The fourth child
Sunday, November 05, 2006
Misty is the fourth child in my family. (I didn't mean to start my composition with a primary school writing style but oh well) My sister and brother play with her like she were their little kid sister. My father laughs at her for doing silly things like he does at my sister and my brother and I when we were younger. Sometimes he gets scolded by my mother for 'encouraging misbehaviour'. And my mother, of course, being the head of discipline in the house, teaches Misty manners, such as not jumping around/along with us when we are walking, not biting us and basically anything that irritates me mother (almost everything Misty does can irritate my mother).
Everyone treats Misty like a baby, and she is the baby of the family after all. At four months, she was teething pretty badly. At five months, which is now, her milk teeth are starting to fall one by one. Being nearly a first-time parent to animals, we didn't know what to do so we called the petshop and the lady advised us to get teething gel meant for babies at the pharmacy. Of course, she eats up all her teething gel that we apply on her teeth that we are never quite sure if it worked at all. I have since collected two of her teeth, after preventing her from eating them (yes, to our horror, puppies do swallow their own milk teeth). Like a proud parent, I have sealed her two milk teeth in little ziplop bags, saving them for a space in a scrapbook for her (which I am thinking of creating later on).
My daily routine with her includes: brushing her hair and moustache, cleaning her eyes, cleaning her ears, brushing her teeth and training her to do tricks. My mother's daily routine with her includes: feeding her twice a day together with three different types of multi-vitamins for who-knows-what purposes. The normal hygiene conditions still apply: cleaning and replacing her pee and poo tray. Last of all, she needs alot of attention such as patting, talking to her, playing with her etc, because this would be good for her overall well-being and her physical body condition with some exercise. So you see, she is really more troublesome to manage than a human baby, although they probably share a similar kind of environment at the initial stage.
After we got Misty, we had to be really careful of what lies on the floor since like babies, puppies tend to eat whatever they get their paws on. Basically we had to puppy-proof the place for a safer living environment for her. And if any of us fell sick, we were firmly instructed by my mother not to spread the germs to her.
Like a princess, Misty whines when she gets hungry and wants food or when she feels sad or pain. She doesn't bark, in fact many people who have seen her think that she doesn't know how. I have seen her bark in the petshop with the other puppies during mealtime, but somehow in our house, she knows that she doesn't need to because she is the only one here. I mean, who else will eat dog food but her, it's only a matter of time. So for that, she whines. She also whines to get your attention, sometimes almost excessively. But she is an independent dog, we have trained her to sleep in her own room (which used to be a study room before it was taken over by her), she recognises her own room and is comfortable going back to it.
Recently she has gotten used to my lap and when i sit on the floor cross-legged, she will come to me and snuggle on my lap. Such a sweet girl she is. In the initial stages of her puppyhood, she was never satisfied to sit or stand at one place for long. She was often restless, highly excited and hyperactive, likely to run around between the hall and her room nonstop, so much so that we were worried she might get heart palpitations for the constant adrenaline rush. Now, she has learnt how to rest after some time, although she is still as hyper as ever and even has a high jump record to prove it.
To end it all, this smart fourth child knows who can be bullied in the household and who can't, which she uses to her advantage. With my mother, she keeps her behaviour in check, sometimes not even daring to move or only so much as to crawl and lower her head in obedience towards her. With my sister, she jumps on her and licks her face on the lips or she jumps on her from the back and bites her hair. Even though we adopted her from the petshop, Misty has grown very comfortably into the fourth child and sixth member of our family, so much so that we now treat her like one of us.
11:44 pm
クロサギ
