Real Life Is Never Quite As Much Fun As TV Commercials

Alas, the poor Pony. He is my personal Sasquatch. My own messin'-with target.

Today I let him out at the end of the driveway to pull the trash dumpster back down to the Mansion area. I let him go ahead of T-Hoe. He runs like the wind, towing that green dumpster like his own unoccupied rickshaw. He would be the first one chosen during an Amazing Race roadblock or detour. Juno scrabbled out to meet him, darted to the garage, scrabbled out to meet him again, and continued her routine until that dumpster was parked.

You know that term scrabble, right? Like in Thunderhead, that sequel to Mary O'Hara's My Friend Flicka. Poor Thunderhead, Flicka's son, who was unofficially called "Goblin" because of his hideousness, had a choppy gallop that would never make him Ken's longed-for racehorse. And that choppy gallop was called scrabbling. Juno did not gallop choppily. But she dashed to and fro with such purpose. Like a border collie herding sheep, perhaps.

Anyhoo, Juno is not really part of this story. It's about me taking advantage of The Pony. Much like I used to honk the horn at the #1 son when he got the mail out of EmBee and started back to T-Hoe, making him jump out of his cat-listening skin. Only this time, I did not honk. I pulled into the garage. Choppily.

On dumpster days, The Pony waits on the safe side of the garage green people-door, with his nose pressed against the fake-paned glass. Once I stop, he enters the garage to carry in our school-day accoutrements. Only today, I inched forward, stopped, inched forward again when I thought The Pony was ready to enter, stopped, inched forward some more. It was like a game of cat-and-mouse, with me being the cat, toying with mousy Pony's entrance.

Finally, I stopped. I had to. I was about to drive through the front wall of the garage. The Pony ran in. "Messin' with Sasquatch!" I crowed when he opened the passenger door.

"What do you mean, 'Messin' with Sasquatch?'"

"You know. Like the commercial. I was messin' with you. Inching forward. Psych! Not letting you come in each time you thought I had stopped."

"Oh. You did? Because I really couldn't see anything except for blinding headlights."

So much for messin' with Sasquatch.