My little Sneaky Squirrel still cowers at the occasional unexpected loud noise or sudden movement. He retains his blanket fort in a corner of the bathroom for those really dark times when he wants to disappear.
Yet Sneaky Squirrel made big progress last night. Out for our evening stroll with Kumquat (who just trucks along, head a-bobbing), we passed by a rather large man we'd never seen before. Normally, Squirrel would have been pulling hard on his leash to get as far away from this man as possible. Yet when Kumquat ventured bravely toward the man for a pat on the head - who was right beside him but the formerly-terrified of everybody-and-everything Squirrel. He walked right up to this big unknown man, glancing over at Kumquat often for reassurance, and parked himself at the man's giant foot.
And the man, who obviously could read body language, knew that Sneaky Squirrel wasn't quite ready for a pat on the head, and so he stuck his hand out and let the little ones sniff him. And sniff they did. And then Sneaky Squirrel stood and looked up at the giant man with his big brown Chihuahua eyes as if to say – "Why, look at me, I've got my Big Boy Pants On."
Yes you do, Sneaky Squirrel, yes you do.
No comments:
Post a Comment