I watched Compass while I drank coffee. She was patrolling the yard but I wasn’t interested in that; I was looking for signs of intestinal issues. That’s a euphemism. She was a healthy retriever mix when we adopted her at one, but within a year she started showing symptoms of the allergies that would dominate her future. Still, that future had continued for another 13 years so far, and she’s going strong now. She’s my model for how to age.

Silly name, though. She had it when she came to us and we figured it shouldn’t be changed. Then we noticed that it isn’t pronounced how it’s spelled. “Come piss” is how we had to call her, and our ideas about shortening it to Comp or Compy never took.

My landline rang. Mom is the only reason I still have one, so it’s always her or solicitors. I headed for the coffee pot as I answered.

“I talked to Betsy today,” my mother reported. “I called to cancel the ride to the rehearsal dinner.”

“Already? You’re always jumping the gun! The dinner isn’t for another three days.”

“I know, but I wanted them to be able to make whatever plans they need. I know I’ll be too tired to attend.”

“Mom. When I RSVP’d yes for you, I made it clear it was conditional. That you might be too tired. You could’ve waited till Friday morning to cancel.”

“I know, Mel. Sue me. It’s the way I am. At my age, I’m not going to change.”

Mom’s 90. She’s a very young 90, but she’ll be 91 in half a year. And about this subject, her infamous impatience, she’s right. I remember when my son was about four and spent a weekend with my parents. Alex came home and reported that he had a nice time but Grandma kept saying the same thing. “What did she say?” I asked. He looked up at me and flung his plump hands outward while pressing his elbows into his sides: “C’mon Jerry!” (Jerry is my dad’s name).

Alex is now 34. He’s getting married this weekend. My brother and sister-in-law are driving in for the Friday dinner and Saturday ceremony. They were going to stop at Mom’s – change clothes and chauffeur her to the rehearsal dinner, but Mom is opting to rest up on Friday so she can shine at the wedding.

“I can’t believe Betsy is so stupid,” Mom continued while I watched Compass squat. “She’s going to lose her son.” Oh dear: the dog was squirting liquid shit. I checked to see that there were a couple of towels near the door.

My sister-in-law is a bitch. She’s a complicated individual, of course, but the older she gets, the more dissatisfied she seems, the more she drinks, the more she says snarky things about others that are consistently overheard. Betsy is a bitch, we all alliterate. Just like we say Jack is a jerk, about her younger son.

It’s her older boy, Sam, about whom she’s being stupid. Sam is engaged to be married in a few months. His fiancee is gorgeous and charming. Her name is Isabella, she’s of Thai heritage, and she is a hard-working nurse/administrator for an assisted living complex. She’s devoted to Sam, and she sacrificed proximity to her own family so she could be with him in Oregon, while he matures and finds himself. But my brother and sister-in-law think Isabella is a manipulative conniving phony.

I’m surprised at Jeff. He’s not a gossip and he’s a pro at letting bad words and scenes not affect him. It was a skill he honed in our own little family. I think Betsy has pounded the critical opinion into his head with her incessant repetition. That’s another thing about her: she latches onto an opinion and chants it like a mantra.

“Isabella is a plastic, LA princess,” is her current tune. She says it to Jeff, she says it to me, she says it to Mom. She says it on the phone, she says it in emails, and based on the twisted bitter expression on her face lately, I’m sure she says it to herself. With each day of this engagement her hatefulness grows.

“Uh, Mom? I have to go. Compass has just had an ‘incident.’”

“Inside or out?”

“Out.”

“You’re used to it. One more thing…” And then she delivered the punchy line. “Betsy said Isabella hacked into her phone.”

“Wait a minute. Hacked into her phone? Isabella? How? For what? Was she listening to calls? Reading emails?”

“I guess she was reading emails.”

“What were they about?”

“I don’t know.” But of course we do. They contained nasty comments about Isabella. They were probably addressed to Jack’s wife, Lilah, aka “the most wonderful daughter-in-law in the world, who I love like my own.” Lilah is okay. She’s a bit homely but nice enough. She puts up with a lot of temper and selfishness from my nephew Jack-the-jerk. Clearly she doesn’t reciprocate Betsy’s affection, or she would have told her mother-in-law about the second trimester abortion that she underwent last year.

I know about it because Lilah confided in me. She and Jack stayed at my place the nights before and after the procedure. They had to come to the metropolis because late-term abortions aren’t performed where they live. It was a sad visit. I was never convinced that Lilah wanted to terminate the pregnancy. But Jack was adamant.

That’s when Jack outed Betsy about booze and her mouth. My mother keeps asking “Do you think Betsy’s an alcoholic?” but the rest of us know the answer too well to ask. She’s got all the symptoms: drinking alone, looking forward to her next, not stopping till she loses consciousness. And more. I’ve been around a lot of alkies, and she’s the first I’ve known who will drink till she passes out and then immediately resume drinking when she comes to.

Jack told me the reason Betsy has no friends. “Every single person she met,” he said to me about the household in which he grew up, “got to overhear her bad-mouthing them.” Talk about not learning from consequences! Instead of taking any responsibility for her smack-talk, Betsy always accuses the subject of deliberately eavesdropping on her loud drunken repetitive accusations. Yeesh.

Sure Betsy will lose Sam. She already has. Jack was her favorite, as all of us know (another repeated statement she’s made, and overheard more than once by Sam). Being Betsy’s favorite has been Jack’s doom.

Sam is considerate and sometimes affectionate toward his mother, but he’s not exactly respectful. Clearly and naturally, he will choose Isabella over Betsy. Isabella doesn’t have to do anything to make that happen.

Betsy will keep drinking. Betsy will slide deeper into selfishness. And I think she will continue to ruin her looks, more by bitterness than by alcohol. There’s irony there. It’s likely that the real source of Betsy’s enmity toward Isabella is simple jealousy. For Betsy is terrified of aging. She’s classically vain. She has had surgical work in the past and now she’s addicted to cosmetic dermatology. Made up and smiling, she resembles Michelle Pfeiffer, with similar coloring, wide eyes, generous mouth. But she’s no longer young. And even 40 years ago she was unremarkable, compared to Isabella.

We’ll all attend Alex’s wedding this weekend. I’m sure Betsy will drink too much to behave well. But I’m equally sure Mom will be overheard making redundant critical comments about Betsy. And Mom won’t need a drink to trigger her unfiltered mouth.

By then Compass was at the door. Wagging her tail and acting like she’s well. That dog gets up every day, figures out what’s working, and enjoys it. I picked up a towel and opened the door.