Chapter Twelve: K-9

It was mid-September, 2008. My mom and I were still testing each other out. Patty G. was unsure of how far I would go in my recknlessness and rebellion, and I was unsure how far she would go in her efforts at being a normal parent. In the this mutual process of testing each other's waters a tension had fallen over the Gray home. It was a stalemate of sorts, both of us eager to find some excuse to hop out the trenches and drop artillery shells of acusation and yelling in each other's ears.

One afternoon, I hear my sister, resident canine lover, blurt out,

"We're getting a new dog!"

I was puzzled at my sister's curious emphatic outburst. It seemed we'd already got enough on our hands with Charlie, the infinite-energy wonder dog. Hell, with Charlie, we practically got three dogs for the price of one. Although dogs are clearly superior pets, did we really need another slobbery mouth to feed and more poop to scoop (specifically, more poop for me to scoop)?

Well, it's not like my family is known for rationality or thinking things through in its decision making. If it was, this blog would blow pretty hard. I had to see what was going on. If we were buying a new dog I wanted to know why, given that my student loans were (and still are) fast approaching. So I inquired my mom as to this alleged new canine member of our family unit.

"He's a drug dog."

Not many other statements have the ability to afflict such fear that I felt in that moment. I think I pretty well hid the fact that I right nearly dookied a shooter then and there. There are numerous constitutional tricks criminals can utilize, when questioned, to side-step even the most senior law enforcement officers. But if a drug dog sniffs something on you, you're toast. My mom says I squirmed like a fish out of water. Having a drug dog in the house could be a major setback to my extra-legal activities.

With this dog in the house, I wouldn't just be sleeping with the enemy. This would be like a Jew cozying up with Hitler, Goering, and the rest of the S.S. after a long day of crunching numbers and analyzing profit margins; he might as well have pre-heated the oven while he was at it. While using dogs to do law enforcement's bidding is a cruel manipulation of nature's beauty and dog's innocence, many a smoker knows that it sure is effective. And there was still more.

"His name is Toker. He's a retired police dog."

Toker? Seriously? At least I could get a chuckle out of all this. And still...

"Mary-Anne and I are starting a business where we search kid's rooms for an hourly fee. We're gonna be rich!"

Well, that's just excessive. If I was scared of a drug dog in my house, imagine the victims of these room searches. I could imagine some Johnny B. Goode coming home to a yelping dog and the sight of his stash swirling down the drain. And chances are that this Johnny B. Goode wouldn't have the balls(/stupidity) to challenge his parents, and would probably end up 'voluntarily' enterring some rehabilitation program to ease his deeply troubled, subrban-minded, and probably white, parents. Chances are if you have the means and are willing to dish out $200/hour to have some odd woman take a retired drug dog to your child's room, you're probably uptight and white. And there's probably something else wrong with you, too. Hint to parents: there are better ways of handling these things.

Even my dad had to throw his hat in on this one.

"You guys don't even take care of the one dog you have now. And your mother thinks you can take another? Man, you better not let that dog in your room (chuckles)."

These were still the times before I viewed everything my mom said through the lens of her cumpulsive lying. If this dog was actually coming to live with us, I had to be prepared.

Option One: sprinkle bits of contraband everywhere in the house. Obscure places, literally everywhere. This way the dog would bark at everything, and would be unable to acutely identify my stash. Potentially effective, but also potentially expensive.

Option Two: try to disable Toker's olfactory nerves in a way that would not cause pain or otherwise harm him. No dice, there's no known procedure that does this.

Option Three: 'Accidentally' run Toker over. This has some obvious ehtical drawbacks.

Option Four: Feed Toker some of my homemade brownies. Maybe he'd realize everything he's been missing out on, and revert to non-compliance with my mom. Even if it didn't work as I intended, it would still be a loving funny sight to see.

I would have time to mull this over. The dog wasn't coming until Thanksgiving. Allegedly. I filed away the drug dog in the back of my mind. I had more important things to stress about in the meantime. But Thanksgiving came and passed. That's not to say our Thanksgiving passed quietly or uneventfully by any means. It was nearing Christmas and I had to find out what my mom was really up to.

"So when is that drug dog coming?"

"Are you kidding? I made that up to see how you would react. And it worked! You freaked out. Why would I actually get a drug dog?"

"Are you kidding? Here's a better question: why would you actually lie about getting a drug dog so you could see how I reacted? One of these actions is definitely much more manipulative and crazy than the other."

Stuff happens. I don't know what else I was expecting on this one. The frustrating part was that she went through so much effort, fake phone calls even, just to convince me that we were getting a retired drug dog named Toker. Toker, for Christ's sake. The best part is that the whole thing seems totally normal to me now, in context with the rest of my mom's behavior. Just another day in the office, you know.

Chapter Eleven: Bankruptcy

It started a few years ago. New Digimon action figures had just rolled into KB Toys, so I went to check on the bit of birthday cash I stored in my underwear dresser. But all I could find was tighty-whiteys. I could have sworn I had a twenty tucked away in there somewhere. Eh, no matter. I wasn't yet a slave to money, and the only practical value of a dollar was getting two ice cream sandwiches from the lunch line.

I got older and the dollar amounts grew in significance. Nothing too major in terms of dollar figures, though, and still in small enough amounts to notice when there was some missing paper. That curious phenomenon happened a few more times; twenties disappearing when I couldn't remember buying anything. So I decided to ask around.

"Mom, did you borrow any of my money?"

"Yeah, sorry, I took a twenty. I'll get it back to you next Wednesday when I get paid."

Thanks for letting me know ahead of time, I thought to myself. If you really needed a quick spot of cash you could just ask. It's not like I'm in your family and would be glad to help or anything. I wonder, what other things does mommy take without asking? And so the distrust began to linger.

Flash forward to the fall of senior year. I've got Roth IRA retirement dreams. I was formulating a plan to set aside money so I could retire on time, and retire in style. No mall walks for this geezer, I want to be riding in pure Italian luxury. I knew that now was the time to start planning for the future, and in a proverbial blink of an eye I'll be sixty five. And when I'm sixty five I know I'm going to want to live for myself and my family, not for debt, the government, or some corporation.

But I still had forty eight more years to go. And in the meantime my parents, or at least my mom, determined that in my drug-addled state I was incapable of managing my own finances. So they went repo on my ass and confiscated all my cash, thinking I would just squander it all on herb. Because squandering it on the useless material treadmill of Target and Wal-Mart is so much better.

The school year was young and I wasn't in the best position. My parents thought I was on the verge of meltdown. I still had some things to prove, so I let their redistribution of property slide. But I found the spot where my mom tucked away the hundred plus dollars in cash she had nabbed. I checked in every now and then to make sure my nest egg was still waiting for me.

Flash forward again, this time to Thanksgiving '08, and I'm cashing in from my hours at Maggie Moo's. We've got some relatives from Ohio staying with us who want to do the whole tourist thing in DC. I was killing time in my room when my mom came to me with an apparently earnest plea.

"My paycheck might be a little late this week, would I be able to borrow some money to take our relatives into DC?"

"Yeah, how much?"

"Just a hundred."

"Sure, that's fine."

My mom had been keeping me restricted to the house lately and I saw an opportunity to earn a night out.

"Since I'm doing you a favor by lending this money, do you think I could spend the night at ____'s tomorrow night?"

"So you're calling it a favor?" shes says, almost shocked.

"Well, I am lending you money."

"I was just lying about needing to borrow money. I just wanted to see if you were spending all your money."

Did she really expect me to simply make all of my funds her private money well? This is the twenty first century, and with kids liable to sue their parents she's lucky I wasn't even charging interest. And the whole time she was just trying to manipulate things, construct a small web of lies to see where it got her. I was surprised she had revealed her strategy of lying. She was basically holding up a giant sign saying, "Don't believe anything I say anymore." Whatever, that was her mistake, not mine.

Skip to Christmas time. I was worrying about how I was going to pay for college. Apparently the United States was (and still is) in a recession, but my parents still had their jobs. There was no evidence of any scarcity under the Christmas tree this year, with ample presents as usual. Being male, middle class, and white is the shit.

I got an iPod video, not bad, I do listen to a bit of music. On the other hand, I didn't have a car so I wasn't sure an iPod would get too much use. With probable student debt just months ahead, why not get a start on saving a bit? My mom didn't mind the idea of putting away a little cash either, and approved my idea that I could exchange the iPod for cash and tuck the money away. So I went to the Apple store the next day and cashed in. But there was a little hang up.

My mom had bought the iPod with her debit card. So the money from the gift exchange just went back to her debit card balance. When I got home, I told my mom that the money had been restored to her checking account, and that it would be great if she could get that cash to me soon. She said she'd gladly oblige and I would have cash-in-hand shortly.

Predictably, I had no way of ensuring her promise. Plus, no one likes getting constantly hassled about money, so I didn't pressure my mom about the affair for a few days. But a few days later, after the events of Chapter Two, my mom was pissed. Real pissed. She informed me that I wouldn't be seeing any of the money from that iPod exchange. Great.

I understand that I am in no way entitled to any Christmas presents, but to single out a single family member is just disrespectful. I don't raid my mom's bank account because I don't approve of the new purse she got for summer. I wasn't counting on being denied that pretty substantial sum. My frustration escalated when I checked in on the cash my mom had taken earlier in the year and found it missing. Now I was down two pretty large sums of money.

My mom had deprived me of roughly $420 in total. I asked her when I could expect to see this money, if ever. She got very defensive, insisting that I didn't appreciate her enough. Anyways, I wasn't in any position of power so I had no choice but to let it slide.

I don't really count on seeing any of that money. I can't wait to get out of those house and I don't have to worry about the constant potential threat of my mom raiding my funds. Until then I'll just have to be a bit more fiscally conservative.

It may just be wishful thinking, but man it would be nice to get a check from my mom for $420. What sweet subtle revenge that would be.