If cats have nine lives, Lucy basically has nine cats. (Kendrick gave this joke a B. Whatever, I think it's funny.). To explain, allow me to briefly enumerate for you the situations in which my twelve-year-old, eight-pound teacup shih tzu has eluded death:
- A brief period of ownership by a person who was willing to "lend" her six-week-old puppy to an acquaintance (me) so she could go to London, and who then decided not to return. Ever.
- An incident where she escaped from my house and hid under my car, resulting in an escaping eyeball.
- A second incident a week later where I came home from work and her excitement upped her blood pressure to the point where the eyeball escaped once again. (That was the end of the eyeball.)
- A tick situation that y0u can read about here, if you want (omg).
- A nighttime stroll through our coyote-filled neighborhood that ended with a stay in our local shelter.
- The discovery of a tennis-ball-sized lump on her neck that I was certain was a death sentence, but turned out to be no big deal (it was an abscess, which is categorically horrifying, but treatable).
- A two-week period during which she walked into walls and spun in circles with her head stuck at a permanent 45-degree angle. This HAD to be bad. Like, really bad. And yet? It turned out - again - to be "no big deal," according to our vet. (It's called "old dog disease." Really.)
- A leg that broke for no apparent reason and that rejected three different casts (they literally just fell off). But then it just got better anyway. On its own.
And now?
Now Lucy has cured herself of blindness.