Kids...

Yesterday was an incredibly busy day… We started out the day with our usual “morning outing,” but it was cut short because “The Boy” [our oldest “kid] did not want to wear his “Doggles,” yes, sunglasses for dogs – called Doggles – needed more for the dust than the sun… Poor little guy has terrible dust allergies – and where are we living? Yep, we’re living in what is probably the dustiest place in the World! [I’ll post a picture one of these days of The Boy with his “Doggles” on. He looks too cool for words with them on – unfortunately he doesn’t think so, and usually puts up quite a struggle about wearing them.] And, “The Baby,” well, she just wanted to play and romp – and chase the birds to the end of her leash – but she did not want to walk. She doesn’t have allergies, and hopefully never will, nor does she have a pair of Doggles – I will buy a pink or fuchsia pair for her when we go to the states next month.

When we returned to the house, as we walked in, I decided it was high-time to finish a project that I started several months ago. That it was going to totally consume the entire rest of the day was not my intent. Sometime before we last left for vacation, in February, I got that awful “spring fever cleaning flu” and started weeding out “stuff” from closets that we just do not have room for. The closet under the stairs was so bad that safety equipment wasn’t an option if you opened the door. Hardhat, goggles [or The Boy’s doggles!], and steel-toed work boots were a requirement to prevent serious injury. Thankfully the “flu” didn’t last long, but while it did… So, after determining what “stuff” we didn’t really need any longer – why the heck we even bothered keeping it to begin or had it in the first place is beyond me – was put into boxes and neatly stacked against the living room wall. [Yeah, instead of keeping it out of sight in the closet, I decide to put it out in the open – so much more attractive this way – nothing like a bunch of overstuffed boxes to compliment any décor!]

At six-thirty yesterday morning I was taking pictures of the “stuff” and madly typing ads to post everything on the “For Sale” section of my husband’s company website. I had no sooner hit “send” to list the “stuff” when the phone started ringing and didn’t stop. The old answering machine was a hot commodity. It was sold immediately. And the make-up mirror – I can’t tell you how many calls I got for this. [More men called about this than women, and although I didn’t ask any of them on the telephone, I just presumed they were calling for some “female” relation. It was when the young man who bought the mirror was at our house when I asked him if it was for his wife – no it wasn’t, he said he wasn’t married – oh, girlfriend, then – nope, he said he didn’t have one, and no – when I asked him if it was for a sister, he said he had no sisters. Maybe for his mother – I didn’t ask about her. He certainly was a handsome young man, I’ll give him that, and perhaps he wanted this lighted, magnifying make-up mirror for his own use… We will never know.]

So, in all, out of several dozen phone calls, if not more, probably about a dozen men ended up coming to our house, and of course, ringing the doorbell – if you have four-legged “kids” then you know what happens when a doorbell rings… My “kids” get all excited – wildly racing to the door, back to me, to the door, back to me and to the door again – simultaneously announcing – The Boy with his deep loud bark, and The Baby with her sharp, high-pitched bark – that the doorbell rang [just in case I didn’t hear it] and someone is “out there!” The floor to ceiling window on one side of the entry-way allows for anyone outside to see “the kids” responsible for the commotion coming from the inside. By the time I am able to reach the door whoever it is that is there is usually backing up down the walkway so as to avoid what must be anticipated as an “attack” about to happen. [No doubt that along with the barking heard coming from the inside of our townhouse, I can be heard commanding in my “Mommy” voice, “Get back, nooo, get back!” This may better explain why visitors back up down the walkway – although I doubt it.]

It is both amazing and sad how four-legged “kids” are regarded in this Country, and that so many people are really, really afraid of them. Very, very few Saudi’s on our compound have dogs – oh, sure there are a few, and in a community such as this, that is not very big, where you are so confined – walled in – you really do get to “know” about everyone. No, I do not actually, personally know everyone, but one does get to know people by sight, or in my case, by who has “kids.” There may be more, but of the many Saudi families here, I can only come up with four that have “kids” that I personally am aware of, versus the many, many Western families that do. As for Saudi’s outside the compound? With regard to having dogs as pets, I believe it would be a pretty accurate guess that but for a small minority –Saudi households are unlikely to include members with names like Spot or Rover.

[More horrifying and pathetic than amazing and sad, is the popularity of dog-fighting, here. This barbaric spectator activity is something that I am passionate about – it incenses me beyond words. Truly, if there was “one” thing I could change here in The Kingdom, it would not be allowing women to drive or go “uncovered,” it would not be ending domestic help “abuse,” or fixing any other number of social injustices or ills. I would make dog-fighting more illegal than smuggling drugs, and beheading – maybe worse – if there can be such a thing – the punishment for any participant in this event!]

That so many are afraid of dogs here, is almost downright amusing. All of the men [not one woman!] who came to our house yesterday to either see an item I posted for sale, to try to bargain for an item, or to actually purchase the “stuff” I am getting rid of, refused to come in because of my “kids.” Needless to say, the “kids” spent the late morning and most of the afternoon being crated and uncrated. The Boy’s crate is a haven to him and he freely and willingly goes in and out. If The Boy is told to “go to your crate,” he [usually] will trot right off and head into his crate without any fuss. The Baby, on the other hand, who less than two months ago spent some twenty-two hours in her crate traveling from North Carolina to The Sandbox, associates absolutely nothing good with being confined in such a manner. There is no treat [piece of American cheese] or cookie you can give her that alleviates her displeasure and she is most vocal about it – crying and whining and barking until the door is opened and she again is free from the confines of what she must think is akin to a prison cell.

That a “kid” or “kids” could cause such fear is just something I must just have not realized or had a great deal of association with in the past. Even when, a couple times yesterday, my communication with these men was at the very least strained, that they were terrified of the “kids” was abjectly clear. From the very little I am able to ascertain, there is absolutely nothing un-Islamic about having a dog. And, although keeping a dog inside one’s home certainly wouldn’t be expected, according to this article, having a dog would be acceptable. That so few do, and that a dog or dogs are the cause of such verbal and visible emotion, here, was for me, something rather unexpected.