Photo by Bill Stokes
By Bill Stokes
Kickass, the doorstop dog, seeks the keeper’s help in sending a message to Boo, a smallish schnauzer-type dog that once lived with the keeper and Phyllis on the Mazomanie hill and who could play the piano and dance, and who invalidated the keeper’s long standing custody arrangement and ran away to California with granddaughter Sarah and Jessie to seek show-biz fortunes.
“Dear Boo:
“Knowing how you demand to be in charge of all things, I think you should know that a great river is going to drop out of the sky tomorrow and flood California like it hasn’t been flooded since Noah.
“Remember that name—’Noah’ and if you see anyone by that name starting to build a boat try to book passage. Take Sarah and Jessie with you lest they get caught in a mudslide or are blown away by cyclonic winds.
“While weather was never a consideration for you and Sarah and Jessie in the excitement of chasing dreams, you should know that Wisconsin has turned in its traditional cold white winter for one of warm gray sludge. You wouldn’t like it.
“So, Boo, you are probably going to stay in California until you get work playing the piano and dancing, while never minding the floods and fires and mountain mudslides because that’s the way you are–you and Sarah and Jessie.
“Just know this, Boo, we worry about all of you with the latest flood threatening, and we hope you have enough sense to head for high ground.
“Love from Kickass, the keeper (Pa-B) and Phyllis.”
Photo by Bill Stokes