Every dog has to leave his mother if he wants to be a real hound. It’s strange because I once knew a dog in Amsterdam who had lived with his ma his whole life. It was odd to always see them together and in all honesty I have to say that he wasn’t right in the head. He was afraid of everything and I guess that’s why he never left.
I would have been a terrible pet. I was born a street dog and I’m still a street dog through and through. Some dogs grow up thinking that wandering is a bad thing, that you should mark your territory and stay inside your fence. But I can’t help it, there’s something about a fence or a leash that don’t make me feel free inside. There was a whole world out there that I needed to explore. I guess that’s one of the reasons I chose to leave that day with Lily.
I remember years ago there was a time when I was feeling particularly blue. I had been incarcerated for months and a friend of mine, a little street buddy called Jack took me to see a wise old sage, a standard Schnauzer named Dougal. Dougal was an expert in the field of canine depression and he told me that he believed I suffered from an acute condition of canine claustrophobia.
My claustrophobia stems from the nine months I spent hidden in that tiny caravan with Lily. Lily had her own little wagon, actually it was a rusted out old Volkswagen parked off to the side of the groove where all the other gypsies lived and that’s where we stayed. There was room for her in her fathers wagon, but Lily preferred to be on her own, she preferred to be with me. I don’t know why she kept me hidden, all the other gypsy kids had dogs, I guess she just wanted me all to herself.
Anyway every Friday night when the music was playing, and the gypsies were drinking and dancing around the fire she would take me back to the barn to see mother and my five brothers. It was a like a giant weekly reunion. Lily used to stand all the puppies up against the wall and measure us one by one, I think she wanted to make sure she was feeding me right.
For a long time I was always the smallest and littlest of the pups and my brothers would lie on their backs and gurgle about in mirth. Sometimes this would make me so angry that I’d feel the rage boil up inside and I would pounce on the closest fattest prick, grabbing at his ear, tearing at it with my tiny razor sharp teeth. Then it would be all on, each one of us biting, hissing, clawing, spitting at each other, grabbing whatever we could get.
Then Lily would cry and mother would have to step in and split us all up. It wasn’t the fighting I hated the most, it was the having to apologize that really got to me. Mother was always tougher on the other guys though, I think she knew that I was different, maybe even a little odd and not quite right in the head myself. I always knew that she truly loved me, that was why she let me leave that very first day with Lily.
I guess I’ve digressed a little bit from my “action adventure” story today. The truth is I have been avoiding telling you something, because even though I’m very old and it happened a long time ago, remembering it still causes me a good deal of pain…
You see something happened late one Friday night on the way to see Mother and the boys in the barn. The memory of it is still as fresh and as vivid in my mind as though it were yesterday. But it didn’t happen to me, it happened to Lily…
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Good to catch up with Scrap and Lily Geoff!
I really like the “digression” in this chapter, filling a the outline a bit more I think of it …as it give more context and depth to the characters (human as well as animal). I know it is essentially an adventure story and you are not aiming to write like Henry James or someone, but it is interesting to me anyways, to have a bit more ‘background’ and context.
You cover a lot of info. in a few lines. We know from the very opening line of course that Scrap did choose to go with Lily, (cliffhanger from chap.4), but it feels right that he is still around the camp, is being cared and fed well (love the bit about Lily comparing his growth to the others, lol), and is even getting some socialisation with his siblings. And some rough and tumble ‘boy stuff’ well its prob. more like puppy stuff, acting out, learning limits, etc.
The part of the story about his claustrophobia etc. is interesting, and has obvious parallels I would say anyway, with humans “incarcerated”, along with the challenges of the nervous dog who always was protected or maybe over protected by his mother, and had a rather ‘enclosed’ life emotionally as a result. And we get clearly from the older Scrap that which has been hinted at from the beginning, that he is a vagrant, a ‘gypsy’ dog, or as is said here a “street dog”, not a house dog, and his spirit needs that freedom come what may… even if his physical safety is less able to be assured.
And as usual, you have left us with a cliff hanger situation re. Lily this time…. which is probably all covered in next chapter as I seem to be behind a week, so well done for this one and will read and comment on the next one soon : )
Hi Anne,
Your comments as always are very helpful. I write very intuitively so they actually explain some things to me, which I LOVE.
Geoff
You are welcome Geoff. I like reading and commenting on your story so I am glad it is not inappropriate, from your perspective.
Thats v. interesting, about writing intuitively.
I’m just thinking that there are links and parallels in both animal and human life, that give Scraps story something of the flavour of a fable, or ‘morality tale’ perhaps?.. where big themes are dealt with in digestible form, eg. using intelligent observant and resilient animals, and sometimes very dense and unself-reflecting humans ; ) ….
Metaphor and allegory, action and story lines that intuitively make sense and add momentum – interspersed with nice pauses and little reflections that vary the pace of the unfolding of story. I guess like a piece of music or opera or play or novel? Rhythm and tempo can vary, and that adds interest and ‘colour’; but the tone and theme are yet moving things forward on the storys’- or the writers – own terms.
cheers,
Anne.