Despite having few close friends, or indeed many friends at all, the Vet is the recipient of the odd card wishing him well for the new year and a Merry Christmas. His reaction is always the same - he reads the signature very carefully and makes a note of the name. The following day he returns the compliment and sends back one of his stock of cards held for a number of years in the downstairs cupboard.
No sense in wasting money and buying new cards every year, he tells our housekeeper Mrs Kennedy, who fixes him with a look of contempt obviously wondering if her Christmas bonus will be forthcoming and how much she can expect.
Had I been able to communicate, I would have told her, not much at all and reminded her of previous housekeepers who, outraged at the paltry sums given, had either walked out or given back the money saying his need must be greater than theirs.
The strange part is that the Vet has always considered himself a generous employer and is deeply hurt when his gifts are either ignored or returned. Of course, the whole village knows of his miserliness and he is the butt of jokes whenever he ventures into the pub. He He He seems oblivious to the snide remarks made when he never buys a round of drinks.
Dogs, of course, can be generous to a fault and around the festive season I try to give each member of the gang a small present to show my appreciation of their efforts. These can range from a rubber bone to a few biscuits, but all carefully wrapped in cheerful paper I once found in an empty house. I say carefully wrapped, but it is not possible to carry out an expert job, so using nose and front paws I attempt to cover the gift as best I can before distributing a week or so before Christmas.
As my father used to say: “We dogs have no religion and any excuse for a good time is welcome”. So we can, and do, celebrate most of the festivals from various religions particularly where they involve feasting and making-merry.
I have kept a kind of calendar on the wall of the barn where we meet and by scratching the wood have drawn up around a dozen festivals in order of importance and time of year. By following this we know which houses in the area are celebrating a festival and we visit in the hope of picking up some tasty titbits. I have found religions are at their most generous at festivals and am rarely disappointed.
In this way we have learned to like food from different cultures and I would boast that my gang is perhaps the most international for miles around, perhaps even in the whole country. I would go as far as to claim that we know more about worldwide cuisine than many humans – certainly the Vet who sticks strictly to his “meat and two vegetables” routine day in, day out.
I am often sad that, intelligent as I am, there is no way for me to record my fund of knowledge so that humans can benefit. For instance, the likes and dislikes of various foods the gang has built up over the years would look rather good in print and I am sure would be a best-seller. But how do I put it down on paper, let alone have it published?
Although there has been research recently acknowledging that we dogs are capable of many human emotions, no one has found a way to mutual communication. It is something I have been working on for a long time, but so far have failed to achieve.
The major problem is time. I would need to spend hours every day with a sympathetic human while I teach him our growls, grunts and barks. Then there are the tail signals and body movements. Too much to learn in one lifetime, so I must be content with the situation as it is – agreed signs for mutual fondness and occasional anger, but nothing deeper.
One day, perhaps, a smart human will meet a sharp dog like me and they will click.
