If I could forget any pet I’ve ever owned, I would erase Molly
from my memory. Molly was the teacup poodle I had in 1985, when I was eight years old. My mom bought her and gave her the hideously refined AKC name “Good
Golly Miss Molly.” I was embarrassed to call her that so she simply went by “Molly.”
Molly was my best friend. We snuggled in my favorite blanket together and watched
Saturday morning cartoons. I taught her how to dance for treats and when she
stood on her back legs, she was barely taller than my Cabbage Patch Preemie, Cassandra Marie. Molly reluctantly allowed me to shove her into piles of stuffed animals where she sat patiently while I conducted photo shoots. I was a child who got along better with
dogs than I did with humans, and Molly was the love of my young life.
One sunny Saturday morning, my dad took my sister Leah and
me to play baseball at the school in our neighborhood. We loaded our dogs and
that god-awful Louisville Slugger into Dad’s dull grey Chevy pickup and drove five
blocks to Lydia Hawk Elementary School. I wanted so badly to amaze Dad with my non-existent
baseball skills; I was determined to win his affection. So it seemed a particularly cruel twist
of fate that instead of bonding with my father, I ended up beating sweet Molly to death with the Louisville Slugger.
Here's what happened...
 |
| Targhee and Molly |
It was my turn at bat and I directed all my focus toward Dad,
ready to impress. I took a few practice swings and then, as I swung the heavy bat
backwards with all my might so I could rest it on my shoulder, I heard the sickening hollow
THUNK that thirty years later I still
can’t shake from my mind.
I turned and looked at the ground where Molly lay motionless
at my feet. From the corner of my eye I saw Leah take off in a full sprint heading the opposite
direction straight through the gate and down the street. In a choked whisper, Dad said, “Rachel, go to the truck.” And so I ran. Pure panic set in and I
couldn’t even think. I climbed into the back of the truck and maybe I cried.
Maybe I prayed. Maybe I hyperventilated. I was eight years old. What was I
supposed to do?
Dad returned to the truck and as I gasped for the air that
refused to fill my lungs I asked him, “Is she okay?” He just shook his head and wouldn't look at me.
He wrapped Molly’s tiny body in his shirt and laid her in
the front seat. Leah and I rode home silently in the truck bed, terrified and
stunned. When we pulled into the driveway I jumped out and ran to my room to
get my favorite blanket. I hugged the dusty pink calico fabric to my chest as I
carried it down the hallway and placed it in Dad’s hands. I told him to wrap
Molly in it when he buried her. In my childish mind, she would need it to keep
warm at night. I’d had that blanket longer than I could remember but Molly needed it more than I did. I had just aged twenty years and it was useless to me now.
My mom sat on the couch staring out the window probably
thinking, where is THIS chapter in the parenting
books? Meanwhile, to keep myself from crying, I did cartwheels around the
living room. I flipped around the floor like Mary Lou Retton at the previous
year’s Olympics, fighting back the tears and trying to erase the images that
were already permanently etched in my too-young-for-this brain. I knew if I
stopped doing cartwheels I’d cry and then how would I ever stop. People do
weird things to keep from collapsing into despair.
It was a horrible accident that left me traumatized, and for
a long time I was unable to even pick up a bat. I had the bonus of being teased
by family and friends when I was finally able to play baseball again. They
would say, “Everyone, get the dogs away from Rachel!” and other hysterical
wise-cracks. I still can’t play baseball without remembering what I did. Or
swing a golf club, or hammer a nail, or watch a coconut fall on Gilligan’s
head, or...
I’m almost forty and sometimes I still do cartwheels, hoping
that one day I will finally forget about Molly.
