“Scooter, let’s talk about how you greet people.”

The toaster popped. I reached for the butter dish. “Scooter?”

 I knew exactly where to find the boy.

“It was the toaster that caused this, wasn’t it?” I stretched out on the bedroom carpet, lifted a back corner of our matelassé bedspread, and placed my hand on Scooter’s right front paw. He has offered that much. His eyes met mine. He lay chin, belly, tail, flat. His head, turbaned by a dangling flap of cambric dust cover fabric that as a young puppy he had torn open (#17 PUPPY).

 “Can we talk about it?” I asked.

“The toaster?”

“Right.”

 

After years of great service, our $12-toaster gave out. Last week, we replaced it. I did what the instructions suggested, I ran the toaster empty and full blast. It would, said the brochure, send a metallic smell into the air. It did.

That did it for Scooter. He ran to his safe spot which was, for the next two days, his preferred location. When he did venture out, Scooter slipped into living room, eyes scanning the ceiling, nose up, serious sniffing by short, inhaled snorts. Again and again, he did this, It was time to talk.

 “Mom. Do you remember what happened once when you burned toast?”

“The fire alarm went off?”

“Oh, it didn’t ‘went off,’” Scooter said. “It stayed and stayed. On. It shouted. That horrible voice screaming over and over, “There’s A Fire In The Building!” Like that wasn’t enough, it fired a series of siren sounds set at a frequency and volume to shatter eardrums.”

 “Wow,” said I. “When I ran the new toaster, and it emitted a metallic smell, then the lever popped, you ran, waiting for that voice, and alarm . . .”

“You need to repeat me?” he asked. “It’s there, living somewhere in the ceiling. It can be called by the toaster.”

“The horrible voice.”

“Right. In the ceiling. In every room!”

“The toaster is a trigger. I’ve set off the alarm more than once by burning toast, haven’t I?”

“You have. I hate it. I’m very afraid.”

 “That’s it then,” I said. “We’ll work on this.”

“That’s not ‘it then.’ Not entirely,” Scooter said.

“There’s more?”

 “Once, in a blog post, you called me a coward,”

“Cowardly. I called you cowardly.”

“Without my permission, Mom.”

“Probably. Was I wrong? I should be sorry?”

“No. You should be educated.”

“Ouch.”

“Mom, a coward is without courage. It’s an old mid-13c Old French word, coart for ‘tail.’ I’m half French, remember. I have a tail. The suffix, ‘ard’ makes it derogatory. So, my French parental ancestors came up with ‘turn tail. The English picked it up along the way with the expression that someone can be ‘cow-ed.’ You know that expression? Or that terrible one, ‘running with his tail between his legs’? Like that’s bad?

“Familiar,” I said.

 “Does that sound like me, Mom? I’m not without courage. Remember when I picked up the scent of the coyote? Did I turn tail?”

“Well, you dropped your tail.” I hoped against being completely wrong about the pup.

“Dropping my tail is a sign of fear or anxiety. Not cowardice.” Scooter scooched out from his safe spot. “However,” he said. “I am, admittedly, quite fearful.”

 I sat up. He stretched out beside me, and added, “If a person who writes isn’t attentive, fear could be mistaken for cowardness.”

“I suppose that could happen,” I said.

“The difference is important,” he said.

“Got it.”

“Fear . . .” Scooter seemed not finished with his lesson. “Fear comes to Middle English from Proto-Germanic feraz, which means danger. It’s similar to the Old Norse far which means harm. Then, by the 12th c. the English understood fear as an uneasiness brought on by the possibility of danger. This is stuff you should know, Mom.”

 “Like danger from the ceiling,” I say. “Invited by the toaster?” I ask. “The very possibility of that voice and stabbing siren sound signals danger.”

“You’ve got it,” he said.

“Scooter, let’s talk about how you should greet people.”

“OH LOOK!” he said. “My Small Ball!”

[Scroll on down to leave a comment]