Sophie, our black cocker spaniel can be a mean old broad.
She is thirteen, so that is ninety-one in dog years.
We were wondering how she would “do with the new puppy”.
My husband wanted to wait until she was gone to get a new baby.
Are you kidding me? That could be six or seven years, I told him.
I am not waiting six or seven years!
His parents had cockers that lived to be eighteen and nineteen.
In dog years that made their ages 126 and 133.
This new baby Beau was quiet, did not make a sound in the car.
We were on the road two hours; he did not make one single peep.
He was fine until Sophie gave him a warning snarl.
That puppy answered her with a bark that came from the bowels of hell.
Sophie turned tail and ran
We have never seen this before.
This is when I knew things were going to be okay.
Tip tap tip tap tip tap. They are coming much faster now.
I said Mama is taking a nigh-night.
That is dog-speak for do you want to snuggle up against your mama?
She is seven, we rescued her almost six years ago.
She loves a good snuggly night-night.
They say a dog can understand as much as a two-year-old child.
Our dog understands that when Daddy is in the kitchen, and the refrigerator door opens,
She has a good chance of scoring a piece of beef, chicken, sausage, or hot dog.
She also knows if it is Mama in the kitchen, she might as well stay on the couch with her tongue hanging out.
I do not share the way he does. I do not think an eighteen inch dog needs to weigh 200 pounds.
He had cockers. He knows all about them.
Tip. Tap. Tip. Tap.
I just lost her to the sound of the refrigerator door opening.