the new United States Constitution, entitled The Federalist Papers. The plan was to write a total of twenty-five essays, the work divided evenly among the three men. In the end, they wrote eighty-five essays, in the span of six months. John Jay got sick after writing five. James Madison wrote twenty-nine. Hamilton wrote the other fifty-one!
Alexander Hamilton was far from perfect and Lin-Manuel’s portrayal is honest, highlighting his flaws alongside his gifts. Arrogant, reckless, idealistic, visionary? He was all those things.
But as much as I adore the music, the lyrics, the beats, the way my kid will stand up to clap, laugh, and dance to it, my heart is most drawn to how this all happened. There’s something magical about how unmagical this was.
Miranda, having written the Tony-winning musical In the Heights, picked up the 600+ page Alexander Hamilton by Ron Chernow for some light vacation reading. Some 50 pages into the book, he was incredibly excited by the notion that this would make a great musical, set to hip-hop lyrics. Miranda couldn’t believe this wasn’t already a musical! Granted, this was his day job but I think it takes a rare mind to see a musical in a several hundred page biography.
This didn’t happen in a vacuum, mind. Miranda’s been in the business, he’s been part of the comedy/improv rap troupe Freestyle Love Supreme for years, and he worked on this while he was also still working on In the Heights.
I repeat: writing Hamilton was his side hustle while performing in the Tony-winning musical that he wrote.
Lin-Manuel Miranda and persistence
Here’s that tumblr link: http://lemonyandbeatrice.tumblr.com/post/139444582196
He was hooked in 2008 and by 2009, he was testing his audience, rapping out what would become the first song of the whole musical at the White House, no less.
Compare, if you will, the differences between his early draft here, and the eventual final opening number.
The show opened at The Public Theatre in February 2015 and was such a resounding hit that the run was extended, then extended again. By July 2015, it opened in the Richard Rodgers Theatre on Broadway and it’s apparently a nearly impossible ticket to get. That’s only the start.
In 2017, they’ll be playing in Chicago, San Francisco, Los Angeles. There’s already a cast recording, and there’s talk of an original cast movie. (Please make it so!)
Sidebar: I REALLY want to see the original New York cast. I’ve fallen head over heels for them, between their Ham4Ham shows for the Hamilton ticket lottery, their work together as a diverse cast that feels much more like the America I know, and truly dear to my heart, their good work in the community.
Immigrants, we get the job done!
Miranda’s a veteran in the business but his excitement at the success and opportunities are heartwarming for a fellow hard-working immigrant’s kid. I don’t need to know critical acclaim to remember feeling the wonder of success.
I’m smitten and inspiration-struck when the words and the music that he wrote are brought to life by the incredible talent of men and women of the Hamilton cast.
He translated the life and times from Revolutionary War-era America in a way that echoes in everyday life and I am earwormed forever.
I hear the Hamiltons comforting their dying son, Philip, when I soothe my sick child, “I know, I know.”
I hear Angelica Schuyler when confronted with sexism still alive and well today:
“’We hold these truths to be self-evident
That all men are created equal’
And when I meet Thomas Jefferson
I’m ‘a compel him to include women in the sequel! – The Schuyler Sisters”
Dear Theodosia rips my heart out, voicing my worries, fears, and hopes for an infant LB’s future:
You will come of age with our young nation
We’ll bleed and fight for you, we’ll make it right for you
If we lay a strong enough foundation
We’ll pass it on to you, we’ll give the world to you
And you’ll blow us all away…
Someday, someday
Yeah, you’ll blow us all away
Someday, someday – Dear Theodosia
And at the end of our days, a reminder we can only do our best to leave a legacy worthy of being remembered.
My words can hardly do it justice, but enjoy the music if you haven’t already and tell me if “Right Hand Man” and “Nonstop” doesn’t get your toes tapping and your blood moving to get out there and conquer your ambitions. Tell me if Eliza’s soaring vocals don’t make your heart sing, whether she’s falling in love, or reeling from betrayal.
If you can get tickets – more importantly, if you can get me tickets 😉 – TELL ME THAT too. In the meantime, you know where to find me! Right here, listening to the soundtrack and writing like I’m running out of time.
It goes without saying that I feel like an idiot. But I’m saying it anyway: I feel like an idiot. So let’s hope this doesn’t become a series.
In the six months since LB has dabbled in non-milk foods, ze has been liberal in hir intentional and unintentional sharing with Seamus. Not once, not even when ze has offered his own treats to him, has he ever taken anything from hir without explicit permission from me. I know this because I keep a close eye on them both. Seamus has been nothing but an angel toward his grabby, unempathetic, sometimes grubby sibling. An angel that stays nearby, but sets boundaries so that ze is slowly learning from our prompting, scolding, and swoop in for the occasional rescue that he likes to be close, he likes to be petted gently, but he does not like to be grabbed, twisted or licked. Ze still licks him. There’s nothing can be done about that. But still, I watch them. It’s irresponsible to take his patience for granted and ze is not nearly old enough to be trusted to respect his boundaries without guidance.
Naturally, that means that the one day that I take them both for a really long walk and playtime, the one time my brain checks out when we’re in sight of home, LB chucks hir snack bread over hir shoulder and Seamus snags it. He never does that. Ever. But in the split second I had to tell him NO and DROP IT, which he would have done, my brain failed us both and I didn’t. So he gulped it down and then my brain started whirring again.
$@!@%!!(@
That was raisin bread. Usually ze eats all the raisins first before gnawing at the crust but this time ze chucked half the slice, which ze hasn’t ever done, before chewing on it. Crap.
Raisins can be deadly for dogs.
Some dogs can eat grapes with reckless abandon. Some dogs can eat grapes, experience kidney failure, and die. Raisins are worse. You need as little as half a raisin for a 300 lb dog and if that dog is susceptible? It can be really bad.
Seamus is a big boy but he’s no 300 lbs and I couldn’t be certain that the bread had been de-raisined. I called the vet to be sure of the facts above and they confirmed: most possible ingested toxic things, if just a bite or less, they’d just suggest we induce vomiting (or they would) and watching overnight. Raisins are Bad News.
Of course, this happens right at LB’s naptime. Since we haven’t replaced his car yet, PiC had taken the car to work and we were carless so I couldn’t race them both to the vet, naptime or no. We’d run out of hydrogen peroxide so I couldn’t induce vomiting unless…
I strap a tired and angry LB into the stroller and raced down the street. Huffing and heaving, we rattle to the nearest store to grab the first bottle of peroxide we could find, pay for it and run back. Wishing with all my might that I were in better shape, and for that idiot catclling from his car to choke on his own spit and pass out, we mad-dash all the way back home. Intrigued by the commotion, LB’s grumbles have faded to an interested chirp, but once we pass the threshold, ze was bound and determined to be involved. Ze quick-crawls after us as Seamus is sent to the bathroom. Quickly, pop a bottle of milk into warming water, then run to the bathroom to measure out a tablespoon and pulling it into the syringe that … was too small. ARGH. Find another or…. Time was ticking, the longer I took, the more likely he would digest that raisin and his kidneys could start shutting down. They say you’ve got two hours, but you’ve really got to get that stuff out ASAP.
I risk a run to the closet to dig out the bigger syringes and SMASH. Of course. Of course LB wanted to know what I was working on and dashed the measuring cup of peroxide off the counter. I should have remembered that ze could reach it now. KIDS.
No matter, I have more. But forget that larger syringe, I’ll just refill this one. Five times. The syringe was only 3 ml, I needed 13. Drat and damn. With each syringe-full, he’s grumpier and more foamy. It helps none at all that LB’s extremely curious, first climbing up my side trying to help with the syringe, then sitting on his back legs to get a better view. His misery is such that he doesn’t even try to move away. The full tablespoon down his gullet, he tucks his head under his back paws, almost pointedly turning his back on me.
Apologetically, I scoop LB up and plop hir on the cushion with the milk, then sit next to Seamus petting him while spreading out the newspapers for the pending regurgitation. In almost no time, ze tossed the bottle aside and comes looking for us so that’s my cue to put hir in bed, all protests and wails.
Ten minutes later, nothing but yowls from LB.
This time, I find the 12 ml syringe. Another two tablespoons, down the hatch. More foam, and with it, an almost satisfying heaving that I was sure would do the trick. Being a hero, he just swallows and swallows and swallows until the urge passes. Fraggit! I text PiC that he may have to leave work early and take over at home so I could take Seamus in for a real induction.
Ten minutes later, still nothing.
One last time.
Seamus is really out of patience with me but down the hatch it goes. And I encourage him to just let it out. Just don’t fight it. And there it is! A lake of foam and food spreads on the newspapers. Never has poking through a pile of vomit been such a relief.
Amid the foam, the carrot chunks and the kibble, I found our culprit. One half raisin.
Elation wars with a sinking stomach. Another call to the vet confirms we still should have him in for treatment. PiC texts that he’s on his way and by 4:30, this saga started at 2, Seamus and I are loaded up and rolling out of the garage. I’m packing a book, a bottle of water, and a phone that’s running out of juice. Of course it is. But with plenty of deep breathing and careful navigating, we arrive safely at our destination.
Social Time! Seamus’s ears say.
No, I’m sorry, not really.
The vet confirms that if it were her pup, she wouldn’t go so far as the “gold standard” of 48 hours in hospital with IV fluids, the next step down should be plenty since it was half a raisin and we retrieved it.
He happily runs off to be poked, poked again, and dosed with activated charcoal.
His kidneys, according to the labwork, seem to be ok, and they’ll want to see him back in 3 days to confirm they are still fine. 72 hours, they say, til we’re out of the woods. $250 today, and another $75 later this week, if he’s fine. Small price to pay, I suppose, in the grand scheme of things, but from now on, wheat bread for walks!
We get home at 6 and still manage to get dinner on the table by 7, and by 8:30, I finally get to sit down at the computer to get my work done. What a day!
It feels like we’ve been tossing in the tempest, caught up in a life twister, for weeks. Nay, months!
Life, death, and taxes, my friends. But unlike the other two, taxes happen on schedule every year.
My salary, Version 1.0
