Me and my shadow

Beattie is a very silly girl. She’s never been one to appreciate change, and she got a bit distressed when I started paid work again two years ago. Now not only is she bothered by my not going out to work now, she’s also picking up on the tension that’s building as the time nears for The Boy to leave for Uni. She’s a clingy girl at the best of times – when you call her she gallops over as fast as she can and sits as close as possible, usually with her front paws on your feet, gazing up into your face, desperate for reassurance and praise. That’s not sufficient at the moment – when she can’t physically be with us she performs a ‘displacement activity’ to relieve her stress. Some dogs will howl, some dogs will destroy things – Beetle self-mutilates. Rather like a child sucking its thumb, she’ll lick the nearest part of herself – her wrist – until it gets sore.

Then, because it’s sore, she’ll lick it to relieve the soreness until, rather like Lady Macbeth, no matter how hard she scrubs with the wire brush, she can’t get rid of the blood. So, until she feels able to relax again, it’s a case of ‘whither thou goest, there go I’.