Nancy Balbirer - A Marriage in Dog Years: A Memoir

PRAISE FOR A MARRIAGE IN DOG YEARS

This funny, heartbreaking, spiritual book is a true love story, and once it has you in its grip it wont let you go. Nancy Balbirers connection and devotion to her dog, Ira, her understanding of his role in her lifeas a soul mate and a teachermoved me deeply.

Tamar Geller, New York Times bestselling author of The Loved Dog

Memoirs become memorable when the voice of the narrator reaches out to create a relationship you dont want to end. It took me all of about, say, eleven minutes to bond with the lovely, funny, and totally appealing Nancy Balbirer, author of the lovely, funny, and totally appealing A Marriage in Dog Years . If you have ever loved a dog or a person or had to say goodbye and somehow keep on going, this touching book will charm and move you. I enjoyed reading it very much.

George Hodgman, author of Bettyville

ALSO BY NANCY BALBIRER

Take Your Shirt Off and Cry: A Memoir of Near-Fame Experiences

Text copyright 2018 by Nancy Balbirer

All rights reserved.

No part of this book may be reproduced, or stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without express written permission of the publisher.

Published by Little A, New York

www.apub.com

Amazon, the Amazon logo, and Little A are trademarks of Amazon.com, Inc., or its affiliates.

ISBN-13: 9781503940024 (hardcover)

ISBN-10: 1503940020 (hardcover)

ISBN-13: 9781503940017 (paperback)

ISBN-10: 1503940012 (paperback)

Cover design by Janet Perr

First edition

CONTENTS

AUTHORS NOTE

Some names and identifying details have been changed to protect the privacy of individuals.

For Boo Boo Bear

Prologue

I am driving in the middle lane on the 10 Freeway in Los Angeles, headed east, when my car, which has inexplicably begun to slow down, comes to a full stop. I press the pedal to the mat and fiddle with the ignition, but its no usethe car is totally lifeless. I am going to die, I think, as I glance into my rearview mirror to watch the traffic careening toward me and then veering to the left or right before whizzing by. Fumbling for my almost-out-of-juice flip phone, I call my newish boyfriend, Sam, with whom I have just had lunch.

My cars dead! I shout. And Im on the freeway!

Can you get over to the side? he shouts back.

NoIm stuck in the middle lane!

Where?

Just past Centinela

Just past Centinela?

Yes!

But before Bundy?

Yes!

Hold on! he yells. Dont move... Ill be right there...

Though I want to, I dont quite believe Sam will find me as I sit stranded on a busy Southern California freeway during peak hour. But even if he does, then what? How can I possibly escape unscathed? Nevertheless, there is nothing for me to do but wait and weep in abject terror, while everything that has led me to this moment on the freewayplus an endless cavalcade of steelflashes before my eyes.

I am an actress.

Like my car, I occasionally work.

In the past eighteen months, Ive been hired and then fired from one of the biggest sitcoms of all time, hired and then mostly cut out of another of the biggest sitcoms of all time, and admonished by my Valley of the Dolls ish agent for having too-small tits and something called carb face.

I am, for the most part, miserable pursuing the only thing I ever loved or was even remotely good at. Even though I have never been more depressed or more lost in my life, I cannotwill notquit trying to make it as an actress. Because even if it is a road more perilous to my psyche than the one on which I am currently braced, breaking up with my career of choice is out of the question: nothing petrifies me more than being a failure.

And speaking of failure, my car has done this beforeon canyon hills, rain-drenched boulevards, movie-studio lotsalways inopportune, embarrassing, dicey, but never death-defying. But like my career, I cant seem to quit my ride because, unlike my career, it is fabulous and I love it. Just a year ago, Id been in an accident with a drunk driver who nearly killed me but instead totaled my previous car, leaving me with three broken ribs and a thematically shiteous end to what had been a total crash-and-burn year in Los Angeles. The insurance money was paltry but enough to buy a used 1991 midnight-blue Volkswagen Cabriolet convertible, with a stripy, limited-edition interior by the fashion designer tienne Aigner, from a British girl in Manhattan Beach. It had low spark according to the mechanic who checked it out for me, but so did I lately. And for barely $1,000, I couldnt really afford to say no.

And just as Im thinking about how harebrained this decision really wasas drivers slam on their horns and brakes, swerving to avoid splattering me and all those tienne Aigner stripes across the asphaltSam calls me.

Im coming up, he yells. On your left!

What do I do? I cry, whipping around to see his Saab racing up behind me.

Crack open the door! he commands. Im slowing down and Im gonna open the door. When I say jump, open your door and jump in!

But

Open your door! Now! Nowwwww! Nowwwww!

Sam and his car have pulled up to my left; he leans over, flings open the passenger-side door.

Jump! he screams.

I dive in and slam the door shut, and Sam hits the gas. We zoom off, and though I am still shaking and traumatized, I am at the same time dazzled. Can it be that this nice guy who can pick a good restaurant is Superman, Batman, Iron Man, and Mighty Mouse all rolled into one? This slightly depressed Jewish intellectual is also a superhero?

Who knew?

But what I did know as we sped away that afternoon, leaving behind both my Cabriolet and my previous existence, was that though I had definitely been falling for this sweet, piano-playing law student, from that moment on, I was madly, incontrovertibly in love. I was the chick tied to the tracks, and he the dashing swashbuckler who would ultimately rescue me from far more than just extreme bodily harm.

I vowed to one day return the favor, to save Sam should he ever be down on his luck or in peril (though hopefully not on a freeway, since I also swore to never drive on one of those again). Leaping into his car and my new life, I was a damsel binding herself to her knight in shining Saab, ready to gamble on a future I couldnt possibly imagine.

I will amazingly forget about this moment, or not forget so much as push it to the far reaches of my mind, until one day when the memory will come to me in a flash and I will see us on that stretch of the 10, speeding off into the sunset, and it will occur to me that I had been so moved by the romance, the love, the chivalry of it all, that I had failed to notice we were not traveling west, but eastaway from the sun.

JULY

One

LOVE SAVES THE DAY

T here used to be this yoga class in Chelsea that met on Saturdays at noon called Love Saves the Day. Even though I was what youd call a foul-weather yogi, only showing up to practice when I felt crappy about myself (as if sweaty twisting while hearing a Rumi poem would make me a better person), I still managed to make it there pretty much every week. The proceeds for the class benefited a different cause each month, which was perfect for a multitasking mom with little me time: I could exercise my body and my existential angst while also trying to save the world.