You guys are totally missing out. There’s a whole lot of info hiding in your average pee mail. When dogs want to share the latest gossip, we just wait until nature calls. You’d be amazed what we can learn during a quick bathroom break.
People read the news. Check the TV. Browse the web.
I linger over a fire hydrant and inhale the whole wide world.
My ears, by the way, are almost as remarkable as my nose. I pick up on all kinds of things humans can’t hear.
What we do with our noses and our ears is kinda like taking a big ol’ knot and loosening it up. Separating out the strands. Unbraiding things.
People smell a reeking pile of trash in a Dumpster. We smell a dollop of cream cheese, a hint of peanut butter, a smattering of Froot Loops.
People hear the roar of a crowd in a stadium. We hear a strain of whiny four-year-old, a whisper of worried superfan, a note of grumpy hot dog vendor.
Man, dogs are cool.
snickers
While I watch from my perch on the back of the couch, Julia passes by on the sidewalk. George asked her to keep her dog-walking route close to home, in case the weather changes.
She’s wearing a shiny purple raincoat and leading three dogs: a goofy mutt named Winston, a timid dachshund named Oscar Mayer, and . . . her.
Snickers.
An old nemesis of mine, Snickers is a fluffy white poodle with delusions of grandeur. A big, snooty, pain in the puffball.
Ooh, that pooch drives me crazy.
Our mutual dislike goes back to my early days as a stray. Snickers was a fancy, pampered, sleep-on-a-pink-satin-pillow kinda gal. Her owner, Mack, ran the mall where I lived with Ivan and Ruby.
That’s where I first encountered Snickers. She teased me mercilessly, and beneath the fuzzy facade, I always suspected there was a little, I dunno, spark there.
Anyways. After the mall closed down, Snickers, being Snickers, landed on her feet. Mack married an older widow lady with more money than sense, and she dotes on that ridiculous poodle. Mack’s too lazy to walk Snickers himself, so he hired Julia to do it.
“Lookin’ good, Snick baby!” I call through the open window, and she gives me her curled-lip, squinty-eyed face, which, come to think of it, is pretty much how she always looks.
As usual, Snickers is dressed to the max. She’s wearing a pink poncho, a sparkly rain hat, and teensy pink boots.
“Those boots were made for mockin’,” I add for good measure.
It feels good, giving her some grief. But before I can really relish the moment, another annoying acquaintance of mine appears.
nutwit
Nutwit, the gray squirrel who lives in the live oak in our front lawn, jumps to a lower branch, looking at me with barely concealed pity.
I hate pity. Especially the barely concealed kind.
“I don’t know why you taunt her,” he says. “You’re hardly in a position to talk, Bob. You are Snickers.”
“Come over here to the window and say that.”
“So you can, what, drool me to death?”
“Are you aware that my best friend is a gorilla?” I ask. “You would make fantastic ape chow, dude.”
Nutwit reaches for a dangling acorn and yanks it free. “I thought gorillas were vegetarians.”
“Ivan eats termites,” I say. “He might make an exception for you.”
“Face it, Bob. You’re soft. You’re one step away from your own pink rain boots.”
“He has a point,” says Minnie, one of the family’s guinea pigs, from her cage next to the TV.
“No, he doesn’t,” says Moo, her cagemate.
“Yes, he does,” Minnie squeaks.
“Doesn’t.”
“Does.”
“Does.”
“Doesn’t . . .” Minnie pauses. “Wait, you tricked me!”
The guinea pigs rarely agree on anything.
Nutwit leaps over to the window ledge, acorn in paw. He presses his tiny, twitchy nose to the screen. “You couldn’t last a day out here, Bob. Some of us have to live by our wiles.”
“Hey, I lived on the street longer than you’ve been alive.”
Nutwit nibbles his acorn. He’s quite the prissy eater. “Whatever you say, Bob.”
“I say scram.”
“Fine. Hint taken. Anyway, storm’s en route. I should be stocking up on my nut stash while I can.” Nutwit gives me a wise-guy look. “That’s how we do it in the real world.” He scampers off with an acrobatic flourish.
Squirrels never do a simple jump when a quadruple-backflip-cartwheel is an option.
“You’re full of it,” I say to nobody in particular.
“We’re full of it!” says Minnie.
“Yes, we’re extremely full of it!” says Moo, and they popcorn in agreement.
Guinea pigs hop up and down when they’re happy. It’s called popcorning. And it’s totally ridiculous.
You’re happy, wag your tail like a real mammal.
“I am not soft,” I mutter, nosing my protruding belly.
I leap, with effort, off the couch. Then I head to the bathroom for a good, long drink from the water bowl of power.
spoiled
I know Nutwit has a point.
I’ve become a creature of habit, spoiled after a stretch of being my own dog. For a long time, I was Bob the beast, cunning and streetwise.
As a stray, I lived off leftovers at the mall while Snickers dined on her fancy-pants kibble. Man, how I loved that cotton candy stuck to the floor. The unexpected UFOs. The ends of ketchup-covered hot dogs, scattered under the bleachers like, I dunno, big toes or something.
Ivan offered to share his gorilla food with me, and Stella and Ruby were always ready to pass along a carrot or an apple. But I refused. I needed to stay in shape, stay tough, stay true to my wild nature.
Okay, so maybe every now and then I’d sneak a banana chunk from Ivan’s breakfast.
But then things changed. I became civilized. Domesticated. A pet.
Don’t get me wrong. There are definitely some perks. Julia, who’s an artist, painted my name on a food bowl. She gave me this wonderfully mushy blanket, the kind where you can bed boogie forever till it’s squished to perfection and you can curl up just so.
I love that blanket. But I simply cannot sleep without Not-Tag, Ivan’s raggedy old toy gorilla.
Course, just when I get my blanket and Not-Tag imprinted with the right amount of Eau de Bob, Julia’s mom does the unthinkable. Puts them in the washing machine and removes every last bit of . . . me.
There are other indignities I tolerate.
The daily walk on a tug-of-war string, after going stringless my whole life.
The attempts to train me. Like that’ll ever happen.
The kisses and cuddling.
Well, the cuddling’s okay, I s’pose.
But the kissing I just don’t get. If you wanna kiss your dog, why not just give him a big old lick on the face and be done with it?
Anyways. So what if I’ve gotten a little spoiled? A tad soft around the edges?
There’s a difference between being soft and being afraid. Being a coward.
another confession
Too bad I know the truth.
I’m both.