Today August 26, I should talk about International Dog Day. Well, I did not on my volunteer website, but here I will. It's going to turn out into another personal memoir.
Dogs have always been part of my life since childhood.
When I was born, I think, my mother's parents had a dog at their home. She told me the story of how even the dog at our home was planned into mental blame and was annoyed to be ruffian that it has to be terminated to death.
Later when I was in Uraiyur, where my father was working in the sugar factory, we had the neighbor's dog always visiting us. His name was Shankar. He was having more of us as his home though he always like going back to his home. I do not know what makes him always come to us but whenever I am up during the day he used be in our home participating in all of my activities right from gardening to guarding me.
At the same time, there was a puppy that grew up to be a dog ahead of me - that's natural as you all know that dogs grow 15 times faster than us. So he was like a plump pig when we go to visit my grandparents I can't bear his weight and needed my mother's support and begging to stop him from jumping on me, licking me, sniffing me all over, and in the entire process pushing me down to the floor and all my toes bruised in his weight - unbound joy in welcoming me home! You will never know what made him intelligent but he's got more than a terrier, dachshund, beagle, Doberman, and whatnot that even I am not aware of. And he has one girlfriend, but my mother tells me that sometimes she suspects many of them were his puppies - why not, he was the smartest on The American Mission campus and has such a large territory for himself with no man being able to enter without his permission - not even the wild boars and porcupines. Well, that reduced a heap of my grandfather's workload. And he loves taking my titbits because he knows that I am the only one who will get the news lately about his diet that he should not be fed with that he can taste by then. And, needless to say, there will be always something new to learn like eating a cone of ice cream or an apple cake that he always can get a bite of because something will fall down for sure on the floor; and there will be no fussy about him eating it because sometimes it will get dropped in purpose! This gave me the privilege to cover him with the blanket at night when he goes to bed with us on par with my grandmother and my mother, and there was always a piggyback ride during morning sunbath with my mother - what a view of the lake? I learned my environmental lessons from my mother watching along with him. He is the one who taught me how I should avoid the busy bees gathering honey from the flowers in my grandparent's garden and in those gardens of those people living in the hills at the other end and in the nearby Bryant Park. Well, they own everything and there were no boundaries for them. He is the one who used to take care of me from not being bullied by my sister and cousins and took my place in turning me that they all lost - his point is I should not fall down the hill slope and the green wet slippery grass, besides he knew the terrain better than me giving them all a clear message - want someone on par with you? I miss now for not understanding that I could have hugged him than crying for blocking me from playing. What to do as he had clear instructions from my mother asking him to take care of me and he watched my mother and grandparents chiding my siblings for bullying me for my ignorance. Maybe he will be the happiest pal to know how kind I am now despite knowing more than them in many ways. And there he was ready to join my mother for a picnic, a walk in the garden, and only my and my time anywhere including shopping. What more he gets but only a walk with us that gives him immense joy for there was always him involved! He has the best coat that won him the First grand prize at the world-famous Kodaikanal Dog Show making my sister the proud winner. He loves kittens - nibbling them is fun and he agrees to Enid Blyton's Topsy. But mother pussy never agrees to it and poor did Sherly know that I will take all her kittens in her absence as I had enough pockets in my jumpsuit for each one of them. Unfortunate, Zimbo was not around, but I got caught by the entire family including one old warrior Brigadier thatha exalted to find many small mews from my pocket with a big mummy mewing pleadingly at my back that they had to run at my back and pamper me to return the kittens back to their mother. Even now they talk about it, maybe he is from heaven. I still remember being pulled back along with him by my grandmother for getting under the bed to get the kittens and being chided for Sherly being in bad temper for disturbing her children. Needless to say, who will mind me telling him that I will eat his food because he is very much assured that he will get it all no matter what and gobble it at one go - of course, he never minds the kittens getting inquisitive about his plate and he doesn't mind them licking the drops that might be left out of the stew once he's done, but never before or when he's eating. Bathing him is very tough - warm water and he hates it! We never had to leash him even in the church he knows how to gimmick the pastor of the church until he forgets and goes to the pulpit to wish him with a wag only to be sent out of the church sadly if not there can be a small bark at times with the hymns. I don't know why the pastor minds him worshipping with us, anyway, he's part of our family and was healed by God's grace - that's why all the extravaganza allowance of not complaining to my grandparents that he is the only family dog attending the church.
After him, there were no pets in our house. But we had a lot of stray animals helped and they are helping me in return since 2014. They found that there was drug trafficking near our house, they were doped to mate a puppy, with another mother stray bitch named beauty "hearing" all the plans and if I am getting emotionally upset. She knew that my baby was hated and the womb was hated even more and the plan was to mutilate and humiliate it with drugs. She spent time "hearing" all the conversations. There was Rangeela teaching Thomas kitten how to warm me up as she smelt me at the distance turning cold and going down when they had doped me thinking that a Christian baby was formed in my womb during a Hindu festival despite the temple people telling them that she is staunchly Christian and not to disturb her but for the misguided priest - that's what public got to know they wanted to abort the "Christian smart baby". And there she was day and night guarding the gate that no man or woman was allowed to get near the gate.
And, so there is now a beautiful puppy appearing like Zimbo, with hooves that can hop like a horse, finding a home has made him so happy that he wants the same belly rub as he's getting in his home! I call him Scott, who knows what's his home name!
Sniff! Sniff! is all the message but there's a lot of love and so much of a personality that's more adorable than a human!
