The story of a dog - Final part

Our man has always had it in for the crows. This is because these birds get fed before him at lunch time. Though he gets a portion of what is given to the birds (my father usually gives him some after feeding the birds), a major grievance with Happy appears to be that birds are given food. So when one of the crows accidentally came down for something one afternoon our man grabbed the bird in his mouth and made off with it. Luckily my father happened to be outside in the garden and sent me to rescue the crow. Master crow (a young one) was summarily rescued. He looked quite stunned and unable to comprehend what happened. Meanwhile, a flock of crows was circling overhead creating a racket, baying for our man’s blood (ever heard of a murder of crows?), reminiscent of scenes from Alfred Hitchcock’s?Birds. We put the crow in the plot next door, as it was empty. The crow took off (literally) after a few minutes. But I fear master crow may have had to close down his FB, Twitter and other social media accounts for fear of being ragged over the ignominy of being grabbed by a canine.

There was some construction work going on in the house next door and the workers had managed to destroy the fence in between the plots. Though they had done a patch up job of repairing it (a wall has now been built between the plots) there were some holes in the fence which our man had duly noted as points of escape. For this reason, he had been chained (till such time that a wall could be erected). One night (at around 2 am), I heard our man barking his head off. The noise seemed to be coming from the next plot. Sure enough, Happy had somehow managed to break the chain and had tried to make off through one of the ‘escape routes’. He would have got away with it had not the chain become snagged on one of the rods in the basement of the plot. I had to go to his rescue and heave him out of the hole and lug the bandit back home. He was secured with one of the spare chains that we have for just such occasions.

Now that there are walls on three sides and a high fence on the fourth and as the gate is locked except when one of us (apart from Happy) wants to go out, our man is confined to the house/garden. He has recently found the comfort of the AC and tiled floors in the veranda and has taken to staying indoors for a good part of the day. But, given the chance, he would be more than willing to run out and explore the locality.

EDIT:?I have been meaning to write this for a while but couldn't bring myself to till now. Happy passed away on 3 November 2021. He was sick for a few days and he died before he could be taken to a doctor. He did not eat for the last three days and refused everything except water. Happy is now buried in the backyard along with the things that belonged to him in his stay on Earth (mats, plates, etc.).

We tried getting a vet to come home to take a look at Happy. But the situation among vets these days does not seem to allow for this. You have to take the animal to the vet, however sick or unmovable the creature may be. It does not matter whether the animal is big or small, or in intense pain. The vets simply refuse to come home to take a look at the patient. I hope this situation changes for the better in future. Whether it is an animal hospital or someone running a private practice, all you are told is to bring the animal in and that they will take a look at the “patient”.

The person who we called to help dig the hole was more interested in talking his head off than in actually doing the job and had to be reminded several times, sometimes rudely, to get on with the job. After doing a job that was far from satisfactory he even asked for extra pay. Those with the emotional intelligence of a teapot should not actually be involved with situations like this. A lack of time led to this person being called in to help.

RIP Happy. You are sorely missed.

p.s. This was something I wrote for Quora a while back. The EDIT section was added around 18 months after the main article.