Puppy and Skunk

NOTE:  The following non-fiction short story is borrowed from an anthology of poetry entitled “The Changing Seasons of Life”, which was authored by Fred Blahnik and published in 2017.

 

Puppy and Skunk

By Frederick J. Blahnik

 

 

Puppy is vain and bombastic and hubristic and embarrassingly in love with himself…..

Skunk is none of those things…..

So it stands to reason that if the two should ever meet there would be fireworks, yes, lots and lots of fireworks…..

And they did…….and there were…..

Very much so!

 

Puppy insisted that because he was so much bigger and stronger and noisier than Skunk, he should naturally therefore be the boss of bosses and run the whole show…..

Skunk–a perfect little gentleman with impeccable manners–quietly disagreed with Puppy’s assessment of the situation……

This pair of inordinately disparate rivals could come to no sort of compromise…..

So Puppy thusly decided to take matters into his own hands……

And teach that tiny, disrespectful Skunk trespassing near his master’s property a lesson he wouldn’t soon forget.

 

A valuable lesson was learned that night, all right…..

But not by Skunk……

Oh, no no no, not by Skunk!!!

You see, the eagerly aggressive assailant–Puppy–caught a full dose of highly redolent, signature civet cat perfume right beneath his furry chinny-chin-chin……

And that instantly and effectively ended the assault against his seemingly overmatched smaller rival.

 

Skunk walked away from this brief skirmish proudly and with his dignity intact…..

Sadly, Puppy could not say the same…..

He slunk back to the rural acreage where he lived–tail tucked rigidly between his hind legs–while repulsing everybody and everything within fifty yards with his thoroughly disgusting odor…..

But the following morning, Puppy awoke with his tail wagging buoyantly once more and his confidence and curiosity and courage NEARLY restored to their previous stratospheric levels……

Yet he nonetheless was not the same reckless, uber-confident young dog from yesterday…..

No, today Puppy is one day older and one day smarter and a little less vain and bombastic and hubristic and he no longer is so embarrassingly in love with himself.

 

Oh, but that uber-energetic little rascal still reeks hideously of skunk spray and no living creature dares to come any closer than a stone’s throw away from our youthful, tail-wagging scalawag who just cannot understand this sudden, “inexplicable” dearth of love!!!