Midsummer Sketches
Around 45 summers ago I watched the family dog stare out my budgerigar which perched in its cage, suspended above him under the staircase. I became transfixed, as the dog sat quite still and didn’t respond to any of the usual calls for walks, treats or play, and the minutes passed. ‘What’s up with the dog?’ I asked but got no answer from those absorbed in television or chores. The usually skittish Barney the dog was intent, and intense for a good ten minutes, and then suddenly let out a single, piercingly loud bark – at which point my budgie fell off its perch and hit the sandy cage bottom stone dead.
I was incensed: the stupid dog had freaked out my bird with it’s stare and then given her a stupid heart attack with his stupid bark – this tiny frail little thing against this stupid huge hairy stinking barking stupid idiot stood no chance. Some hours later, with tears and a small ceremony attended by close relatives and absolutely no dog, the bird was buried under the roses in the garden.
For over 40 years I have told this little story of the family dog barking my budgie to an untimely death. Except… as I watch intently the bird in my garden struggle to regain its strength enough to fight another day… I wonder… did the dog sense that something was wrong with the budgie and try it’s best to alert us to it – and in that final second, bark not to cause it to fall, but because it fell. Perhaps the ‘stupid’ dog, was not so stupid after all.
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