12 SNOW BOY!

Grandma has a lot of sayings, and one of them is “A tired boy is a good boy,” in that a boy like me is more apt to listen when he’s too tired to jump around with “ants in his pants” (another of Grandma’s phrases.)

I was given to her in December 2015. My hyperactivity flagged the necessity that I burn off some energy. This was, and still is, easy to do in winter, for it snows a lot here.

I LOVE SNOW!

The first thing I do after hopping out of the car is roll my back in the snow. Grandma makes me wear a sweater and I get itchy. A good roll in the snow cools me off and makes Grandma giggle.

She looks at the image left in the snow when I’m through. “Well, it doesn’t look like a snow angel. Maybe a wheel? Or a snow monster?”

I don’t hang around to answer because it’s time for snow tunneling.

I stand still and listen for the underground critters. Then I jump and pounce above the sound, sticking my face down to sniff out where I might start digging. Grandma wonders if I might suffocate sometimes, for I can tunnel a great distance with my face under the snow.

“Petey?” she will call, a bit worried.

I look up. “What?”

“Just checking that you’re okay. How can you breathe under there?”

I’m already back at it before she finishes her sentence.

There’s a whole world of smothered smells under the snow. I get to play detective in the game Who Was Here? (I made up this game. Since I’m the only one who plays it, I always win.)

Mole.
Mouse.
Rabbit (this was before the snow fell. I do not cheat by following tracks.)

Then there’s the hidden poop that Grandma can’t see. Grandma will be lagging behind on our walk, and she thinks I’m cooling off in the snow again.

When she catches up, there’s the BIG REALITY.

“PETEY!”

“What?”

“How can you find that stuff? Under six inches of snow?”

I know how to distract her, though. When I was a pup, the snow was too deep for my short legs, so I learned to bound. Or, as Grandma puts it, Boing! She says it looks like a combination of a fox- rabbit hop. Depending on how much trouble I’m in, on occasion she says I look possessed by a demon.

It gets me around and I’m up where I can see what’s going on. Grandma starts laughing and can’t stop, calling me “The Boing-Boing dog!” (Sorry- no photos of the boing-boing. Grandma cannot capture action photos yet.)

At the end of an exciting snow hike, we’re both happy. I’ve had fun playing my favorite game. And Grandma is happy, for I’m tired enough to obey her the rest of the day- after my bath, of course.