Our Fifth Doberman

Lucky Garvin
Lucky Garvin

I guess it happens to everyone [although I seem to do it more than most]; get lost; go right when I should go left. I recall my first day in high school, heading out for Geometry. Turned right and entered a room redolent with the smell of brownies and the bustle of a bunch of young women in aprons. “This really doesn’t seem like math to me.” I looked above the door, “Home Econ.” Okay, so sue me.

A similar thing must have happened to Napoleon Bonaparte Garvin – no relation to that French guy we read about in history – at least known I’m aware of. He’s a one-eyed, knock-kneed, peaches and cream colored kitten, hair-covered, not fur, Sabrina and I just rescued. Watching him around the house gives rise to a thought…

It is illogical and unscriptural, but I believe when a critter spirit is created, they must attend a class where they are better informed of the type animal or bird they are to be: bird, or dog, or squirrel, or whale whatever; further, they must attend this class prior to coming to Earth. They receive their final form as they come to Earth. Prior to that they are spirits, and one spirit looks pretty much like another; no distinctions.

I believe, without equivocation, that Napoleon was seeking his class with his map upside down. He wandered into ‘his’ room, and since all the beings there and in each classrooms are merely spirit glows – not yet having taken Earthly form – he could not have known he was in the wrong room.

While there, he learned that he would grow large, be fearless, bark and bay, and lovingly protect his family. This lesson fully absorbed, Napoleon left the class. Had he bothered to look up he would have seen the sign: Doberman Classroom.

Thus Napoleon came to Earth looking much like a kitten, but acting much like a Doberman. More precisely, he is under the Heaven endowed impression that he is, in fact, a Doberman.

If you weighed him, I would be astonished if his body weight exceeded two pounds, a convenient single-serving size for a Dobie. But on the Cattitude scale, he would twist the needle off the dial.

He struts between our four Dobies as a peer, utterly fearless. If he wants to get from Point A to Point B, and there are four Dobermans lying between, he simply skips over their backs like racing over stepping stones across a creek. If they be standing, he scoots between their legs at such speed I doubt they ever knew he was there. And the most amazing behavior: sometimes, he’ll lie down on his back, stomach exposed – which is a p0osition animals rarely take unless submitting or fearless. Since, from this position he reaches up and swats their noses, I suspect the latter attitude is in play.

We have one Doberman who, because of a paw problem must wear one of those abominations called a ‘cone’ which fits around his neck and face and prevents him from licking a wound. Napoleon thought this device quite remarkable, so, as the dog lay on the floor, Napoleon crawled inside and fell asleep next to the Doberman’s snout.

But he also does some things of arguable intelligence; like the day he pawed open a cabinet door. Behind the door was darkness, so he leaned inside, farther, farther… and fell down the laundry bin. Happily there was a pile of clothes there to cushion his landing. Sabrina and I rushed down to retrieve him, bought him back upstairs. Once there, he immediately ran back to the same opening peered inside, seemed to say, “What’s this dark hooooolle…..!” There was a Doppler effect as he, once again, fell in.

He takes great joy in attacking anything in our home, be they four-footed or two, as much as he enjoys curling up on Sabrina’s or my lap, or on the back of a somnolent Doberman. There he will stay until he feels the helm of sleep, at which point he simply arises, stretches, and takes his little magisterial self off to bed without so much as a ‘by your leave.”

Given this canine propensity, I am concerned he will learn Dobie ‘Head Fakes.” The other day, our oldest Dobie Jax walked to the door as if needing to go to the back yard. I got up, went to the door, where upon Jax executed a 180 and jumped into my very recently vacated chair.

I hope Napoleon won’t begin to take note of such behavior and start some tricks of his own. But believe me, it wouldn’t surprise me a bit!

Look for Lucky’s books locally and on-line: I Swear By Apollo; The Oath of Hippocrates; The Cotillian; A Journey Long Delayed; Campfire Tales; Sabonics; More Campfire Tales; Growing Up In Stephentown; Animal Archives; The Story Teller.

SEE SABRINA’S WILDLIFE WEBSITE: FACEBOOK.COM/SWVA WILDLIFE

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