I was looking at pictures of some of my past Shelties. Hallie Sheltie passed away last year and Princess Darcy the year before. Kind of makes me a little sad. I wrote a short story a while back about them that I would with the pictures. Billy is my youngest son and was in elementary school and Hallie was pretty much his dog and was about 3. They would play for hours and often when they should have both been in bed.... Darcy was an older (about 14) Sheltie I adopted. She had lost most of her teeth and all of her hearing but she was a sweet girl. Anyway here is the story for your enjoyment: _______________________________________________________________ For the young hell-bent on chasing the sun through the sky and claiming all they see as their own, sleep is an anathema, a foe. They wage a pitched battle against it every night, but every battle ends in a loss. It is not a spectacular loss like the sacking of Troy. No, it is a slow but inevitable loss. Even the fiercest of the day warriors succumb to a gradual loss of willpower to fight anymore. The beginning of the end starts with a gentle yawn here, a droopy eyelid there, or perhaps the odd stretch. Sleep is egalitarian; it affects the brave young warriors, Billy and Hallie, equally and they each sleep the good sleep. Through the night their young bodies marshal their forces, building new supplies of energy until it and they can be contained no longer. They burst into the morning with Hallie sprinting out the back door barking excitedly and Billy running through the house looking for the one shoe that somehow separated itself from the other during the night. He yells at Hallie for stealing his shoe as certainly he could not have left it in some random location in the house despite the fact that his clothes from the previous day are distributed throughout the house. It is of no real consequence as Hallie is already outside and the errant shoe is soon found, mysteriously located next to a dirty sock in the living room. The coincidence escapes him and he makes no apologies to Hallie as he runs into the back yard with a ball. The shoe already forgotten, fearlessly they attack the day together. They continually chase the soccer ball from one end of the yard to the other, barking and yelling, letting everyone know it is the day, it is their time. ------- She comes to tell me it is time for sleep. The day is no longer her time but something to be endured. It is hot and uncomfortable outside and no longer fun. Going outside is just a necessity to be endured for as short a time as possible. The noise would be bothersome too if she could hear it but she can’t. A calm existence is all she wishes for. Darcy sleeps most of the day on the cool tile in a corner of the house. Curled up and protected by the two walls from running feet, she feels comfortable and safe. Here she mostly stays until it is time for dinner and the older folks bring order back to the household. Dinner is a high point of the day. With only five teeth, it takes her some time to eat the soft food but that takes nothing away from her enjoyment. She finishes her dinner and then starts to look for me as experience has taught her that I come home sometime after she eats. When she finally sees me – or my shadow as her eyes are now cloudy from cataracts – she gives me the best welcome she can: three Sheltie spins. Even at 14, her spins are still quick and graceful and I feel privileged to receive such a greeting. It is one of the few glimpses she permits into her youth of long ago. She waits until after I eat and have settled down into a chair to come by and put her front paws on one of my legs. It is her way of asking to get on my lap for a rub or pet. I have to reach down to pick her up with one of my hands under her rump. If I don’t, she will shift all of her weight to her rump and roll over backwards like a Yogi Bear beach ball I had as a kid. She enjoys the attention until finally she has had enough and goes to lie down in a corner again to rest. As the evening progresses, one-by-one the rest of the family members head off to bed. The younger ones go reluctantly and the older ones go with somewhat more enthusiasm. Working in the study, I forget how late it is… again. Darcy comes to tell me it is time for sleep, and she is right. I tell her thank you for thinking of me and pick her up. Maybe she can tell by the vibrations that I am talking to her as she wags her tail a little as we walk down the hall.
Posted on: Mon, 20 Oct 2014 16:05:02 +0000
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