a document of days

When I returned from my trip to Connecticut, I returned to an apartment building with no elevator. There was a bright yellow warning sign affixed to the door announcing this outage was indefinite. This wouldn't be such a problem if we didn't have a geriatric pup who is very afraid of descending stairs.  It's not so much that he can't do it, it is that he believes he can't and so he trips and falls every time.

Because Ryan can pick him up with no problem, he had been carrying Salinger up and down all weekend. But when Monday morning rolled around, I knew I would not be able to carry him down three floors.

Luckily, a friend of Ryan's also has an elderly dog and she'd been trying out various shoes that would help keep her dog from slipping. Just a week earlier, she gave Ryan a set of shoes (called PAWZ) to try on Sal. The shoes are made of a thick balloon-like material.  They stay in place, as they are tapered at the top, so the dog will not trip over the shoe itself (we have had this problem.)  PAWZ are not meant for long-term wear, as, obviously, a material like this doesn't let their feet breath.

These shoes are miracle workers!!  It only took minutes for Sal to get used to them, and once he realized he wouldn't slip, he was easily running up and down the stairs.  At first he was a little embarrassed, so I had to tell him how great he looked in his new kicks.  Here he is looking shy in his new shoes: