FFF: An autobiographical tale

Today I am entering YAM-Aunty's Final Friday Fiction challenge.

My source text is 'The Wind in the Willows' by Kenneth Grahame, and the phrases (from p87) to be used in my story are:

Line 8:  As a matter of fact I did none of it

Line 12: Well very long ago

Line 16: Here where we are standing

[Regular blog readers will recognise that my piece is, as is traditional for first fiction, strongly autobiographical. I do hope this is allowed.]

Pees and Prejudice 

Our tale today is one of injustice, reconciliation and forgiveness. It is a true story, which starts off, well, very long ago. The main character is a wee terrier puppy called Bernie, and we begin when Bernie went with his owner Gill to stay with his Human Grandma and Grandpa for the first time.

Now it is important to  to understand that although Bernie was a wee puppy, he was already very advanced in his house-training and he absolutely knew the difference between indoors and outdoors and which was the right place to take a ‘comfort break’. In fact the thought of soiling his indoor territory was quite repulsive to him (as it is to most dogs).

Unfortunately, Bernie's Human Grandma held fast to the prejudice that all puppies pee on the carpet, as he realised when he overheard the following interchange between her and Gill:

“Gill, there are some dark marks here on the rug, I think it must be Bernie. Look, right here, where we are standing…”

In response, Gill sounded a bit irritated. “Oh Mother, that’s just a trick of the light, see it’s not even wet, really you are imagining things again.”

If Bernie had been able to speak, he would have added, quite firmly, "As a matter of fact I did none of it".

But repeatedly throughout this and subsequent visits, poor Bernie was falsely accused of peeing on the carpet. He felt quite hurt, and was not sure he even liked his Human Grandma that much.

Now Bernie is an older and wiser pup, and his Human Grandpa is sadly no longer with us, he thinks he has worked out what was going on. At the time of those early visits, his dear Human Grandma was so worn to a frazzle caring for her beloved but by then very sick husband that she could barely think straight. She just knew that as a good wife it was her role to keep everything in the house clean and tidy, and was anxious lest she be found wanting in this respect. So her brain started conjuring up problems that weren’t real.

These days, Bernie's Human Grandma lives in a very nice care home and is no longer responsible for the housework, and she is much more relaxed and loves having Bernie to visit and never ever accuses him of peeing on the carpet. And so Bernie has forgiven his Human Grandma for all the earlier misunderstandings, as he  can appreciate that it was neither his fault nor hers that the issues between them ever arose in the first place.

Click here to see the link up to the other FFF stories.

And a big THANK YOU to YAM Aunty for organising this fun challenge!

Reconciliation

I know I’m a bit late with this, but did you watch the Queen’s Christmas Day message? 

No, me neither, but I gather the theme this year was ‘reconciliation’.

So being a loyal subject (and still, Your Maj, hoping for that invite to spend the weekend at Balmoral with the corgis...) I am going to tell you about my own personal efforts at reconciliation, which took place a few days ago, on New Year’s Eve and were, by and large, successful.

We were back in Scotland, but not at home in Aberdeen. To tell you the truth, I wasn’t quite sure where we were heading, as Gail drove up the A9 then through Inverness and several miles beyond.

I must say it all looked rather promising when I saw this sign through the car windscreen and Gail said, “Nearly there Bertie".

We finally arrived at an unfamiliar house, but the moment I set paw on the front doorstep I picked up an all too familiar scent.

Imagine my horror when who should come galloping down the drive but my nemesis, flat-coated retriever Jake. Yes, he who inflicted those horrid wounds on my shoulder last September.

Jake’s master Neil quickly grabbed him by the collar and I nervously edged past them and into the house.

It turned out we were staying the night and celebrating the New Year with our Aberdeen neighbours Neil and Yvonne at their Highland retreat in the woods near Kiltarlity.

I have to say I was feeling a little tense at first, and stayed close to Gail. I noticed that Neil was keeping his hand near Jake’s collar, which was reassuring.

As the evening progressed, the humans relaxed as they emptied a bottle of Prosecco, then a bottle of Merlot, and then, as midnight approached, the Glenmorangie appeared. Jake and I caught the increasingly mellow mood, and when Gail suggested Yvonne take a group photo I only growled a little at being made to stand closer to Jake than I would have preferred.

(I fear Gail is looking just a teeny wee bit squiffy here….)

Next morning, we all went for a walk in the woods, Jake and I both off the lead, without incident.

So, not exactly best buddies yet, but there was at least some sort of a rapprochement.