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Show Right before we left Hospital Point, the summer of 1974, we adopted a dog for a few days, a dog we promptly named Peanut. We had spent the day on the Wainae Coast of the island, playing in the water, digging enormous sand trenches, eating sandwiches kept cold in the cooler, and saying good bye to the island. We were at the very end of the coast, a fairly remote place, playing in the shallow shade offered by trees in constant search of fresh water. Out from behind one of those trees, a poodle emerged. A big black standard, with curly hair and bright white teeth. For some reason, maybe because we were about to move and my parents were more keenly aware of being placeless or maybe because we were so far from any house or likely aid and the dog seemed so isolated, my parents said we could bring the dog home. With joy, we loaded him into the wayback of our white Datsun and drove back to Hospital Point. Within a few hours of being home, though, he had snapped at all of us, tiny little nips that made me cry. A dog used to being on his own, he didn't take to the unbounded affections of a five year old or the prodding of a toddler. I couldn't understand why Peanut would bite. After all, we had rescued him from a life on the beach, given him food and water, a bed of his own, ensured he was not left behind. I realize now my parents never meant to keep him, a biter or not. In a few days, a plane would take us back to the mainland. We put an ad in the paper, and soon he was gone. Soon we were gone as well, off to Virginia and my father's tour of duty at the Pentagon, but the memory of Peanut remained with me. That something could so easily be abandoned, not to an empty beach but still to the unknown; a nip here and bite there and you were left behind. 49 |