"If you wanted a calm animal, why
on earth did you get a Dalmatian?" my veterinarian asked the day I
consulted her about my dog's hyperactive personality.
Pepper, I had told him, has some
really annoying habits, one of them being trail blazing. The way our lawn
looks, crisscrossed from fence line to fence line, you'd think there was a herd
deer out there instead of one spotted dog with an obsession for jogging.
Next to running, what Pepper likes
best is excavating. If I had a dime for every hole that creature's dug, I could
buy a dog run with a sterling silver lock.
She has taken over our moonscape of
a backyard. It's my territory, she says in the kind of bass voice that would be
unbecoming to a female of any other species, and nobody better forget it. Especially
no body belonging to a meter reader better forget it.
And she means it! Day after day
Pepper keeps a watch out for the electric-meter reader so that when he finally
comes by she can engage him in a little over-the-fence conversation. A little
over-the-fence conversation goes like this: "If you even look like you're going
to come in here and read this meter, I will personally see to it that no one
ever again accuses you of having a nose."
Actually, noses are not Pepper’s
favorite food. What she really likes are sleeping bags, imported leather boots,
irreplaceable wooden antiques, and table scraps. Her definition of table scraps
is anything she grabs off your plate when you're not looking.
I tell you, you don't want an animal in the house around meal time, who is big enough to reach the middle of the table, from a standing position. Once Pepper made off with a whole pot roast on a night
when we had important guests. It was not a pretty sight the way she swallowed
it whole right there in front of everyone without even so much as a thank you
or comment on how delicately it was seasoned.
"What your dog lacks in
manners, she makes up for in chutzpah," my husband's boss said as our pet
licked her lips and belched before turning tail to go look for a stick of
chewing gum. Of course I didn't know she was
looking for gum at the time, but there was no mistaking that she finally found
it. I now have an expensive calfskin purse with an easy access hole.
One of the hardest things we've had
to adjust to, since we plucked a tiny black and white puppy from a breeder’s
kennel with the mistaken delusion that here was a helpless little creature we
needed to save from Walt Disney's Cruella De Vil, is our dog's ungrateful
attitude.
Instead of loyally sticking around
to repay us for our hospitality by playing her designated role as man's
faithful companion and protector of his property, that self-centered animal
heads off to California every time she gets out. It's downright disgusting the
way she looks back over her shoulder as if to say, "Maybe I'll see you
around sometime, Chumps," and then makes like a locomotive for the West
Coast.
My kids all say Pepper wants to go
to Disneyland. But I know what she really has in mind. So far I've always been
able to catch up with her before she reached Hollywood to audition for the next
101 Dalmatians sequel.
By Sharon Nauta Steele
DESERET NEWS
April 8, 1992
