LETTERS FROM HOME: THE SERENDIPITY OF WHIMPERING IN THE PARK

Sept. 21, 1995

Dear C.C.

A little bundle of boy arrived at our home on a chilly, wet morning this week. DC was up before sunrise to go to a meeting when she heard whimpering from the park next door. Whimpering's the wrong word. Whatever the sounds were, she could hear them from inside the house.

DC drove the car out to the corner, where under the light she saw a puppy and a big barking dog that appeared to be bearing down on it. In her haste to save him, she remembered to throw on the hazard lights but forgot the emergency brake. So we have sobbing puppy, barking dog, rolling car and sprinting rescuer.

"Lucky I didn't squash him," she told me later.

Lucky it is, a tiny puppy of indeterminate breeding, but cute and black with brown markings over its eyes and on its paws.

DC wrapped him in a towel and awoke me with the announcement that my birthday present had arrived early.

Actually, I was hoping for a border collie or at least a putter.

We wonder how he ended up there crying in the cold park, and what movement of the constellations brought him within DC's orbit at that hour.

His docked tail says this guy belonged to someone and might be lost, so we've put an ad in the newspaper and we're asking around the neighborhood to see if anyone has misplaced a puppy. Meanwhile, the joys of parenting a puppy are upon us.

He was shy at first, quivering when DC placed him on the bed. He seemed to want to burrow among the pillows, which I guess simulate the warmth of his brothers and sisters.

His appetite is good, but DC thinks he's destined to be a shrimp. She wonders if he'd ever be able to climb the stairs -- a definite requirement of residents at our house.

I look at him and see only perfection. The sharp white teeth, the black eyes you can't see the whites of, the tiny grunts when he's trying to climb a pillow, the twitching and animal sounds that take over his body when he dreams. The fleas.

Actually, we've been meaning to get a dog for a long time, ever since we left the house in the country. Our neighbor Margie had four and we borrowed them at will. We've been out to visit them a few times, though four have become three, as dogs are wont to do.

The dog hold-up has been due to the lack of a fence. Ours only goes part way around our property and doesn't extend all the way to the ground.

So we need to complete the fence before we get the dog. But we need to paint the outside of the house before we complete the fence, because the current work-in-progress looks like something Mondrian did in kindergarten.

We ought to finish patching the plaster on the inside first, though, so we can paint the walls and put up paintings and finally invite over some friends. They must believe we're antisocial misfits by now, our promise of a housewarming party has been delayed for so long.

But putting up paintings will have to wait until we decide what colors to paint the walls.

And there's no reason to buy more furniture until the painting's taken care of.

Of course, our lack of furniture makes this the perfect time to get a puppy.

Some days, you can't argue with the logic of fate.

Love, Sam

~Sam Blackwell is a staff writer for the Southeast Missourian.