A canine confession

Among the families I visited on Thanksgiving back in 2010 was the McCauleys who are always happy to see me with plenty of relatives visiting them. They always like to sit around me and hear stories from the days in New York and Malta, but the most funny incident happened with their dogs today. Actually there must have been 4 or 5 dogs in the house, all well-behaved, until two of them got into a vicious fight over something. It could have been food or one of them bumped into the other. These were two small dogs, both puppies, a Shit-Zu and a boxer. It only lasted 4 to 6 seconds, but they were at it in a most terrifying way, not knowing if they were going to kill each other or survive. It was so sudden and caught everyone by surprise. When their owners separated them, the black boxer came near me and in the cutest way, he put his paws on my thigh, with his sad sorrowful eyes. Al McCauley was next to me and he could not resist laughing hysterically as he said “Oh my goodness, he wants to go to confession!” Since he was all black with a little white under his neck, he could very well have been dressed as a priest. And so to continue the scene, I started talking to him as I caressed him on his head....”Are you sorry?.... Why did you do it?....Are you gonna fight again?......OK I forgive you.....” At each phrase he looked at me with pity and extreme remorse as if he was a penitent in the confessional! Just before I finished I told him “And now for your penance, stay away from meat for the next three months!” When I finished, he got down and went in the corner by himself, as everyone joined in the laughing. It was one of those scenes that makes you love animals, especially dogs who can be so loving and tender and can almost speak to you. This was the case with this boxer - he mimicked a confession and if he could talk, he was really telling me that he’s sorry, his eyes showed remorse, guilt and pain, all of which were forgiven by this once-in-a-lifetime dog-confession.