BEAUTY SHOP TALK

by

Vicki Charmaine Bunch

The similarities between people and their dogs are truly amazing. The regal Afghan, prissy Pomeranian and vicious Doberman are exact replicas of the officers of the Axel Womans Club who happen to raise these very breeds! The jowly bloodhound, the bulldog, and the pug resemble their owners--cousins of Sonny's who live in Oklahoma. My dentist looks like his dachshund, the paperboy looks like his Irish Setter, and my grandmother looks like her Chihuahua.

Are we drawn to animals like ourselves? Or are they drawn to us?

Over the years, I've taken in a number of stray dogs who seemed to seek me out. As someone who has been called a human mutt, I identify with mixed breeds. So what if our hair is matted and we smell bad? We fetch, roll over, and play dead as well as any Papillon. Under the fur, we're all the same--loyal, cute, and smart.

Several years ago my husband Sonny found a little black poodle in a busy intersection during a blinding thunderstorm. Sonny put the wet pooch in his cap and brought him home. "What shall we call him?" we wondered aloud. Then we noticed he bit his paws constantly, got strangled on the fur and hacked.

"Let's name him Hacker," I said. Hacker and Sonny became inseparable. In a way, they seemed like twins. Sonny didn't hack or bite his feet but sneezed loudly enough to give someone a heart attack and chewed with his mouth open. Cruel classmates in junior high had called him Smacker. The name stuck.

Sonny's smacking and Hacker's hacking made me a nervous wreck. Didn't Edgar Allen Poe write a story in which a guy is driven insane by a dripping faucet or beating heart or something? I found myself screaming like a Barbara Stanwyck when she was being driven mad by the telephone in Sorry, Wrong Number. Yelling only made them worse--like overwound sets of chattering teeth.

Chances are--it wouldn't bother you. But I can hear high pitched sounds the human ear cannot detect. I can smell a skunk five miles away. And catch a Frisbee in my mouth. I wouldn't dream of chewing my feet, nor would my dog Fluffy, an obese Australian shepherd mix. We're easygoing, playful creatures. Hearty eaters who enjoy the company of males, especially when they're muzzled. We like long naps in the shade and rolling on dead things. We hold our tails high and have an elegant demeanor. We sit, shake hands and hardly ever snap.

"Watch us," we tell Hacker and Smacker as we demonstrate good behavior. But it's true what they say--you can't teach an old dog new tricks. Just the other day Sonny bit a big hole in the sofa when he dozed off and dreamed it was a three-layer cake. (The sofa's smelled like that ever since Hacker threw up ice cream.)

"Bad boy!" I yelled, swatting him with a rolled up newspaper.

"Why did you do that?" asked Sonny, waking with a mouthful of red velvet. He was smacking as usual which really annoyed me.

Ever since then, the furniture is off limits to him and Hacker.

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