I will rue the day.

Sunday night was the night my parental abilities showed themselves, and I am already afraid for my future, non-existant (presently) children.

As many of you know, I have a lovely English bulldog named Zola, who is essentially my child. As a matter of fact, when I went to my high school's alumni homecoming game thingie, I brought my dog, while everyone else had their brats in tow. And guess what? Everyone was fawning over little, snorting Zola Bean. Because she is awesome. And much more well-behaved than those little minihumans. I try to keep in mind that she is of a different species, but I falter occasionally. Take Halloween, for example. I REEEAAAALLLLLY wanted to dress her up as a ladybug, but everyone objected so vehemently that I decided against it. (Next year, when I no longer have my parents as roommates, is a totally different story. I may even take myself trick or treating with Zola. I am not ashamed!!!)

Anyway, on Sunday night, I let Zola and Maggie (my parents' Corgi) out for their final take-a-shit/piss run. Thankful for indoor plumbing, I waited by the door in my jammies, letting Maggie in after she took care of business, and tapped my foot impatiently for my little snuggle buddy to come to the door.

Now, Zola has this habit of getting really excited after she's done the deed. Peeing, not so much, but pooping has her tearing back into the house like something literally scared the shit out of her. This bit of information is important.

So I hear Zola running in the dark and I prepare by turning the door handle a bit. There's no need to make myself cold without reason. Then I see Zola leap into the air and WHAM! she runs into the second of three steps leading up to the deck. Without much in the arena of reactions, Zola continues her run to the house, albeit a little more slowly. She enters the house and looks up at me with this sort of stunned look on her face, yet wagging her tail the entire time. I look down on the floor, and there's a little spot of blood that wasn't there before.

I freaked the hell out.

I'm not the kind of person who can't handle body fluids. I once helped a guy who'd split his head open when he was having a seizure; I'm not bothered by vomit; I have no problem when I have to plunge the toilet; etc.

But for some reason, the fact that my little, adorable Zola had a cut on her chin made me flip. I had her quickly follow me into the kitchen, where I applied pressure to the wound (in retrospect, not that big, but the amount of blood it was oozing was a little disconcerting) and called frantically for my mother, who was upstairs at the time. And Zola was looking at me like I was nuts. To be fair, I was. After I few minutes, I calmed down, stopped the bleeding and applied Neosporin, and all was well.

If I get this worked up over my damned DOG getting hurt, how am I going to handle my own flesh and blood? And I'm not just talking about physical injuries. What happens when my child isn't invited to a birthday party? When my daughter breaks up with her first boyfriend? When my son doesn't make the football team??? AUGH!!!

I'm horrified for my progeny. HORRIFIED.