Teddy Dog Show

Here is a story that I think best defines my life as a middle child…everyone refers to it as Teddy Dog Show.

I will just cut to the chase—I sound corny when I try to build something up. So one day in the summer, not sure how old I was, but my sister, Janie, and cousin, Jannie, were all playing together. We decided that it would be fun to put on a dog show, more like a horse show, with Teddy.

We turned our backyard into the ring, and we made all the jumps from the pool furniture, floating noodles, trash cans, really anything that we could find. When we started to discuss who would be what, Janie quickly stated that she would be Teddy’s trainer, the one who gets the glory when he would do well. Janie then assigns Jannie to be the commentator because she was taking riding lessons and would know what she was talking about. As for me, I became a jump. My job was to just stretch my arm and leg out to the trashcans and wait for Janie and Teddy to jump over me. It was made very clear to me that only I could do this because I was the tallest—I believed them. I took the job very seriously, thinking that I was playing an important role. But, in the end, I got no glory, no recognition like Teddy, Janie, and Jannie.


It was not until a few years later when I watched the video that I realized how nerdy I really was. And it is so typical of me, Janie, and Jannie even to this day: Janie always had the most powerful position, Jannie was always the brains behind it, and I was always just there doing the jobs that no else wanted to. Another example is when we made a contraption that would pull people and put it on Teddy. We duct-taped rollerblades to a Radio Flyer, made reins and a harness, and put them on Teddy. Janie got to ride, I ran next to Teddy to make sure that he kept going. Typical.