Freedom!

Yesterday was a very long day. I was booked to have my stitches removed in the evening but confined to the house until then and suffering with cabin fever despite the best efforts of my humans to keep me entertained.

I sat by the safety gate at the front door watching the builders’ dogs running around and felt a great urge to jump the gate and join them! The nice man from DHL made a fuss of me and gave me lots of treats but he had to get on with his deliveries so I was on my own again.

I walked round the kitchen and licked the floor just in case there were any titbits I’d missed but I’d forgotten the floor had been washed that morning so just got a mouthful of lemony chemicals on my tongue.

Then I had a mooch around the sitting room and decided to lie under the coffee table in the hope someone would notice how bored I was but everyone was busy at the start of a new week so that didn’t work.

At long last we left for the surgery. In the car park, I sat patiently and on my best behaviour to set an example to the other dogs there, including a frisky Spaniel puppy who pulled on its lead in a very naughty fashion and refused to go into the surgery, and a scary-looking black muscle-bound hunk of dog who whined and fussed and made me rather nervous.

When the vet came out to me, it took all my training to stop myself jumping up and licking him with delight as he took off my jacket and proceeded to clip the stitches from my back. He seemed pleased with my progress and said running around was now allowed but that I couldn’t go swimming for a couple of weeks. (That’s fine by me as the water’s still far to cold to do much more than get my feet wet.)

When we got home, I jumped out of the car and ran. I ran up the field and did a couple of laps at a speed a greyhound would have admired. Then I ran through the gate into the rose garden, jumped the flower bed like a racehorse, and took off round the big lawn for a few more laps just for the sheer joy of it. I made for home, taking the hedge in one massive leap, and landed with tongue wagging, tongue lolling and eyes sparkling at the feet of my delighted owners. I’m free and life is good once more!