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Title: Loki, the Trickster Dog, Being a Fool

Date Occurred: June 4, 2019

Date Written: June 4, 2019

Written by: Joel T. Kant

Copyright (c) June 4, 2019 by Joel T. Kant

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While still in bed a little after six in the morning, Holly told me, "Carol only has a half-day of school today."

Carol's summer vacation starts tomorrow, but she has to attend commencement today, even though she is still a junior.

Holly was then telling me she was going over to her mother's house this morning when we both heard the barking of a dog. I recognized the sound of the bark as that of Loki. In the house next door, the couple bought two little puppies. One dog is named Loki and the other Thor. Loki is the more aggressive and louder of the two.

For the past few weeks after some training, the owners have mostly managed to keep the two dogs in their own yard. Prior to that, the two would often come to our yard to bark at Holly, Carol or me. They would bound like a bunny or kangaroo more than run like normal dogs as they raced over to us. They'd then crouch down and bark repeatedly. In particular, the dogs seemed to like to bark at me.

Invariably, one of the owners would then run over. He or she could generally get Thor to retreat to his own yard with stern words, but Loki would keep at it until physically picked up and hauled away. He was small enough of a dog that even the woman next door could easily lift him. After several of these encounters, the woman said to me that they would be getting an invisible fence, but it does not seem to exist yet.

However, like I said, the last few weeks, I have been cutting bushes, weeding the garden, and other such tasks to look over to see with surprise the two dogs are out. If they started heading toward our yard, a stern word caused Thor and Loki to freeze and stay in their own yard. The training the neighbors were doing seems to be working.

That is, until early this morning!

Holly declared, "They sound like they are just under our window!"

Holly specified "they" because clearly both dogs were now barking. As usual, once Loki, the Trickster dog, got things going, Thor, the Thunder dog, would come join in. The racket was so loud it almost seemed they could be coming through the window as I pushed back the curtains.

A mere three or four feet from our window stood a massive white-tailed doe. Thor had retreated in what seemed fear still barking as he backed off, but Loki was still at his barking very close to the doe. Loki was hunched down and aggressively barking, as he had often done to me. The woman next door got far closer to the doe than I would have ever dared. She physically yanked Loki off the ground. She made a hasty retreat. The doe stood looking at them, immobile.

I said to Holly, "If that doe kicked a little dog like Loki, that'd be the end of him."

The woman herself could easily been hurt by a deer that big.

Holly came over to look through the curtains herself. The doe still stood immobile, although the dogs and their owner had disappeared into their own house.

Holly asked, "What's that thing on our lawn?"

It looked like a small bush. I wondered if the doe had pulled up one of the branches of the bushes I had been cutting yesterday. However, the garbage cans were still closed.

Then, the bundle on the lawn stood up! It was a small fawn. The fawn came and drank from the udder of its mother.

As I got my camera, Holly said about the fawn, "How cute." (Fig. 1)

Figure One: A Doe Feeding Her Fawn in Our Backyard

[Photograph by Joel Kant]

I responded, "I wonder if Loki and Thor were after the fawn. No wonder such a commotion."

Now that I knew that the doe had a fawn to protect, I was amazed how brave the woman next door had been to get so close to rescue Loki from being kicked by the deer! What she had done seemed quite dangerous!

As I watched, the fawn finished its drinking. The doe and her fawn then slowly marched off, going the opposite direction as the house with Loki, the Trickster dog. Thus, a happy ending for the doe, the fawn, Loki, Thor, and the woman who lives next door. (Fig. 2)

Figure Two: The Doe and the Fawn Leaving

[Photograph by Joel Kant]

THE END

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