Benjamin Linus: An Apt Moniker

This story begins almost three years ago. About a year after the wife and I purchased our home we adopted a dog. We named him Benjamin Linus after the troubled character from the TV show Lost because he had one blue eye and one brown eye which made him seem a bit nefarious. The name turned out to be a bit prophetic because like the character Benji would spend weeks earning our trust with magnificent behavior only to turn on us when we would least expect it. He has mangled two pairs of my wife’s Uggs, gnawed on couch legs and cushions, stolen countless articles of clothing, and never met a dog bed he could resist eating.

About six months into our adoption of Benji he decided to up the destruction and chewed through the rug in the office and a giant chunk of molding around the office door. I fixed the molding with some putty and decided to simply cover the rug because I anticipated future attacks. Two and a half years later while a lot has change we have not had a recurrence of rug abuse. Our child is approaching the crawling stage so we decided it would be nice to replace our old chewed up rug in favor of something newer and cleaner.

We contracted Home Depot to install new carpets because they advertised a 72 hour installation process. That has turned out to be a bit of a lie because the clock does not start from the time you hire them to do the job. First you pay 35 bucks, then they send someone to your house to measure, then they waste two days, then they send you an email, then you pay a majority of the cost, then you wait a few days until they call you at their convenience to schedule an installation three days from the phone call you are currently having. While that is not the point of this post, I have found it more than a tad bit annoying.

Also, Home Depot recommends you remove the old rug yourself because for them to remove it would be a substantial additional cost, (there words, not mine). Therefore, today in anticipation of my new rug I began to remove the old one from Benji’s room, also known as the office. The rug is going in the office and den and the two rooms are separated by a pocket door. In an effort to properly ventilate the room while I worked, I opened all the doors and windows to and from the office which included the back and garage doors. I then closed the pocket door to keep Benjamin locked inside the house proper.

When I finished my job, I sent Benjamin into the backyard (so he would not destroy the house) and then attempted a quick shower. Mid-shampoo I realized my stupendous error. I had left the doors propped open to continue airing out my workspace! My insane dog could be chewing on anything or anyone in my neighborhood as I had been in the shower at least five minutes before realizing my folly.

I bolted from the shower, slipped on the slick tile floor and gracefully (if you can call falling out of the shower graceful) bounced back up on my feet into the hanger with my towel on it. I wrapped the towel around myself and ran through my house like a crazed person. I banged on the back door in a vain attempt to locate my long gone dog. I ran into the office, doors open as I had feared and found no signs of Benjamin Linus. I went into my garage, looked out the gigantic opening where Benjamin must have sauntered off, still dripping wet, and did not locate my dog.

I rushed through the house and over to my front door in an attempt to get a better view of my street. I flung the door open and to my shock found Benjamin Linus napping on lawn five feet from where I stood. Immediately, I was of two minds. One was relief that my dog had not run off, but the other was a vision of me chasing Benji around my front yard in a towel (the stuff of nightmares). Before I could reconcile my two thoughts I opened the door and told Benji to come into the house, amazingly, he stood up, stretched, and casually walked inside.

The other amazing aspect of this story has to do with my little girl. She managed to nap through the entire experience of rug removal, my quicker than quick shower, me running through the house like a mad man, and Benjamin returning home (though technically he never left). I dried off, put on some clothes and sat on the couch to reflect upon my stupidity when through the front window I saw a woman walking a gigantic dog. Benji saw them too and ran around the house like a hound possessed barking like he wanted to eat the world. This of course promptly roused my child who began sobbing.

Now more than ever I am sure Benjamin Linus is the most aptly named dog in the history of canine domestication.