A Doggy Fourth

Jack Russell Terriers are a funny sort of dog.  They bluster and bark and act like they are the size of a St. Bernard.  They run and jump; boy do they run and jump.  They are the doggy version of a type A personality…until it thunderstorms.

I’m not sure about other Jacks out there but, Maddy, my little bullet is deathly afraid of thunderstorms.  And the older she gets the more afraid she becomes.  The cat walks nonchalantly around my shivering Maddy, mocking her.

Living in Virginia it is very common after a hot and humid summer day for an evening thunderstorm.  As soon as the sky turns a bit dark, Maddy has run for cover, patiently waiting it out in the dark of a windowless bathroom.  In her doggy mind she is sure that the storm won’t be able to locate her there.

But that is not the least of it.  Once while she was peacefully sleeping and so darned cute, impulsively, in order to capture the moment I pulled out the only camera within reach, my cell phone.  The flash went off. 

Now, most dogs think their masters are godlike, but my dog actually thinks I can control the weather.  Like the Norse thunder god Thor, Crystal has a magic lightening machine.  And what follows lightening, but thunderstorms?

Whenever someone texts me, and that lightening machine vibrates and lights up, Maddy runs for cover, meaning the nearest dark place she can find. All you see is the back of her, tail tucked, as she makes a beeline to safety.

Now we approach the Fourth of July and even though firecrackers have been illegal in Va. As long as I can remember everyone who lives in my neighborhood has amassed large quantities of the exploding stuff.  And it sounds to a slightly disturbed Jack Russell much like Thunder. 

So while others are eating hot dogs and lighting off fireworks a little terrier I know will be waiting it out under a blanket where the thunder can’t find her.  Until the next time the skies turn dark and I notice a little brown and white blur practically running me over as she seeks out the current hidey-hole.  I cover her with a blanket and she is calm until the next storm… or text.