There was a time when I leapt from chair to couch and back again with nary a pant. Now, my solar plexus trembles under the weight of my own memory. I know I am a fragile and complex canine, but perhaps that's not the good thing I once thought it was. There is a fine line between Diva and piece of work, and I am plagued by the question: have I crossed it?
I like to chew socks.
Sometimes when I sleep, I am roused by the very force of my own exhalations. They resound in a cyclical keen of Why, Why, Why?
Last week I got my toenail caught in my ear-hair.
My youngest charge vexes me, veritably pulling the fur of her own protector. Daily, I ask myself if she is worth the chowder.
Can Opener! (hold up right paw) High Fours!
So contented was I with my tail of splendour. In those years when I was the only spaniel, I held it aloft--my plume of vanity. I knew nothing of the Blenheim Lozenge, that yarmulke of superiority, and I wanted for nothing. Now I feel the pain of knowledge--the knowledge of what I do not have. My glory days lay at my feet, a shameful pile of broken trinkets.
Got Splotch??
I believe T.S. Eliot was thinking of me when he wrote The Four Quartets. You'll say that's impossible given the time-space continuum as humans understand it, but if you simply re-read Burnt Norton it'll all make sense to you. Go ahead, I'll wait.
Sometimes I hide behind the couch and then JUMP OUT and run really fast into another room and then skitter across the hardwood floor and forget why I came in there so then I run really fast back to the couch in the living room and do a little business-business.
The Waste Land? Also about me.
I forget all about it until someone finds it and yells, Pam Spaneeuuul! and then I do ears-hang-low.
HURRY UP PLEASE IT'S TIME
S'okay because I like my name. It rhymes with ham. Pam, ham. Pam, ham. Pam, ham...
...Pam ham, Pam ham, Pam ham...Get it, get it, Clover? I'm a poet and I don't know it, ha ha ha!
Pamela Spanela, you are a jewel.
Posted by: Kim | February 05, 2011 at 08:49 AM
I was almost giddy when I got to the fourth photo down...and thought Pam was chewing on a wine cork.
PS-They are both divine.
Posted by: eurolush | February 05, 2011 at 11:34 AM
Clover and Pam are both great.Clover will teach Pam all her tricks.
Posted by: Irma | February 05, 2011 at 02:33 PM
priceless!
Posted by: DawnC | February 05, 2011 at 04:35 PM
I didn't get it the first time I read it, but now I think I do: the two dogs "speak" in two different typefaces.
I always enjoy photos of the cuteness in your life.
Posted by: ssheers | February 06, 2011 at 10:23 AM
'You are old, Mistress Clover', the young dog said,
'And your hair has become very white;
And yet you incessantly stand on your head --
Do you think, at your age, it is right?'
'In my youth', Mistress Clover replied to young Pam,
'I feared it might injure the brain;
But, now that I'm perfectly sure I have none,
Why, I do it again and again.'
'You are old', said Young Pam, 'and your jaws are too weak
For anything tougher than suet;
Yet you finished the goose, with the bones and the beak -
Pray, how did you manage to do it?'
'I have answered one question, and that is enough,'
Said Mistress Clover, 'don't give yourself airs!
Do you think I can listen all day to such stuff?
Be off, or I'll kick you downstairs!'
with apologies to Lewis Carroll.
Posted by: Alice C | February 06, 2011 at 11:11 AM
Tell Clover that a pure white brow really is just as kiss-able as that Bleinheim spot. Some folks may even prefer it.
But really, a toenail stuck in your ear-hair is really uncalled for! Poorest poor Pam!
Posted by: Barbara | February 07, 2011 at 11:45 AM