A Little Brown Puppy Comes to Maine and is Never Allowed to Meet the Dog Next Door

I love coming to our little cottage in Maine. We live at the end of a private drive shared by five other cottages. As far as I know, from taking walks up and down our lane, we are the only part time people.

We have one really nice neighbor, Evelyn, on the side of us that is not connected to our lane. She likes dogs and is friendly to me. She also fills us in on the goings on about the neighborhood. There is a big white poodle who lives on the other side of us. She looks like she wants to have a play date with me when I walk by because she stands in the front door and wags her tail.

My Mommy and Daddy have called out Hello to her Parents, but they run and hide when they do. If her parent walks outside and sees us in our driveway, she runs around the other side of her garage so she doesn’t have to encounter us. We know not to bother them because they have orange cones in their driveway all the time. I am not sure if they think the orange cones makes us think we also should not speak to them when we are outside. They know we are southern from our license plate and therefore speak kindly to everyone.

Today my Daddy was walking me on the lane and the poodle came out with her Mommy and as soon as she saw me she ran into the woods, far far away from us. I wonder what she thought I, as a little brown dog, might do to her big white dog. I am beginning to think they don’t like brown dogs.

Mommy said that when she came home in the car they were walking on the lane. Mommy’s car is very silent so she got kind of close to them. When the Poodle and her mommy realized my Mommy was behind them they ran into the woods and the Mommy stood with her back to the lane, but the Poodle wanted to see who it was. Mommy rolled down her window and said, “Hello,” knowing that the woman would not respond, but just because that is how my Mommy is with people.

We wonder if they can’t hear, or maybe they are painfully shy, but that is not what the neighbors say. It is sad because even though I don’t pay much attention to other dogs myself, the big white poodle looks like she wants to have a friend. Maybe next year they will be friendlier.