All my Fault

It’s Puppy Stan here and I’m all upset. See, I took Jean for a walk last night, late, very late. It was lovely out and the moon was even asleep on its side.

We were nearly home and I gave a yank to go up on a load of wet grass and she tried to pull me back and next think she gave a yelp. I heard her ankle crackling and she kinda hobbled home and put me to bed.

This morning, I woke to talk about hospital and X-rays, whatever they are and my Dada gave me my brekkie and I watched him helping Jean out the front gate. She looked AWFUL and didn’t wave back to me like she usually does.

I waited and waited for ages and thought they might never come back but they did. She still looked awful but she waved in and I started to cry i was so glad to see her and to know that she was glad to see me.

It’s all about RICE now. I don’t understand but she says it could be a lot worse. Thing is she’s in bed which is strange cos we are usually out and about in the day.

I raced up the stairs and jumped onto her bed to say ‘sorry.’ She played with my ears but didn’t want me near the crackly ankle. It looks different to usual with a big bruise on it. At least she still has an ankle. I just didn’t know exactly what’s going on but I heard her say something about lig something. I just hope that’s a good thing. Dada said earlier that soccer players have this kinda problem all the time. He’s just phoned so I wonder if she’ll get him his tea – and mine.

I will never, ever yank on the lead again or try to run on wet grass. I’ll do anything to get things back to normal, anything.

I’m sorry for going on but I just can’t bear the muddle and the guilt. My tail isn’t working right either.

Lots of love,

Stan

Treasured Guilt ~ Five Photos/Five Stories 5

I was eight when our Dalmatian, Beauty, ‘fell pregnant.’ It was either an immaculate conception or a neighbouring dog, randy Brandy, scaled the 15ft wall that lay between them and had his way with her.

Randy Brandy was a big wire haired mixum-gatherum of a dog with a long square head and every conceivable shade of brown in his coat. Beauty was ‘beauty’ personified!

She had four pups, Freckles, Brutus, Tiny and Treasure. I was absolutely thrilled when they arrived but my parents were rather less enthralled and didn’t want Beauty getting worn out by them.

My little heart broke as one by one homes were found for the pups. Treasure was my favourite and I hoped against hope that I would be able to persuade Mother and Father to keep him.

(As I look at the photo of Beauty and Treasure which Father took, the fact that Treasure is a little blurred doesn’t escape me. Beauty was the apple of Father’s eye!)

Beauty and Treasure. Photo: Frank Tubridy

However, the terrible day dawned when Mother found a woman who wanted a gentle pup to give to her mother. We were living in Castleblayney, Co. Monaghan and the new owner was based in Dublin which seemed to be at the other end of the earth to me.

Collection was arranged for a Friday evening in deepest November and the kind lady, knowing of my upset, handed me a book token for the huge sum of £1 when she arrived to take Treasure away. (At that stage, £1 was worth about a year’s pocket money to me.)

At around 10pm that night, the telephone rang and it was the rather distraught daughter phoning from Dublin to say that Treasure wouldn’t get out of her car and that she would be bringing him straight back. Needless to say, I was thrilled. ( I’ve often wondered what really happened as it couldn’t have been that difficult to get a tiny pup out of the car.)

So, when I woke the next morning, Treasure was back with Beauty, back where he belonged!

A few weeks later, friends of ours who lived just a few miles away said that they would love to have Treasure. I realised, even then, that this was probably the best offer that was open as I would get to see him regularly and I knew he would be very well looked after. Even I could see that he was getting a bit much for Beauty.

Everything worked out great for Treasure and I did get to see him as often as I wanted.

However, I’ve lived with that book token on my conscience all these years. I know I should have given it back. I know, I know, I know … but I couldn’t resist all the Nancy Drew books and the doggy diary that I could buy with it.

***

I would like to thank Willow for nominating me for this Five Photos/Five Stories Challenge.

Here are the rules for the Challenge:

“Post a photo each day for five consecutive days and attach a story to the photo. It can be fiction or non-fiction, a poem or a short paragraph and each day nominate another blogger for the challenge.

My final nomination is Dale over at A Delectable Life