(This short, tongue in cheek piece of fiction is reprinted courtesy of the Green Mountain Trading Post.)
A brilliant full moon illuminated Lincoln Peak, home of the ski area known as “Mascara Mountain” when Stein Erickson schussed the slopes. The luminous orb evoked an outburst of yipping and yapping, a primal sound guaranteed to raise the hairs on the back of the neck of anyone out walking at night. The eerie sound carried a long way in the still air, lasted only a few seconds and ceased as abruptly as it began. Wolves? Eastern coyotes? No… feral poodles! It all began when a mutinous mutt named Oscar rebelled at the prospect of another boring day spent lying on a shag carpet in a nearby condo.
Acquired as a pup, Oscar matured into a disobedient dog that ranked high on the poodle behavioral barometer, known as the “willfulness scale.” Oscar stubbornly resisted all efforts at training him to come, fetch, roll over or play dead. In addition to a strong will of his own, the dog’s anthropomorphic swagger so annoyed his owner, he was tempted, but never actually delivered, a swift kick to the dog’s hind quarters. Each time Oscar was allowed outside he undertook a rambling foray into the woods. And each time, his owner stumbled after him shouting “OSCAR!”
But unlike Nipper, the Victrola dog, Oscar ignored his master’s voice, continued on his merry way, and plunged deeper into the forest. His owner abandoned the pursuit and placed a bowl of dog food by the door. The poodle reveled in new-found freedom and ignored the enticement Oscar trotted into a sun-dappled grove but paused when he spotted a black bear cub foraging for wild blueberries. The poodle had never before seen a bear. The cub had never seen a poodle. They peered at one another for a moment. The dog took to all four heels when an angry mama bear burst from a thicket. Oscar did not stop running until he entered the not entirely fallow field that formed a fairway on the Sugarbush Golf Course.
Some distance away, a golfer teed up on a link with a sharp dogleg to the right. He selected a club, swung and drove the ball high into the air. It landed 200 yards away, rolled to a stop and was met by Oscar. The poodle nabbed it in his jaws and dashed into the woods. “Hey!” The man shouted. All-too familiar with sand traps and water hazards, but never a poodle hazard. Rather than chase after in hope of recovering the ball, he unwrapped a new Titleist, placed the immaculate white orb atop a tee and sent it flying an equal distance. Oscar dashed out nabbed the ball and made off with it. The golfer swore and took Arnold Palmer’s name in vain as he steered an electric cart towards the scene of the crime. But by the time he reached it, dog and both golf balls were long gone.
A poodle named Piero had no intention of abandoning the security and comfort of home, but was forced to cast his fate to the wind after sustaining a direct hit from a business end of an angry skunk. Fortunately, the chokingly odiferous chemical missed the dog’s eyes. Oscar rolled and writhed on the leaf litter, hoping to scour away the stench, but it only added a piquant note to the noisome bouquet. Prior to Piero’s owner’s relocation from the upper west side of Manhattan to a luxury condo that overlooked the golf course, the haughty poodle strutted up Fifth Avenue with pompom-tufted tail held high.
An aristocratic dog, Piero possessed a discriminating palate and a sensitive nose. In addition to disorientation, the skunk blast far exceeded all previous olfactory encounters, comprised of organic urban waste deposited by other dogs, pigeons, and rats. When Oscar encountered Piero, the cloying stench inhibited the customary sniff to determine gender, but did not prevent the two from forming the nucleus of a pack. Whereas Oscar and Piero were classified as “standard” poodles – the largest of three categories – Barney was a "toy" poodle, the smallest. A former inhabitant of the somnolent N.J. suburbs, the dog’s exposure to the great outdoors had been limited to a patch of crab grass in a narrow, fenced yard.
Long accustomed to being toted around in his mistress’s arms, like a 5-pound sack of spuds, the woman never imagined he’d run off to join the circus, so to speak. After moving to the Sugarbush area, all it took was a summer day’s romp in a field to persuade the dog to abandon the constraints of domesticity.
Barney’s owner assumed there was no need for a leash, never dreaming her pet would run off to join the circus, so to speak. She held the front door open. Barney walked outside and sprawled in the sun. As soon as the door was shut, Barney ran into the forest in search of adventure. A feisty red squirrel took umbrage at the intrusion. The rodent thwacked its tail, chittered angrily, and charged, hoping to intimidate the dog. Barney suddenly sprang 3 feet into the air, a maneuver that exceeded the squirrel’s cognitive faculties and sent it skittering up the nearest tree. Barney scurried away and before long encountered the other two renegade rovers.
The trio sought shelter in a shed used to store golf carts during the off-season; a safe dry place to sleep, with little chance of being discovered. Shrubs hid a gap in the back wall, a gap large enough for a dog to squeeze through, the result of snowmelt, rotted wood and time. Under the cover of darkness each dog returned to its former abode on the off chance a bowl of crunchy nuggets had been left out by their owners. More often than not, the nuggets went down the gullet of raccoons, squirrels, mice, and chipmunks. The owners assumed it had been eaten by their truant pets and continued the practice.
Rather than depend upon an unreliable source of food, the dogs resorted to other sources: Oscar scavenged amongst the trash bins behind the golf course’s clubhouse restaurant. An employee, having observed one such incursion, left out hamburger scraps, uneaten French fries, and pizza crusts.
Piero, on the other paw, dined on choice leftovers prepared by a chef at the French-style bistro located nearby. Lacking only a chilled glass of chardonnay, Piero dined on leftover crepes, stale baguettes, abandoned hors d'oeuvres and whatever culinary triumphs not consumed by the customers. Frog’s legs were not on the menu, but Barney acquired a taste for them, legs and all.
The dog pounced on the amphibians that loitered alongside ponds scattered about the golf course. A black poodle named Filch was the next to join the pack. Having achieved infamy (and his name) by snatching food from under the nose of people enjoying a picnic near the golf links, the dog approached with an ingratiating grin and tail a’wag.
The picnickers assumed the dog was lost, hungry and offered him a cookie. To their surprise, with one swift lunge the duplicitous dog nabbed and dashed away with a wedge of cheddar. Easily outrunning his pursuers, the dog doubled back, snatched an entire rotisserie chicken and raced away with the swag clenched in his jaws.
The doggy diaspora did not include an aged poodle upholstered with short curly blond fur. Dante was blind, deaf, possessed a long slender snout, walked with a delicate mincing step and had lost his teeth, which excluded him from the adage, “There’s a bite in the old dog yet.” Twice a day Dante was put on a leash and escorted around the field that surrounded his mistress’ home. The patrician poodle peered wistfully through clouded corneas as he recalled the halcyon days of puppyhood. After scent-marked the boundary of his domain, his mistress led him indoors for a meal designed to meet the dietary needs of a venerable senior.
Although satiated, Dante loitered alongside the dinner table, the moist knob of his nose tuned to the frequency of food. If a morsel fell from a fork, the poodle intercepted it in midair and rarely missed. The first non-poodle inducted into the platoon was a large, shaggy, mud-clotted dog of indeterminate pedigree, possibly related to the yak.
Stubbs liked nothing better than to roll in fresh cow manure. But, having never undergone a bath, Stubbs stunk to high heaven. His owner banished the dog from the interior of his house, already so imbued with the odor of dog, nothing short of flame could cleanse. As a result, Stubbs endured all four seasons in a drafty wooden doghouse in the backyard, where he liked to lay atop the flat roof. A length of chain attached to his collar determined the radius of bare earth scribed around the shelter. Stubbs spotted the poodles, leapt from the roof but was abruptly halted by the inelasticity of the chain. The abrupt wrench snapped the dog’s leather collar.
Suddenly free, Stubbs joined the mutinous mutts, eager to participate in whatever fun might transpire. The growing pack trotted downhill through the woods. A fluffy, white, fabric-softened Samoyed was the next to join. An unusually sedate dog, Rex resembled a small polar bear, but roused from torpor only when hunger or a full bladder goaded.
When Rex felt the need for exercise he retired to a padded dog bed until the feeling passed. The temptation to seek life elsewhere occurred every Easter, when his mistress spattered his pristine white fur with liquid food coloring, a clash worthy of a Fauvist painter. People took one look at the Day-Glo dog and accused the woman of animal cruelty. Rex seemed oblivious, but endured silent humiliation during the time it took for the colorful splotches to fade. Roused from sleep by the pack’s barking, Rex took off after them, determined to add a howl of his own to the howling wilderness. The pack approached a patch of burdocks that rioted quietly in the sun.
Every dog detoured around except Rex, who sought to catch up by bounding into the patch, only to emerge carpeted with spiky seed pods, looking like a giant hedgehog. A black lab named Colby was the next pet to join the meandering mob. Colby’s owners considered her the best dog on the planet, obedient and polite. The high point of Colby’s day was the opportunity to swab food residue from dinner plates, tongue-mopped so thoroughly as to scour the glaze from the porcelain. Colby remained within the perimeter of the property by means of a battery-powered device fastened around her neck.
A pair of stubby electrodes delivered an unpleasant, but harmless, low-amperage shock if she strayed beyond the perimeter. The battery eventually died. Colby’s owners forgot to replace it. When the pack trotted into view the incentive to remain within the “invisible fence” vanished, along with Colby. The gang of growlers now numbered seven.
After surging downhill through wooded terrain, they entered a copse where wild turkeys were busy pecking at anything remotely edible. Several birds took to the air with frantic flapping, while the rest of the flock stood its ground. The dogs halted at the sight of a phalanx of beady eyes, pointed beaks and sharp heel spurs on each bird’s leg. A chorus of threatening clucks persuaded the dogs to give them a wide berth. A blue jay raised a ruckus as the dogs trotted below. Chipmunks chirped and hid. Crows added raucous commentary as they glided overhead.
The pack emerged into an upland pasture. A herd of feisty heifers did not take kindly to trespassers. A brief chase ensued. Easily outrunning the cows, the dogs squeezed beneath the lowest strand of a barbed wire fence, continued on and arrived at the outskirts of Warren. A sleeping yellow lab raised his head as the pack bounded into view. Charlie felt no compulsion to exert himself, let alone join them. A supremely lazy dog, when ushered outside, Charlie took one half-hearted lope around the yard before collapsing in the shade. As a pup, he experienced a fright at a pond. Since then he’s avoided all water other than the contents of a bowl.
Having traveled downhill several miles from the golf course, the pack approached the southern edge of the village, not yet aware that thousands of spectators had gathered to watch Warren’s Independence Day parade. A blast from a carbide cannon signaled its start. An honor guard led the way. Crowned with chrome-plated helmets, the quartet toted white carbines, Old Glory and the Vermont flag.
The local sheriff rolled past the crowd at a snail’s pace, carrying two presumed innocent until proven guilty children in the cruiser’s backseat. The first float was nothing more than a pickup truck with several helium-filled balloons attached to its bumper with string. Hardly qualified as a float, but provided free advertising for an insurance agency. A hay-wagon towed by a tractor came next. Children onboard tossed penny candy to their clamoring peers on either side.
For years, Vermont’s top politicians participated in the Warren parade, drawn as reliably as rats to cheddar. Bernie was unable to attend this year’s event, unlike previous parades in which he basked in adulation while his once abundant mop of hair wafted in the breeze. This year it was the governor’s turn to strut and wave, while lesser luminaries trudged in his wake. The annual competition to design and build the most impressive float persisted among The Valley’s architects.
A design team’s winged contraption looked like something from one of Leonardo’s notebooks. Costumed zanies wove in and out on roller blades, gleefully squirting onlookers with water pistols. Other prancing miscreants sprayed skeins of sticky filaments from aerosol cans. The owner of Sugarbush - the king of the valley - strutted by. Having been a skier since infancy, his muscular thighs rivaled those of a kangaroo. An antique auto driven by an antique person chugged sedately along the parade route. Presumably, car and driver are stored in a barn under a tarp from one year to the next, taken for a spin only on the Fourth.
The parade reached its peak when a school bus decorated to suggest a yellow submarine cruised past full of joyously excited kids. And suddenly the parade was over for another year. Blue lights atop a state police cruiser pulsed, an unambiguous coda, although the crowd had no intention of dispersing anytime soon. “The Funkleberries” were set up and ready to play on the balcony above the Warren store, as they’ve done many times over the years.
Soon there would be dancing in the street. Dogs on leashes at the top of the parade route were the first to twig to the pack’s imminent approach. After wrenching leashes from their masters’ grip, they joined the stampede. Thirteen dogs - a barker’s dozen - led by Oscar, the point dog, galloped past children shrieking with delight as the dogs raced by. In spite of the burdocks that carpeted Rex’s pelt, his mistress spotted the truant and shouted his name. The Samoyed broke from the pack, turned and crept towards her with the penitent, hang-dog mien of a dog that knows it has been a very bad dog, indeed. She ripped the seed clusters from Rex’s fur, hugged the penitent dog and all was forgiven.
Filch was the next wayward wagger to reunite with his owner. The duplicitous dog was admonished, taken home and from then on was fed so well the dog never tempted to pilfer picnic provisions. Mud-clotted and shaggy, Stubbs was by far the grubbiest dog in the pack. His owner jumped into the street and intercepted the dog. The man’s angry denunciation quickly morphed into joyful reconciliation. Barney was so small he might’ve been mistaken for a hyrax.
Nevertheless, his owner spotted him, called out his name and was rewarded with a spectacular leap that landed the pet in her arms. Colby was the next to reunite. Her owners took the black lab home, installed a fresh battery in the electroshock collar and told the dog not to wander off again. Of all the poodles, only Oscar was denied a reunion. His owner had chosen to play a round of golf and skip the parade, having witnessed it many times before.
“The Funkleberries” opened with “Standing on Shaky Ground.” Hundreds of people began to whirl, kick and stomp, with Oscar trapped in their midst. All four claws skittered on the pavement as the poodle evaded any number of feet. He almost made it, until a sneaker-clad foot imparted the long overdue kick to the dog’s posterior. Oscar yelped as he bolted from the crowd. He then began the long uphill trek back through the woods, a journey took all afternoon. When at last the tired, hungry poodle reached his master’s abode, the dog scratched on the door. It opened a minute later. Oscar’s owner looked at the poodle and said, “Well, look who's here. What do you have to say for yourself?”
“Woof,” Oscar replied.
Williams lives in Montpelier.
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