Our Mistresses' Voice
How very peculiar; the more hard of hearing she becomes, the more vocal also. This is a riff on that little old "his master's voice" dictum alluding to authority and response. Given that our black miniature poodle Button, now fourteen years old, is alert only to sharp sounds, she cannot respond to her master's voice, a very nice baritone, but one whose resonance in authority has been lost.
He tucks her tenderly into bed every night and carefully covers her with her own little blanket, to ensure she is entirely comfortable before heading off into doggy nightscape. She's an odd little beast; since she was a puppy she has suffered from what can only be described as recurring nightmares. Why that should be so is quite beyond us. But when that happens we know; she utters plaintive whines and we hasten to comfort her.
She has always, as far as we're concerned, led a privileged life, other than for the first five years when we were both working out of the house and then it was a day-time lonely life while we were out of the house. Since then it is she who has literally ruled this roost; we hasten to obey her every command, evident in the canine utterances we have come to understand.
In turn she too understands our command/demands for she has acquired a sizeable vocabulary of understanding; the tone of our voices, the measure of our actions, a reasonable deciphering of events around her necessarily impacting on her in some manner. She may be aged in terms of the length of time she has spent on this earth, but she remains a puppy at heart.
She is nimble, agile, possessed of a superb memory, given to lending herself to certain enterprises from which she extracts pleasure. She is also in fact, physically indefatigable, certainly far more so than we three-score-and-ten elders - giving us a true run for our money despite that her age quite equals ours. But then we are not quadrupeds.
She has taken to waking us in the morning, quite unlike the quiescent patience of her history with us up until now, when she would ensure we were already wide awake before demanding attention. Now, every morning, at miserably early hours anywhere from 6:00 a.m. and beyond - generally commensurate with daylight - she pads restlessly about the bedroom, and begins to whine.
We can always whine back at her, imploring her to go back to sleep, or to be quiet, but then there's the little trifle of her failing hearing abilities, along with her general disinclination, so the efforts are for naught. One of us, usually her purported "master" rises, to let her out into the backyard to relieve her bladder; I swear she does this in mocking emulation of her "master".
After which she generally consents to return to bed for another snooze. Which may last anywhere from a half-hour to an hour, and then it is back to the restless padding-about and relentless whining. We very well know what it is she wants; she is insisting on being fed. At this juncture we realize the game of sleeping in is over.
Sigh.
He tucks her tenderly into bed every night and carefully covers her with her own little blanket, to ensure she is entirely comfortable before heading off into doggy nightscape. She's an odd little beast; since she was a puppy she has suffered from what can only be described as recurring nightmares. Why that should be so is quite beyond us. But when that happens we know; she utters plaintive whines and we hasten to comfort her.
She has always, as far as we're concerned, led a privileged life, other than for the first five years when we were both working out of the house and then it was a day-time lonely life while we were out of the house. Since then it is she who has literally ruled this roost; we hasten to obey her every command, evident in the canine utterances we have come to understand.
In turn she too understands our command/demands for she has acquired a sizeable vocabulary of understanding; the tone of our voices, the measure of our actions, a reasonable deciphering of events around her necessarily impacting on her in some manner. She may be aged in terms of the length of time she has spent on this earth, but she remains a puppy at heart.
She is nimble, agile, possessed of a superb memory, given to lending herself to certain enterprises from which she extracts pleasure. She is also in fact, physically indefatigable, certainly far more so than we three-score-and-ten elders - giving us a true run for our money despite that her age quite equals ours. But then we are not quadrupeds.
She has taken to waking us in the morning, quite unlike the quiescent patience of her history with us up until now, when she would ensure we were already wide awake before demanding attention. Now, every morning, at miserably early hours anywhere from 6:00 a.m. and beyond - generally commensurate with daylight - she pads restlessly about the bedroom, and begins to whine.
We can always whine back at her, imploring her to go back to sleep, or to be quiet, but then there's the little trifle of her failing hearing abilities, along with her general disinclination, so the efforts are for naught. One of us, usually her purported "master" rises, to let her out into the backyard to relieve her bladder; I swear she does this in mocking emulation of her "master".
After which she generally consents to return to bed for another snooze. Which may last anywhere from a half-hour to an hour, and then it is back to the restless padding-about and relentless whining. We very well know what it is she wants; she is insisting on being fed. At this juncture we realize the game of sleeping in is over.
Sigh.
Labels: Companions
posted by Pieface @ 12:05 PM
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