Buster Brown's Sausage Story

In my second creative writing class, we read a news story about how a butcher was left open by accident and the surrounding community 'liberated' the goods.  All around were people with sausages, giving them to each other, creating good will among men, dropping them so that even the pets could enjoy them.  Our assignment was to write the story from the point of view of a character within the community. I chose a dog.  And, since there is only one dog who has really inspired me in my lifetime, I chose Buster Brown as my voice (for more Buster Brown, visit my early blogging on the JIm and Claire blog).

It had been a long week, what with the pill popping and stomach pumping.  Humiliating to be labeled a cage jumper and even more so to be forced to wear one of those giant satellite dish things on my head.  What self-respecting canine wouldn’t want to pull an IV out of his leg? Needless to say, eating a bottle of ibuprofen for attention hadn’t gotten me the kind of attention I had been seeking and I was glad to be home again, drooling in my own bed and ‘vacuuming’ the floors.

We followed the usual route on our evening walk and my nose was once again in fine form, post-vet.  While I was there I felt like I was never going to smell anything but antiseptic and cat and fear again, but a couple of minutes out in the free world cured me and I could smell that Moose had already been by on his evening walk. I lifted my leg onto his scent in greeting.  Then I had a good growl and hackle raise at the neighbor’s yard art.  I wasn’t too hot yet, so I was feeling good, not too itchy, and looking forward to flipping my squeaky frog around a few times when we got back home and the possibility of a possum sighting.

When we rounded the corner to head back to the house, I stopped short. I sniffed and snuffled and then, before I knew what to do with myself, I let out a howl and streaked off at high speed.  Being a beagle, I follow my nose, and it takes my brain a while sometimes to catch up.  I could hear Eddie shouting after me, but let me tell you that there is no such thing as an obedient beagle when there is food involved.  And this was food with a capital “F”: spicy and sweet at the same time, tangy and fat and juicy.

I shot under the first house I got to, eager to put some distance between myself and Eddie, and found myself in an enclosed yard with a deck. Trapped! To go back under the house would mean an end to my quest for Eddie would surely put me back on the leash he had so foolishly let me off of.  I peered around, frantically.  A potted plant sat above a chair on the deck and it seemed the most logical way to access the next yard, where the smell was stronger. My legs trembled and I leapt from chair to plant to fence top, where I balanced precariously and then inched forward before free falling to the ground.  Many years of cat and possum observations had taught me some fancy footwork, although I had yet to master a graceful landing.

The smell was stronger, almost visible, wafting over from the next yard.  I howled and squeezed myself under the fence, digging and clawing my way through and then, without stopping, I was upon them.  Sausages! Everywhere! I don’t know where they came from, but I wasn’t the only one who had been drawn.  People were running out of an open doorway with bags full of them. Children dropped armloads on the ground. After months of organic dog food there were sausages dropped on the ground, willy nilly!  I could hear Eddie calling me and I threw myself at them with a furor that I reserve only for food, growing and snapping at the feet around me, choking them down at breakneck speed.

 It was the best day of my life.

A return: The anecdote

I'm back!  And I'm taking a creative writing class. Our first class focused on "the anecdote" (written in the first person; could be something that happened or not). So here are my first creative writing attempts in LONG time.  I give you an anecdote from the point of of an object: Dou Dou.

To be loved so thoroughly that one’s nose has been rubbed off is a privilege.  At least I keep telling myself this, although at times I do feel slightly vulnerable.  A giraffe of my status--one who has been discontinued--is worth quite a bit and I make sure that despite my lack of nose..and my unfortunate name (which, in some cultures is a term for excrement) I continue to carry myself with dignity.

When I was new, my fur was soothing and silky to the touch.  I was a beautiful lemon yellow with soft pink spots. My body flowed out into a blanket shape, each

corner tipped with aqua green hooves.  My little ears flapped when I moved and I held my pink tipped horns at a stately angle.  My tail was a colorful conglomeration of pastel ribbons, designed to tease and tickle tiny fingers.

I was a gift for a child of only 3 months, who promptly, upon meeting me, put me in her mouth.  At first, I was horrified by the saliva on my previously pristine fur, but eventually I got used to the feeling of being sucked and chewed on and I took pride in my role as “favorite blankie,” despite the insulting title and the general hardships of my life.

I had to learn to sleep creatively—preferably on the floor or jammed between the wall and the mattress-- to prevent nightly suffocation. My frequent escapes from bed caused the child to shriek in despair, which in turn drew the exhausted parents into the room to crash about in the middle of the night trying to find me. I never managed to hide for long and all the ruckus was a bit unnerving so I focused on inching myself over onto the side of her pillow and that’s how we spent our evenings together.

I was frequently dragged about by tail and horns, stuffed into bags and boxes and suitcases, dropped from great heights into dirt and mud and, most terrifyingly, thrown into a machine that first doused me with water and then battered me for hours.  Wet and exhausted, I was then tossed into a loud, hot chamber, where I tumbled around for what seemed like an endless eternity.

But I was loved. And it was a love I couldn’t escape, a possessive and undying love that took my nose and stained my person with bodily fluids.  A love that I didn’t appreciate until the day I got lost.

It was a cold, but sunny winter day and the grandparents were visiting.  As usual, the child insisted that I come with her and I looked forward to a day outside of the house.  It was nice to get some fresh air and I enjoyed seeing the city sights.  The distractions of the outside world gave me a reprieve from the constant stroking and squeezing that the child inflicted upon me.  But it also presented other challenges, particularly when the grandparents were around and there seemed to be no end to the drips from untidily licked ice cream cones.  But still, I considered myself a giraffe of culture and felt that it was my duty to see the sights of London so I welcomed the chance to educate myself.

On that fateful day, we were headed to Covent Garden.  There was some discussion between the grandmother, a great enthusiast of flea markets and the grandfather (decidedly NOT a great enthusiast of flea markets) about how much time would be spent perusing the Covent Garden wares before heading to the ultimate destination: the Transport Museum.  The child’s mother wore a glazed look and kept checking her phone and the child was focused on pulling all of her baby wipes out of their packaging. That was when it happened.  With one  enthusiastic tug and a squeal of delight, she freed all of her wipes and sent me sailing out of the buggy and onto the ground. I watched in horror as they trundled on, not one of them noticing my dirtied and supine figure on the ground. 

At first I was sure that I would be trampled, but somehow managed just to be kicked around like an old piece of trash until someone noticed me for what I was and, with a sympathetic cluck, draped me over a nearby railing.  That gave me hope, for while I had always been treated roughly, in my opinion, my life with the child was a far better option than spending the rest of my days draped over a fence. Unfortunately the kindly person had draped me so that my head was hanging upside down, so I could hear pigeons roosting above me, but could not get a good look at just where they were positioned. It also impeded my ability to seek out my child and her family and gave me a headache.  So, confident that they would retrace their steps and find me, I decided to take a little nap.

When I awoke, I was no longer on the fence, but smashed into a dark and cold space that smelled of petrol.  I was pinned to the floor by a heavy metal object and I stared helplessly up at a small slit, through which a tiny ray of light shone.  I have to admit that I was terrified.  Everyone had heard the story of the Velveteen Rabbit and I wondered if I was destined for a similar demise. I wondered if anyone would have the common decency to at least hold a small memorial for me…or write a complimentary obituary.

At once the car (for I had determined that it was a car in which I was hurtling through time and space) stopped, sending the metal object crashing across my face.  The last thing I remember before fainting was a middle aged, dowdy woman reaching down for me.

When I came to I was in a room that was filled from floor to ceiling with stuffed animals and dolls.  Many of them were brand new and perfectly preserved with their original tags and certificates attached.  I was in sorry, rumpled state, but this was early in my life and well before the loss of my nose, so I pulled myself together and attempted to make small talk with some of my fellow inmates, who I suspected could shed some light on my situation.

From inside of her unopened box, a vintage Barbie informed me that we were part of the Dowdy Woman’s collection. We were all, she said, discontinued, which meant that the company that had originally manufactured us, no longer did.  We had been replaced by new designs and new lines to keep up with the trends and the fickle desires of children around the world.  But before she could explain what the dowdy woman was planning to do with all of us, my captor appeared and picked me up.

I could smell the coffee on her breath as she she tutted and crooned, rubbing my fur and examining my stains. I suddenly missed the sweet and inoffensive breath of the child in a way that I never had before. The Dowdy Woman then crossed into the kitchen and tossed me into the terrible washing machine with a particularly distasteful detergent called Borax. I had only ever experienced ecologically friendly and hypoallergenic detergents, and the Borax was an insult to my skin, leaving me feeling raw and peeled. But it did, I admit, get the stains out, and I felt very handsome despite all the manhandling.

After my deep clean and a slow dry on the radiator, the woman set me down on a fluffy blanket and began taking pictures of me.  When she was satisfied, she tossed me back onto the shelf with the others before plopping down onto a groaning chair and turning on computer. 

I contemplated this. Computers have always been part of my life. My child’s parents sometimes spent more time staring at their computers than they did at each other or at their own offspring...and this thought sent another pang through my heart.  What if she had to spend the rest of her life without someone to look at, to hold, to confide in, to comfort and be comforted by?  What if I had to spend the rest of my life on a shelf with discontinued dolls in the same state!? I realized then, that all that suffocating and chewing was an expression of love and that I loved her, too.  She wasn’t an inconvenience…she was my child and I missed her dreadfully!

The days went by and the Dowdy Woman frequently checked her computer, occasionally looking back at me with an expression of disbelief.  Every day there were new arrivals to my shelf and several of my shelf mates were bundled off, never to be seen again. No one knew what happened to them.

 After about a week it was my turn to be plucked off the shelf to meet my fate. The Dowdy Woman cocked her head at me and guffawed. “Fifty-Five pounds…well, YOU sure were a lucky find!”

Before I knew what was happening, she wrapped me in some tissue paper and tied a ribbon around me then stuffed me into a padded envelope.  From inside of the envelope, I could hear the sound of packing tape and the scratching of her pen writing an address.  A little later I fell from a great height into the bowels of what I can only assume was a Royal Mail Post Box.  Where I was going, I couldn’t know. Maybe I was to be sent off to some horrible place where raggedy, unloved toys gathered dust and dry rotted. Maybe I was to be incenerated…or worse, to be a chew toy for a new puppy!

The Royal Mail is not a smooth ride, so by the time I reached my destination I was battered and bruised. I felt limp and drained and resigned to my fate, whatever it may be.  I had failed my little girl by falling from the buggy, so whatever happened to me was what I deserved….

But wait!  From inside of my parcel pack, I could sense something very familiar…noises and smells and voices.  With a squeal, my little girl ripped open the packaging. “Dou Dou! My Dou Dou!”  She smothered me and kissed me and tossed me into the air.  I gazed into her eyes and if I could have cried I would have. No amount of smothering would ever convince me that I belonged anywhere but here.  And as she carried me off, I heard the mother say to the father, “Thank God for that horrible woman on Ebay.  The baby doesn’t even seem to notice that he’s a different one…”