There's Something Under the Bed!

There are some places in this world that a little dog should not investigate; places that are way too scary regardless of how brave he is.  One of those places is under the bed.  Think about it, it's a big dark expanse where any number of scary things could lurk such as garbage cans, sewer grates, and smoke detectors that scream “Fire, fire, fire” in a menacing voice (okay, I’ve never personally seen any of the aforementioned items hiding under the bed, but you never know when one might take up residence).


Taking a look under the bed: 2009

Anyway, I've always made it a point to avoid the dark void under the bed.  The only exception being, of course, when I was a little puppy and didn’t know any better (see the picture on the right).  However, being as close to the floor as I am, there are times that I can’t help but take a gander in that general direction (if Pa would allow me to sleep on top of the bed I wouldn’t have this issue...hint...hint).  And it's under these circumstances that I get in trouble.

It happened last Monday morning when I was lying on my pillow in Ma and Pa’s room eating a giant Milkbone cookie.  You see, my family and I have a bit of a routine that we follow every weekday morning.  When Pa is ready to leave for work, he gets a giant cookie from the Milkbone box in the dining room and tells me to go to bed (a trick I was taught so that my family could leave the house without me trying to race them to the door and sneak out—normally, I would find it offensive that my family would ever want to leave the house without me, but the giant cookie helps me get over the pain).  Anyway, I usually gallop into the bedroom, throw myself down on my pillow, and lay there drooling while I wait for slow-poke Pa to finally deliver the cookie which I then happily consume.

So there I was, happily finishing up the last crumbs of my cookie when my eyes were drawn to the space under the bed.  At first, I saw nothing, just a dark space with a couple of harmless boxes (its behind the boxes that things lurk, you know).  But then, all of a sudden, I saw something with large white eyes and sharp pointy teeth.

As any good watchdog would do, I immediately sounded the alarm by jumping up from my pillow and barking at the top of my lungs.  Apparently (and I’m definitely going to have to address this at the next family meeting), Ma and Sister thought my cries were a false alarm and did not drop everything to investigate the disturbance.  In fact, it was only after a full minute of frantic barking that Ma finally meandered into the room to see what was going on (Sister, meanwhile, slept through the alarm).

At first, Ma thought that I was barking because a piece of my cookie had escaped me and rolled under the bed (a legitimate assumption especially in light of that time a piece of cookie rolled under the dresser and all I could do was stare at it for hours until my people came home) and started looking under the bed for the missing piece.  But there was no piece of cookie to find and I was still barking hysterically.  That’s when Ma started to become concerned and wondered what I could be barking at and whether or not she really wanted to know (I guess she was concerned that there might be a smoke detector under the bed).  “There’s nothing there” she told me with a noticeably shaky voice.

It was then that I decided to take the entire matter into my own paws.  To Ma’s amazement, I dropped to the ground and started crawling, on my belly, toward and under the bed.  Now, I could only manage to get my front half under the bed (I guess they purposely make beds low to the ground so as to deter large garbage cans from taking up residence), but it didn’t matter because my display of bravery apparently instilled some in Ma and she came down to my level and took another look.

Ma looked around.  “There’s nothing there…” she began but stopped when she saw the big scary eyes and large gnashing teeth.  “Oh, is that what you see?” she asked as she got up and walked around to the other side of the bed.

“No Ma! Don’t be a hero!” I thought.  From my spot half underneath and half outside the bed I watched as Ma knelt down and pulled the creature out by what I could only image was its long scaly tail.  “Nice knowing you,” I thought as I backed myself out from under the bed.  I really felt sad because Ma’s always been really nice to me and I’d hate to see some big giant under the bed monster jump out and attack her.

But I didn’t hear any screams.  Instead, all I heard was Ma saying: “Hey Rigs, is this what you saw?”

Completely amazed and relieved, I cautiously walked around the bed and saw that, in Ma’s hand, was not some big scary under the bed monster, but instead my alligator toy named Allie.  With a wag of my tail, I ran to Ma’s side, grabbed my toy, and scurried into the living room.

So, do I still believe that big scary things are living in the dark recesses of the area under the bed even though there was nothing there on Monday?  My answer:  a resounding yes.  There just weren’t any there that day because Allie had scared them all away.