Well I didn’t see that one coming. One of the conditions of my Mistress adding Aristotle to our little family was that she didn’t go quite so mad on spending on us all as she may have done in the past. She thought that wasn’t unreasonable. I didn’t get a say! Anyway, it has all gone remarkably well until now. Aristotle had never known any different than us all sharing everything and given I’m not a selfish dog by nature, it has all worked fairly harmoniously. He was thrilled when he got to choose a new collar and it has never occurred to him that the rest of us might have also chosen leads, beds, blankets etc. Until now! It is the first time we have all gone away from home and needed to take our beds with us. Megan’s bed is the blue corduroy one with paw prints. It has been washed and brushed ready for her stay in hotels. Ours have not been washed as the kennel floor is not so clean as a hotel and we don’t need to make a good impression. Anyway, I packed my old bed. I don’t like taking my big one to kennels. I find my old one that bit more cosy. Shadow packed her brown bed and Megan’s was ready to go in the car as soon as my Mistress got back from taking us. I found Aristotle sitting in the hall with tears rolling down his cherubic little face. He had finally realised that everyone had a proper bed, in my case two, but not him. He and the girls normally sleep in their crates at night and have vet bed as the base. During the day he sleeps on the settee or in one of our beds. I didn’t know what to say. There’s the old big blue plastic bed, but the cushion for that was so old it fell apart, so we just have an old scrap of vet bed in that too. It’s not very cosy.
I went to get my Mistress and explained the problem to her. She went and gave Aristotle a cuddle and promised that as long as he doesn’t tell our Master he can go and choose a bed of his own just as soon as she comes home. Then she came to talk to me and asked if I would mind taking my good bed to kennels so that Aristotle could borrow my old one. It’s pushing the whole sharing thing a bit far, but I couldn’t bear to see the little chap upset, so I shrugged and said he could. In the end we all got off ok. I’ve brought some of his toys for him to play with and a couple of bones. I’ll do my best to take care of him and I’m going to ring my Mistress part way through the trip so that he can talk to her.
Alfie Dog with a little help from Rosemary J Kind alfie@alfiedog.me.uk
Alfie’s Diary – the Book is available at Amazon UK –https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B00583ZGSA