From time to time I sent a photo of Snoopy to the many friends who’d expressed an interest in seeing them. To summarise their many responses, Snoopy is a poseur, handsome and photogenic, with expressive eyes and an exceptionally shiny coat. Allan went so far as to suggest that Snoopy’s breeder probably regretted letting him go and my having him desexed.
In good weather I usually spend time reading in my gazebo, in the shade and surrounded by greenery. I hadn’t wanted to distress young Snoopy by leaving him in his enclosure where he could see me, but not join me, so I’d sacrificed that pleasure all summer. But, on an unusually warm day in April, I thought I’d give it a try. As I’d feared, he whined at the gate separating us. To give us both some peace, I put Snoopy on a lead, collected his day bed, and took both into the gazebo. I attached the lead to the leg of my lounge, put his bed beside it, and lay down with my book. Snoopy immediately leapt onto the lounge, where he stayed, inspecting his new surroundings with great interest, without moving off for an hour. I wondered if he’d stay there if I let him off the lead, but I wasn’t game to find out.
Snoopy seemed to enjoy his time at Meroo Kennels, so I didn’t feel guilty leaving him there when I went to see a performance in Sydney. The only drawback was that the kennels were closed between 9.30am and 3pm. As I like to avoid spending unnecessary time in Sydney, I had to get up at the crack of dawn in order to complete the 2¼ hour drive from Newtown to Meroo Meadow by 9.30am. One morning Nathan said that Snoopy had had a great time, which I took to mean that he’d played a lot with other dogs. So he was tired, but – unlike me – he slept off his tiredness until early afternoon, by which time he was well and truly re-energised.
In the hope of tiring him, or at least slowing him down, I took him for a walk, after which one of us was exhausted. As you will doubtless have surmised, it wasn’t Snoopy. From my lounge chair I heard from the garden a strange sound I couldn’t identify, and curiosity got the better of my somnolence. I went outside, to see Snoopy racing round and round the decorative enclosed area (at 10 months, he could still get through the bars of the metal fence), sending the bark mulch flying as he sped.
You may recall my futile use of hot English mustard to deter Snoopy from extracting pieces of fluff from the small hole he’d made in the wall of his day bed. My second choice of deterrent, pepper, proved no more effective, so I thought I’d try a different approach. I spread an old handkerchief inside the hole, to inhibit Snoopy’s access to the fluff below. For a few days I thought I’d achieved success … until I found pieces of the handkerchief spread all over the lounge room floor. Was there no challenge Snoopy was unwilling – indeed not eager – to confront?
As the weather grew colder, we saw an increasing number of kangaroos on our morning walks. It took all my strength to restrain Snoopy in his attempts to chase them, but his excited yelps usually drove them out of sight before we got anywhere near them. It was bad enough when Snoopy espied them in other people’s gardens, but when, one morning, he was confronted by one in his own garden, he took it as a personal insult. And on another morning a male roo larger than me stood his ground – possibly curious to identify this small creature which, were he carnivorous, was just the right size for his breakfast. This time Snoopy came dangerously close to winning his trial of strength with me.
“Getting up close and personal” is an expression to which I’d given little thought until Snoopy came into my life. However, I could think of little else when he lay across my neck while I was trying to read in bed one morning.
And I learned that a supercharged puppy is no cure for a cough. I developed a particularly bad one during the wet period in May, and found that the best way to gain relief, during the day, was to lie on a lounge, relax, and breathe slowly. Unfortunately Snoopy took my assumption of a horizontal position as an invitation to jump on top of me, although he sometimes waited until I was in a semi-comatose state before doing so – perhaps enjoying my more strident reaction. He took great delight in walking up and down my body, before – sometimes – settling down between my arm and my torso, with his head on my shoulder, or between my legs, with his head on a more sensitive region. Either way I felt duly touched.
Tony Barnett
