Stories From My Past - Shelter From The Storm

This happened when I was in Jr. High, maybe early in High School. It was an overcast day, and I was visiting a friend's ranch.

I remember standing on one side of a fence, and a horse was on the other side. It was a generic brown horse - I don't remember details. I had some sugar cubes in my hand, and I was feeding him.

I held out my hand - he was gently eating right out of it. I looked off at the horizon. It was a hazy day, and the horizon didn't exactly look right. I couldn't figure out why. I could hear the horse next to me, crunching the sugar cubes. The "crunch crunch crunch" didn't sound quite right either.

I turned back to look at the horse, who was "crunch crunch crunch"... and CHEWING MY HAND.

I just knew that at any moment the delayed-reaction pain was going to hit. The horse had calmly consumed my left hand up to the wrist! I pulled back and jumped, and opened my eyes.

I was in my bedroom, safe in bed. There were flashes of light from outside - lightning. It had been a dream. I could hear thunder, and ... I could still hear the "crunch crunch crunch" of the horse eating my hand!

Wha...? I looked down at my hand. There was a noticeable lack of horse on the end of my arm. But that sound was real, and it was still going on.

Crunch... crunch... crunch...

After a quick search of my room, I found the culprit. A pair of sad doggy-eyes looked up at me from the depths of my bean-bag chair. The crunching sound was her walking around on it in circles. "Sugar" was nesting.

Sugar was a good dog with a firmly established belief system. I don't know if she believed in God, but she believed that lettuce was the Devil and she knew without doubt that lightning couldn't strike you if you were in Jeff's bean-bag chair.

Sugar was easily the best dog I've ever had. I miss her - even though she did scare the heck out of me that night. :)