Читать книгу The reincarnation of Molly, the German Shepherd - Thomas Rogers Walter - Страница 6

We are the Walter family and in 1994 we lived in a beautiful four-bedroom apartment. My wife had colorful flower pots in every window, and we could walk straight out onto our large balcony from the living room, which was full of solid pine furniture. The huge potted plants on the balcony always gave me the feeling of being in a tropical greenhouse. The balcony had a roof and the side that was exposed to weather was clad with panels. Two large windows gave the plants enough sunlight so that they flourished and thrived. I felt so relaxed when I was amongst them that I would sit there outside almost every day, all year round in the rocking chair meditating. The amount of steaks and beef sausages that were barbecued out on that balcony probably equaled that of a village fair. Usually a few good friends or relatives joined our barbecue events and there was always a fun group getting together. A gas station was operated on the ground floor in the same building that our apartment was so comfortably set up in. At first, this did not bother us much. We also lived close to the edge of the village; we just had to walk a couple hundred meters down the road and we would be in the middle of the beautiful nature of the Palatinate. Maybe it was simply part of my purpose in life, or maybe I had a true love for nature: whenever possible, I would be out in nature, spending my time exploring the surrounding meadows and forests. The area surrounding the little village mainly consisted of lowlands, surrounded by a few moors where they used to dig up peat back in my Grandpa's time. Thick wafts of mist would always form out there in the early hours of the morning, covering the fields like soft, white clouds, slowly letting the morning sun warm our faces. When the morning mist had finally settled, it left a comforting smell in the air, as if everything had been freshly cleaned. After the sun had performed its duty of warming the earth and everything that grows on her, I could even smell some of the herbs, like wild mint and the elder berry tree, which were found in large quantities at the edge of the forest. Some mornings I was even able to see families of deer with their young fawns in the grass before they retreated back into the thick, evergreen forests. There was also a little duck lake full of water lilies. When they were in bloom, the lake looked like a painting covered with bright colors.

Each year we also saw many duck families on this little lake, swimming along with their little ducklings. The giant toads in the little neighboring ponds were as big as a man's hand, and on mild summer nights we could hear their croaking right in the middle of the village. The only thing spoiling the wonderful, picturesque nature was the airplanes that would land at the US Air Base just a few kilometers away. The noise from these airplanes, which we never really got used to, was one of the reasons why we left our beautiful apartment and moved into another quiet locality. At the time, there were three of us in the family. There was Jasmin, my sweet little daughter with dark brown curls who had an infectious smile from the time she was born. She was 6 years old at the time and was already asking for a brother with confidence. She wanted him to have blond curls, if possible, like my wife Manuela, who had blond hair. She was a hairdresser who took care of Jasmin's education and the household during these years. My name is Thomas, and I am the father of the family, a butcher, hobby chef and barbecue expert. At the time I was working at an Opel plant with a three-shift system in Kaiserslautern. The house and gas station owner Marion lived with his dear wife Sybille at her parent's place in a nearby village. There were reasons for this, as Marion had lived in the building with the gas station until his father died and he no longer wished to be reminded of old memories from his youth. He knew from his own experience that it wouldn't be easy to have a harmonious private life if he was living right above his place of work. We also soon noticed that living above a gas station – that recently had a beverage retail store added to it - entailed a few problems of its own. Just a few days later, Manuela experienced the first of many uneasy nights above the gas station. Marion always closed his gas station punctually at 7:00 pm then he drove right home to Sybille, who would already have supper prepared. At that time of night we were the only people you would encounter in the building.

I myself drove to work for the night shift at 9:00 pm on a weekly basis and Manuela and Jasmin stayed in the house alone overnight. Sometimes it was a driver who ran out of gas, or a local villager who was used to grabbing a few bottles of beer on his way home. It didn't really matter who disturbed the nighttime peace. Everyone still thought that Marion the gas station operator still lived here and that he would still want to do some business after closing time. To our dismay these incidents began to occur more and more often and usually while I was away working the night shift. So Manuela and I thought about how she could get more respect from nighttime disturbers, who were making her and our little daughter anxious. It was also difficult to get these night owls to leave the doorstep. Most nighttime disturbers simply weren't interested in the fact that we simply lived here and that we weren't the owners of the gas station. They even shouted up to our bedroom windows and sometimes knocked at the old front door for long period of time, which would echo up to our apartment. Most of them ignored the big, explanatory sign I had put up on the outside of the front door (that we, the Walter family, are just renters and have nothing to do with the gas station). I came home one morning after the night shift and Manuela once again told me about one of the disturbers who had basically behaved in a very intrusive manner. The only way it was possible to get him to leave the doorstep was to say that the police were already on their way. That was why I finally decided to get a guard dog and train it to bark loudly and growl viciously at anyone who rang the doorbell or knocked. I knew it had to be a big dog with a deep voice in order to command the respect of someone on the other side of the door - and to instill a bit of fear in them. I explained to Manuela that the growling and snarling of the dog would make the disturbers' hair stand on end and the thought of the guard dog managing to open the door by itself would make them sweat with fear. I myself remembered the Karl Siegel butcher shop from the days of my butcher's apprenticeship back in 1980. I experienced a few frightening moments there as a teenager. For one thing, I new my boss Karl's guard dogs quite well, their names were Branko and Max. However, when these two large animals roamed the property freely and jumped up snarling at the big, iron gate when I came to work at 6:30 in the morning, my first thought was that I would not want to meet these two German Shepherds in the dark if I was a stranger. Branko and Max were primarily fed beef rumen, raw meat and bones. Once I observed how Branko, a big black male dog, simply bit through the thick femur bone of a pig as if it was made of pretzel dough. I felt very queasy when I saw this and heard the loud snapping of the bone as it shattered in his strong jaws.

At the time, all the guard dogs owned by business people in the village were trained to attack people. Back then, guard dogs knew no pain or fear; they were ready to sacrifice themselves and die in order to protect their properties. Today, all medium-sized and large companies have surveillance cameras to protect their goods. I still think that in the event of a power outage only a good guard dog is capable of still doing its job and doing it well. This can still be seen today in most high-security areas, where the combination of electronics and dogs is still used. Nonetheless, we had no other choice. A good dog would help us keep nighttime disturbers away and it would be a faithful protector of the family.