Sometimes, You Lose With a Pair of Jacks

Let the record show that HOS (Hick's Oldest Son) found out at the bus stop that our neighbor's dog, Copper, is actually named Jack. Because I have my own Jack, I will probably continue to refer to him as Copper. Or perhaps Copper Jack. You remember this big fellow, right?

Monday night, on my next-to next-to last lap of my driveway walk, I saw Copper Jack come back under the two strands of overgrown barbed wire that divide our property from his. He laid down between that fence and the driveway, facing me, chewing on something he grasped with his front paws.

When I walk, Copper Jack and my Jack run under that fence and chase rabbits through the field. When it's about time for me to stop, they reappear for the evening snack on the front porch. Sometimes I'm late, or they misjudge the waning daylight, and they show up early. I glanced at Copper Jack as I made my turn round the concrete carport to start another lap.

"Huh. Copper's got something. What IS that? A squirrel? It's stiff. Did those dogs finally get a squirrel? It looks like that belly fur color of a red squirrel. Or is that DEER? A scrap of deer hide? From HOS's deer he shot Saturday morning with his bow? What in the world...?" Of course all that shot through my head in an instant.

As I stepped off the concrete onto the gravel, I was right in front of Copper. I stopped. Leaned over slowly, just getting a look. "What you got there, Buddy?" I normally don't call him Copper to his face. He's very skittish with me, and always jumps back, tail wedged between his muscular rumps. As I leaned down, I saw what it was.

A leather work glove!!! And not a cheap one, either. I didn't know at the time who it belonged to. I though it might be Copper Jack's human daddy. Anyhoo...nobody wants to lose one leather glove. So I said, "Here. Let me see that." All in slow motion, for skittish Copper Jack's benefit.

THAT DARN MUTT LUNGED AT ME AND SNAPPED before I even reached out a hand, and simultaneously LET OUT A SERIES OF THREE YIPS like I had whacked him with a snow shovel! Copper Jack's human family was out in the yard. I couldn't see them through the underbrush, but I'd been hearing them playing ball the whole time I'd been walking. They got silent.

Because of my good deed at rescuing not-cheap personal property, I was probably being considered a dog-beater. As IF my little old lady wasted muscles could harm that giant brute of a dog. Anyhoo...Copper Jack ran back under the fence. The ball-playing resumed. We have a good-neighbor relationship with these folks. I figured Hick could ask the gal (he sees her on the gravel road a lot and stops to talk like we country people do) if her husband was missing a glove. And then HOS could give it back to her at the bus stop.

That night I asked Hick if he lost a glove, and he said, "Where did you FIND it?" Seems that Hick and HOS laid gloves down while working over by the freight container garage, on their pipe roller. (Don't ask, the story will be coming down the PIKE soon. Heh, heh. You thought I was going to say PIPE, didn't you? Nope. It's PIKE. Genius and I used to fight over that all the time). It's HOS's glove (you can see a railroad logo brand thingy on it) and he was wearing it while welding. He definitely wants it back, even though it was kind of dog-slobbery when I rescued it.

NOW...for the other Jack.

Hick called me yesterday while I was in town, and began the conversation by saying, "I'm going to shoot your dog!" Of course he wouldn't. Hick's too old to fend for himself. Who would buy his hot dogs if he didn't have me? He'd have to learn to eat something else. Which it appears he HAS.

"I made myself a bacon sandwich and set it on the seat of my Gator while I carried the trash bag to the dumpster. I came back, and my sandwich was gone! And Jack was sitting on the floorboards of the Gator, LICKING HIS LIPS! That dog ate my sandwich!"

"Well, he's a dog. And he definitely likes to eat. Why would you lay down a sandwich with him around?"

"I thought it would be safe up on the seat!"

Come to think of it, Jack and Juno and even Copper Jack don't bother my groceries when I leave them sitting in the bags on the side porch while carrying others in. Of course, they ARE mostly wrapped in the packaging. And the dogs don't like those rustling Walmart bags. Still...I would never set down my gas station chicken. Or a sandwich on a paper plate.

I imagine Jack might have looked something like this when Hick arrived at the Gator he'd left parked in the front yard:

Good thing Hick's not a poker player. I don't know how long it would take him to learn that sometimes, you lose with a pair of Jacks.