HUSKY
"Mum, can I have a dog?" was a frequent plea when I was 10. We had a cat called Poppet that somebody had given to my sister Hazel, but I wanted a dog. There didn't seem to be any likelihood that I would get one.
Mum went to town one day, which wasn't unusual, and when she got home she called me to come over to the fence and see what Mrs Lucas next door had bought for John. It was the dearest little Pomeranian you ever saw. Mrs Lucas didn't want John to get it until Christmas, and this was only November, so she wanted to know if we would mind it for the intervening weeks.
The little thing wobbled down the path after me, its fluffy tail curled over its back. It was barely old enough to have left its mother. "What shall we call it?" Mum asked. "We better not call it anything, John will only change its name when he gets it" I replied. Mum still thought we should give it a name, after all we couldn't just keep calling it "puppy" for weeks. I was out at the front gate with it when a boy came past on his bike and stopped to see the puppy. "What's that, it looks like a husky dog" he said.
That was it. I rushed inside and said that since we were going to name it, we would call it Husky.
On Christmas Eve, as we had known would happen, Husky had to go over the fence to John's place. I had known all along, so the break wasn't too unbearable.
On Christmas morning, the whole charade was revealed when I was told to open that big present first, and there in a large box was Husky, mine after all, and not John's.
Husky and I were mates as only a dog and a child can be. We went everywhere together, a bit like "Old Shep" in the song. Dad fixed a wooden nailbox to the carrier of my bike, and Husky fitted into it perfectly. The first time I took him up town he got out of the box when I stopped. He learnt the same day that if I said "stay there" he stayed, and if I didn't he could get out. We used to go swimming together in the creek, and from his obvious enjoyment you'd never believe how he ran away when he heard Mum say "bath". I think she must have got the soap in his eyes.
Husky had a kennel down the back yard, but in winter it was cold so Dad made a bed for him in the his work shed. The bed doubled as a punishment site. Every time Husky did something naughty we told him to go to bed, and he would trail down the yard with his bushy tail down, instead of over his back. Sometimes we would see him slinking off to bed like that without being told, and we knew to look around and find out what he had done.
The parting of the ways was the result of a bitter old man who hated dogs, laying poison in dog-owners' properties, and Husky was not exempt. I was away at boarding school at the time and it was left to one of my aunts to tell me. Her words were "Poor old Husky's dead" and I, at 14, was devastated. It wouldn't have been so bad, I felt, if she hadn't called him "old". To me Husky was eternally young, my vibrant, happy companion, and the only dog I have ever had or ever wanted. Maybe I have denied myself much pleasure in never having another dog. They can all be great companions. Maybe I shouldn't have idolized a creature. Well I did, and I will love Husky till the day I die. But the real sadness would be to never have had him in my life at all.
Tags: Dogs Love Pets Children
