BarkingProse

Betcha thought I wasn’t going to get my bark done today. I know it’s late in the day, but it took me this long to decide what to bark about.

It was a toss up between chicken stories and us dogs getting mad about mom and her motorcycle.

I’ll get to the chickens on another day. But since mom rode off and left us barking, Tess and Jack wanted me to tell everyone how left out we felt.

Mom has loved motorcycles since she was little. She got her first motorcycle when she was done with college. She bought it from some guy and then had to call her friend to ride it home for her because she didn’t know how to drive it.

Over the years mom rode lots of motorcycles. Her favorite is her old BMW she’s had for thirty years. She says it’s as smooth as a sewing machine when it’s tuned up right.

Most of the time mom drives the car so she can take us with her. But today she said the sunlight was perfect for an afternoon ride. So she asked dad to watch us and off she went by herself on her motorcycle.

Us dogs were awful mad that she would leave us. We carried on something terrible. Tess barked, Jack wailed and I howled. Mom looked at us in disbelief and then started laughing. She said if we kept it up she might not come home in time for our dinner. That really got to us so we complained even louder.

Mom came home about two hours later. None of us told her that as soon as she was out of sight we went and took a nice nap. We wanted her to feel guilty so she wouldn’t leave us again, but dad ratted us out. I hope it snows soon so mom can’t ride her motorcycle. Either that or she’ll have to get a sidecar and take us with her.

Anyway, we were plenty mad and we want everyone to know how badly we were treated. She better stay home with us tomorrow!

Remember I got in trouble for going a whole week without barking? I promised mom I would post a bark every day in September to make up for goofing off. I’ve been thinking about the different things I could bark about and decided to start out with some silly stuff.

Mom was pretty young when she found her first Australian Shepherd. She named him Jesse. He was black and white and most people thought he was a border collie, but he was all Aussie.

Mom said Jesse was crazy about the ball like me. Since mom was young and goofy, she liked to teach Jess all sorts of stupid dog tricks. Her favorite was tennis ball in the toilet.

She won’t show me how it worked but she described it to me. She and Jess would go in the bathroom. Jess would sit facing the toilet. Mom would drop the ball in the toilet and tell Jess to leave it. She’d flush the toilet and the water would suck the ball down to the bottom of the bowl.

Then she’d tell Jess “okay” so he’d know he could go after the ball. He’d wait until the toilet was finished emptying. When the water started coming back into the toilet the ball would shoot straight up into the air. Jess would leap up and grab it. Mom didn’t want to handle the yucky wet tennis ball so she taught Jess to drop it back in the toilet himself. Then she’d flush and they’d do it all over again. Mom said that’s an example of how dumb she was when she was young.

Mom also taught Jess to climb up on the kitchen table. She says she has no idea thirty years later why she thought that was a good idea at the time. It didn’t bother her to have Jess sitting on the kitchen table while she was cooking, but it sure made other people nervous.

I wish I could have known my mom when she was young and silly. By the time I came along she had gotten all serious. But I think she still has a silly streak. Yesterday when I brought her three pairs of shoes from her closet just so she’d pay attention to me, she laughed and told me how much she loved my silly self. Maybe if I work with my mom I can help her remember how much fun it is to be silly. I’m counting on her. Gotta run!