A heartwarming Christmas tale by Hamish the dog.

My Christmas by Hamish the dog.   

I begrudge this time of year as it creates unnecessary change for a couple of lousy weeks. Do you know I can always tell when Christmas is here (apart from the obvious) because in our house my owners, house guests, family, whatever you want to call them become even more strange than normal. Allow me to introduce myself. My name is Hamish and I’m a dog, a Scottish terrier to be precise and I consider myself to be steady, well behaved and good company. I’m not actually Scottish. Makes no sense really. I was adopted at about 9 weeks old. This was 10 years ago. You would have thought I would have got used to my owners strange behaviour at Christmas over the years but every year it gets even more ridiculous than the last. A couple of years ago another little creature started visiting our house on many occasions. She is extremely loud and likes to make me play stupid games. Her name is Emily I believe she is a human, but she pretends to be a dog… I know her game I’m not daft! 

Anyway back to my groans about the Christmas period. I sleep downstairs and because I am a “good boy” I am allowed to roam the house at night. I have my fluffy bed with delightful bone pictures plastered all over it. It’s modest but comfortable all the same. Normally I retire to bed when everyone goes upstairs and I have a jolly good sleep…. but i can always remember my first Christmas experience.I had gone to be bed as usual had a good stretch and was just about to nod off when I heard a thud. Up I jumped expecting a man with a swag bag…….when on the floor in front of me was a slim rectangle cardboard box with little doors on it. Hmmm what’s this I thought…………..and what’s that delightful smell…………..my long nose drew me to some oddly shaped brown objects sprawled all over the floor. I felt deliriously hungry and I was starting to drool. I know not a good look………….and I couldn’t help it before I knew it I had eaten one and it was amazing. Then another and another…………..oh boy........ I’m in trouble, I thought sneaking back into my bed.  

I had a terrible night’s sleep wondering what was going to happen the next day. Why could I not resist the temptation?I was sat cross legged ………..well not literally……….. when why adopted mother came down. Next thing I heard Sarah scream…….."Bloody hell Hamish……… look what Hamish has done he’s knocked the advent calendar down and ate all my chocolates!”.At that moment I really wished I could talk because this would been my response. “Woh………….hang on a minute Mrs, it wasn’t my fault you hung it up with a dodgy drawing pin and what am I supposed to do? They had fell on the floor, would you have eaten them…..? No. Well I did you a favour and tidied up didn’t i?”

“Look at him , he knows he’s done wrong..... he’s hiding under the table”

Just to clarify I wasn’t hiding………. a piece of chocolate had flew under from the night before and i didn’t want to miss the opportunity of another delightful mouthful of heaven. My father comes in that point and taps me right across the same long nose that got me into trouble in the first place. 

“Come on pal your outside for a bit and you can stay out doors until you behave yourself, and no treats for you today” Outside i was dragged and stayed out there in the horrid cold for a good few hours, and as for the no treats…… well that is just not on. 

That was just the start of my Christmas hang ups. 

The fancy dress is also a bit much. Every Christmas I have to go through the trauma of being dressed up like Santa Claus when quite clearly I am nothing like him. Being pulled about and dragged to the neighbours by the Devil child (AKA Emily) is not the highlight of my Christmas and neither is the Christmas walk around the estate like I am some performing monkey. The only consolation is that the cat looks even more ridiculous than I do. He looks nothing like Rudolph! Then there’s Christmas dinner, as I am banished from the dining room I find myself dying from a slow starvation, being teased cruelly by the smell of the Turkey and all its trimmings. Me and the cat know we are in for a treat later as we get our own dinners………but we have to wait. Always a beautiful dinner however but there is always some joker who thinks it’s funny to stick a brussel sprout in my bowl and bury it in the food. Like I say I am not daft I will find it ………and I will remove it.

By tea time everyone is merry and wearing stupid hats which is great as we all look as ridiculous as each other at this point. As the night draws in mother turns to me and looks at me with soft loving eyes, i admit they are strangely drifting in different directions but loving all the same. She slurs “Come on Hamish come and sit with Mummy and Daddy. (just to point out they aren’t actually biologically Mummy and Daddy- that’s just weird). To be honest though, i don’t really mind it, it’s nice in a strange way. Well i don’t know where my real folks are do i ? So this is the next best thing. I climb up on the sofa and snuggle up and that’s when it hits me that despite all the grumbling I realise Christmas isn’t too bad after all and that i am actually a very loved and lucky doggy.