Dream of: 25 April 1996 "Wolf Disease"
As Carolina and I were riding in a rural area in a car which I was driving, I noticed we had come to the cottage where I had bought Picasso, about 6 months earlier when he had been about two months old. I quickly decided to stop because I needed to talk with the people who had sold me Picasso.
At the time I had bought Picasso, the woman who had owned him had signed a paper showing that Picasso could be registered. It had only been after I had left her with the dog and returned home that I had realized the document needed to be signed in two places by her before I could send it in to the Kennel Club to have Picasso registered. I had held on to the paper, thinking I would have to contact the woman again so she could sign it. And now seemed to be the opportunity to talk with her about it.
I parked the car, stepped out and walked up to the front door. As soon as I reached the door, I noticed it was a bit strange because it was over a meter off the ground and no steps led up to it. Nevertheless I knocked, and a woman probably in her late 40s came to the door. She was standing behind a screen, which seemed nailed across the outside of the door so the screen couldn't be removed. It appeared this door wasn't actually used for passage.
Since I immediately saw this wasn't the same woman who had sold me the dog, I quickly asked her if the people who sold Dalmatians lived here. The woman just as quickly answered that they didn't. Thinking I might have made a mistake, I was just about to turn and walk away, when I noticed the head of a large Dalmatian above the woman's left shoulder.
I again asked the woman if the people with the Dalmatians lived there, and this time I heard a man's voice from behind the woman ask who was outside. I hollered back in, "Steve Collier."
I thought the people who had sold me the dog would recognize my name, and they must have, because both of them, the man and woman, appeared in the door behind the screen. Both were slender and probably in their mid-thirties. It was immediately clear that they wanted to talk with me, and I waited a moment while they went out another door, came around to the front yard, and met me.
The woman was a bit excited. She began explaining that one of the dogs who had been in the same litter as Picasso had contracted some kind of disease, something she called "wolf-something," and she had had to kill the dog. She was now concerned Picasso might have the same disease and she seemed to be suggesting I might have to have him killed. I quickly told her there was no way I would let that happen.
She then asked me if I had Picasso with me. I told her I didn't, but then looking over at my parked car, I saw he was indeed in the car with Carolina. I walked over to the car and quickly let him out so we could see him better. I told the woman I had noticed Picasso had seemed to have some unusual secretion from his eyes lately, but the secretion hadn't appeared serious to me.
As we had talked, we had all moved into their garage. There was a red car in the garage, similar to my BMW, but it was up on a rack so we could walk under it. After the man, his wife and I had sat down on the concrete floor of the garage and were watching Picasso run around, I noticed two other Dalmatians which belonged to the couple also running around in the garage. I also noticed one of the dogs had a brown spot on its head. I wondered if that was a sign the dog wasn't full-blooded.
Although I still wanted to talk with the woman about the registration papers, I realized the papers weren't now my major concern. Besides, I also now remembered I had recently sent the papers to the Kennel Club even without the required signature, thinking since one signature was on the paper, it might be accepted. I was still waiting to hear back about that. What was of far more concern to me now was the health of Picasso and determining whether he had some kind of disease.
But my attention was abruptly distracted by something else. The car which was up on the rack in the garage had gradually begun coming down, so now, even though we were sitting down on the ground, it was just barely above our heads. We all moved to the side out from under the car. I was astonished that these people could be so careless as to almost allow the car to come down on our heads. In fact, the whole place was beginning to seem a little too dangerous, and I was beginning to think the best thing I could do would be to simply leave.
Copyright 2002 by luciddreamer2k@gmail.com
