We all know that dogs dream, they are vivid in their imagination. Moon (a beautiful company to the solitary; an endless fountain of ideas to an artist; lovers’ best friend; and ‘chanda mama’ to every child) is being described by a dog here. This is one such attempt to capture what the dog imagines about the moon on its birthday. [A brief character sketch of Angel (the b’day girl) and each of her friends mentioned below, has been captured in my previous article: Make your pets monsoon ready.]

“Lazily opening my eyes, I see nothing except for the moving shadows coming from the windows. My eyes now start to get accustomed to the surroundings and my vision gets less blurred by each passing moment. I feel my feet sweating. My bed is too hot to continue sleeping on. I get off my comfy-bed and look out of the window. It appears to be the time when the sky becomes pitch black. I see some tiny polka-dots shining in the sky and a big round ‘luminous piece of cheesecake’ which curiously grows smaller and diminishes one day, only to grow into a big ‘luminous piece of cheesecake’ again. I am still curious as to who stealthily eats it and who bakes it back to its original shape. Yearning for this distant cheesecake, urged me to satiate my taste buds. I decide to rely on the piece of bread, which, to my family’s surprise, had vanished from my plate. I was full at the time of dinner and wanted to save that beautiful piece for an ‘emergency’ like now. Relishing through the still fresh slice of bread, I am surprised with the smell of a fresh nail paint.  I must confess that the smell of nail paint, though nice, interrupted my wake-dream of the slice of bread. Now I notice, that my feet is the source of this sweet smell. Not just my feet, my fur smells good too. I convinced myself that it was one of my human sisters’ pranks. I keep walking through the hallway and suddenly I stumble upon something and fall on my face. It was just a tennis ball! I came to the middle of the living room. The instant when the lights went on, I almost jumped out of my skin. At first, I was startled to see so many people standing around me with my furry friends. But my parents, amongst others, had this big smile on their faces that made me feel good. I was happy that the person, who gives me injections that were never painful (which only he was capable of doing) and medicines that tasted good (except for some) was also present. My vet always gives me those little ‘crunchies’ whenever we met. Maybe that’s what makes him one of the most popular vets (among us pets) in the county. My friends: Dolly, Molly, Buzo, Bruno, and Brutus wore a cap which looked like an inverted ice-cream cone. All of them loved my vet, except for Buzo. Buzo was one the very few dogs to hate my vet because he trims Buzo’s fur so that he doesn’t get ‘knots’.  I was amused at the sight of my friends, even more amused, that they behaved themselves. I was glad that all of them had come, but I was equally curious to know the reason. My parents cuddled me and took me over to a table. The table had this huge white cheesecake which has eternally tickled my taste buds. My first canine instinct was to leap onto the table and have that cheesecake all to myself, but my parents knew me well and held me in their hands so that I would behave myself.

The little human kids started shouting in a loud, synchronous and sing-song manner.My wise furry friends too, got excited and started wishing me “Happy-birthday Angel!”. Now I understood why everybody was invited. IT WAS MY BIRTHDAY!  I was baffled when everyone followed their lead and shouted on and on. Not just this, they clapped their hands louder than their voices, this was extremely painful to my ears. Adding to my fright, a big balloon popped and showered candies which hit hard on my tiny head. This shower of love, automatically welled up tears in my eyes. I felt very humble, to have such a lovable family. Maybe, I’m the most fortunate pet ever.  

Collecting the candies, showered from the balloon, unruly human kids bounced all around, . Terrified out of the sound and disturbed by the sudden candy shower, I and my friends stood still while our pet parents thought that we behaved better than their human kids. My parents, still holding me in their arms, blew out the candle which was placed on the cake.

I don’t really like the smell which the candle gave, after it was blown. The cake was cut and much to my disappointment, I wasn’t even given a piece. I and my furry friends were served bread-milk and the same old dog-food, which I always have for my breakfast. I looked at my parents with bambi-eyes, expecting they’ll spare atleast a small piece of that lovely cake, but much in vain they just patted me and mumbled something with stern-set face telling me as if it wasn’t good for me. There was one good kid who came to me and offered a piece of cake, I almost jumped forward to give in to my temptations, but I refused to eat it. I knew my parents well, they wouldn’t do anything that would hurt me. The fact is, my parents have always treated me as if this house is as much mine, as theirs. After all of us had licked our plates clean, we assembled in the lawn and played a game of ‘catch-the-Frisbee-first-and-get-a-biscuit” for some time. I was searching for the ‘luminous piece of cheesecake’ in the sky. Was that the one which had a candle struck in it and had been served to every human? Now I understand the mystery of ‘the missing ‘luminous piece of cheesecake’’.

It was starting to get bright outside, like at the time when we went for early morning walks. Before leaving, everybody started giving gifts, some big-some small, to my parents. It was funny to see a frown and a hint of jealousy on my furry friends’ faces for the beautiful gifts I had just received. If I was happy before, I was ecstatic now. Above all, this day, for all its surprises, gifts and candies, has become one of the happiest days in my life as the mystery of the missing luminous cheesecake is solved!! I am proud of myself, with every passing birthday, I am getting wiser.”

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