Puppies

 Some weeks ago, one of the female dogs on my street gave birth to six puppies, and now the puppies are grown to the point where they're independently roaming the neighborhood, going house to house like a band of unruly trick-or-treaters, wrecking various forms of havoc from corner to corner. Lone shoes can sometimes be seen sitting at the roadside, muddy pawprints mar the efforts of the day maids, bits of garbage, treasured and fought over, lay deposited at one house front or another. Most terrorized of all is the mother of these pups, who is clearly done with feeding them and runs in fear at the sight of them, and their sharp little teeth!

Of course these dogs have found my house. They have found everyone's house. They live nowhere and everywhere, and are often pursued by ten year old girl who has assigned herself as matron, and whose vicinity they escape just as their mother escapes theirs.

Several times a day, the pack bursts into my house, spilling across the floor, under the bed, into the bookcase, out the backdoor like marbles. They chew on the area rug, they chew on the chair legs, they chew on each other, and have all-in-all a wonderful time doing so. And they get stepped on, because they are everywhere at once. Wherever one's foot falls, it falls half the time on a puppy. 

One in particular of these little puppies has taken to staying behind when the rest of the mob bubbles out the door, possibly in search of their mother's teats. This little dog, however, becomes quiet, sits by my feet, follows me when I got outside for a smoke, follows me when I go to the bathroom, and sits just behind me when I cook so that I will be sure to trip over him when I take a step backwards. 

This little dog, I suspect, is thinking that he might live with me--just as so many others have done during my ten years here in Bali. But he is mistaken. I don't want a dog. I love dogs, I do, but I don't want a dog of my own. Because I know what happens to these happy little fellows. One day they step into the road at the wrong moment. Or one day they eat a poisonous frog. Or indeed, a poisoned bit or meat left by someone they have annoyed. Or one day they just disappear, possibly eaten themselves. My old heart just can't take it.