When I was just a day old my mommy left me alone on the
mountain. Later she tried to find me, and I was right where she left me,
but she never did find me. The ones that walk on two legs picked me up and
took me over to my new mommy’s house.
At first I didn’t want to eat and I felt puny, but my
new mommy looked after me and made me eat out of a bucket. Later she
started giving me sweet grain and I really like that.
The strange men came over and put a hot iron on my side
and burned a strange looking symbol on my hide. It hurt when they did that
and I cried. The others ran to the big ones that look like me; but I ran
to my new mommy even though she doesn’t look like me.
My new mommy comes out and feeds me everyday. She combs
my hair and polishes my hooves. I like to walk beside my new mommy. Every
now and then I step on her feet and she says ow. When I butt her with my
head and she falls down she says ow then too. I don’t know what ow means
but mommy doesn’t seem happy when she says it.
Mommy and Daddy have lots of critters that say bow-wow.
They wake up in the morning and say bow-wow. When someone comes to visit
Mommy and Daddy they say bow-wow. I want to say bow-wow, but it just comes
out moo. Maybe I need to practice some more, but for now it keeps coming
out moo no matter how hard I try.
The bow-wows go in and out of the house, so I don’t
see any reason why I shouldn’t too. When Mommy or Daddy leave the front
door open to air out the house I just walk right in. After all, just
because I can’t say bow-wow, doesn’t mean I don’t want to say it. It
just comes out wrong. Mommy laughs and then leads me back outside.
"Come on big black dog," she says, "You
don’t need to be in the house."
"I’ll bet if I could say bow-wow you would let
me come in the house," I think, "She may call me a dog but when
I say bow-wow it still comes out moo."