THE PET CHRONICLES
BY JOLENE HEAD
A CONCERT IN THE DARK
WOOBBBOOO, WOOOBBBOOO! I am sitting awake listening to the sound of something I can’t quite place. What is it? WOOOBBOOO! There it is again. This time Pike hears it and gets up. He walks to the top of the stairs, sighs a heavy sigh and comes back to bed. WOOBBOOO! Oh come on, it is 2:30 in the morning! What could possibly be making that noise? It sounds like a horn, only deeper and more breathy. I get out of bed and pad through the house in search of this odd noise. Pike clearly doesn’t care or maybe he already realized that the noise is coming from downstairs- more precisely from the kennel the puppy sleeps in. When I approach the kennel, I am quiet as to not get him all wound up. Then I hear it again. WOOOBBOOO-it echoes off the plastic crate and reverberates through the still and quiet house. I peer in and see too big
chocolate eyes peering back at me from the other side of a big red Kong filled with peanut butter. From this angle I can only laugh at what looks to be a dog playing the latest wind instrument to join the ranks. The french horn has nothing on this highly crafted, piece of red, industrial-strength rubber, chew-toy filled with peanut butter. The noise it makes is a mixture of Jabber Jaws Woobooboo cartoon days and a muffler. Rome’s concert for the masses will however, have to wait until the daylight hours. Pike has come down to check and see why I am not back to bed yet and peers in at the puppy as if to say, “are you kidding me right now, do you not realize some of us have to actually work tomorrow?”
I reach in to take the Kong from the puppy and put it aside for later in the day. I turn to head upstairs when I hear him Squeak, Squeak,Squeak,Squeak,Squeak. UGGGG!!!!!! What now? An encore? Are you serious? Back down the stairs I come to peer through to see the puppy chewing on his raccoon with such wild abandon I almost feel bad at what I am about to do. I reach in, pat his head and remove the raccoon from the kennel and search for anything else that could possibly make noise of any kind. I let him out to go potty and kennel him back up . I lay in bed waiting for something else and just as I drift to sleep, I hear the unmistakeable noise of Elaina screaming, “MOMMY MOMMY!!!!” I race into her room where she turns to me with her deep chocolate brown eyes and says, “mommy, I need some more water”. Of course you do , while we are up, lets go potty. 10 minutes later I am back in bed. Just as I began to drift to sleep, I feel a presence in the room and open my eyes to two eyes the color of the bluest ocean peering at me. Conner is there saying he needs a cough drop. Up I go to the medicine cabinet to retrieve the cough drops and then back to bed. I drift off to sleep when the emergency phone rings and I hear the sound of Jacob saying, “this is Dr. Head”. I lay there and listen to him talk to a worried client and wonder if we are going in... nope, sounds like it can wait until we are open. I rest my head back and Bradly, our oldest, comes in and asks if we need to go in. “No,” I say, “go back to bed.”
I roll over and look at the clock and see the numbers staring back at me with their neon green glow and see that it is 5:49 am and it is time to start the day. As if on-cue, I hear Pike race down the stairs, the puppy is crashing around in his kennel, the water for the shower has the pipes humming and we start another day. I shift in bed and stare at my husband’s still closed-eyes and wonder what the back of my own eyelids might look like. I prepare to start my day. I feed the kids, I feed the dogs and as I drive into Starbucks for my morning coffee fix- I am half-tempted to ask if I can get it by the liter. I do my Wal-mart run where I make the smartest purchase of my entire life.... EAR PLUGS. Here is hoping for some sleep and quite. Sleep well my friends, sleep well.
