Why I say “him” is because he was almost human in all aspects – his level of understanding, his mannerisms, his food tastes, and above all, his inflated ego, and opinion of himself. Even as a four month old pup he’d lap up his milk quickly and then push his siblings around to lap up some of theirs. Our kids named him “Snowy” after TinTin’s dog, and he used to sleep on their bed, after jumping up from his cot.
As he grew he became very fond of chewing up socks and shoes, and it was impossible to admonish him. Seriously – he would pull his ears back and look up at you so innocently that it melted your heart.
He often got himself into comic situations. One evening we went out and left him in a room that had a window with small square openings which we left open for light & ventilation. When we came back – a hilarious sight awaited us – Snowy was stuck in the window, half in and half out! He had jumped up and tried to squeeze his way out, through one of the small openings, and got stuck! When he saw us, the look on his face was amazing – like a thief caught in the act! I wish I had taken a picture of him. But we were all so busy laughing.
He was such a fearless chap that once I saw him chasing a dog three times his size, in the adjacent park – the bigger dog was running as if the devil was after him!
During his walks outside the house, he had taken a fancy to a white Pomeranian bitch that lived in a house across the road from ours. One morning we were amazed to get a phone call from the house owner that our dog was chasing her bitch around her house trying to mount her. We looked for Snowy and realized that our main door and the gate were open. My wife Roop and I rushed up to that house. We shouted at Snowy to stop and bundled him up back to our house. He had made full use of the opportunity of finding the door and gate open.
Along with the happy moments, there were however sad events too. He developed scabies once, for which his vet prescribed Ascabiol lotion to be applied all over the body – but he licked it up, killing his appetite for the next few days. He lived to an amazingly long age of 19 years & 8 months and witnessed the marriages of both our sons. Ritu, my daughter in law, looked after him a lot during his last days, very caringly.
When he died, we cremated him in the electric crematorium at the Vet hospital in Moti Bagh. Next day, with his ashes, we left for Garh Mukteshwar, and scattered his ashes in the Ganga – a fitting finale for a great living being!
