I Would Rather Starve

It must nearly be breakfast. I can hear the birds singing and the sun has finally risen. My stomach is rumbling and I cannot hear anyone. I am starving and beginning to feel faint. I need food.

Finally, I hear some commotion upstairs, so they are awake at least. I am rather impatient when it comes to breakfast time. I just love my food and right now it feels like I have not eaten in weeks.

I wonder what tasty treat she will serve up this morning. She has always been so tentative towards my appetite. I have food allergies, so I have to have the same dry food and she usually tops it with their food cut into small, bite sized pieces or on the odd occasion it may have to be topped with dog meat. Either way, mealtimes are my favourite part of the day. 

I do not mind what she provides, although I do prefer the vegetables to be carrots or peas. The broccoli and cauliflower remind me of eating her plants from the flower beds in the garden. They require a lot of effort and are very chewy. To be honest, I really do not enjoy eating her plants. They give me the most awful indigestion but if there is less for her to look after in the garden, it means she has more time to look after me. I am so hungry and starting to feel faint.

I must focus on something else and take my mind off breakfast. Oh my! I have just seen my reflection in my metal bowl. My tummy seems smaller, a lot smaller. My skin seems to sag less. I must have lost some weight since last night, a few pounds at least. I am shrinking. I need food. I am wasting away.

When she was cooking last night, I did not smell any meat. Usually I get an aroma but yesterday there was nothing. I do wonder what will grace my bowl this morning.

‘Come on Lillia, let me get you breakfast’

Finally, she is here. I manage to find the energy needed to dance around her feet. I hope she appreciates it. She is moving in the right direction and going in the fridge. I hope she comes out with chicken. I love chicken. I am so excited. The fridge door is closing. She looks down at me.

‘What have I got for you Lillia?’

Oh, it sounds exciting! Although, I cannot quite see what she has got. I cannot smell anything apart from her morning breath, as the residue from that is definitely still lingering. She is putting the dry food in the bowl. Yes, something else is going in. I have another sniff of the air, still nothing apart from that breath, she needs to brush.  I cannot see. What is it?

She is holding the bowl in the air. Too high for me to see anything due to my height restrictions.

 ‘Come on Lillia, be a good girl and sit’

I follow her to my water bowl near my bed. The food bowl usually sits alongside it. She waits and looks at me to sit before placing the bowl down.

I do not sit and stare back at her. She repeats herself again.

‘Sit’.

I look back at her. She still has not yet put the bowl down.

Why we must go through this sitting thing is beyond me. I honestly do not know who she is trying to convince. She will never have me trained.

I decide to ‘Woof’ at her and then sit down.

The bowl is going down, I can see…WHAT IS THAT?

She has given me my dry dog food with what can only be described as a green leaf sat on top of it.

I look at the bowl and then at her. Why?

‘Lillia don’t look at me like that. I am on a diet and it is the only thing I have in the fridge. We have not got any leftovers from last night and I have run out of dog meat or tuna. I will pick some up later. I thought as you eat every plant, I put in my flower bed you would like it. Come one Lillia, it is a lettuce. They are really delicious.’

And she decided to get it out my bowl and hold it near my mouth, presumably wanting me to try it. Well I am refusing to try it and I turned my nose away. She put the leaf back in the bowl. I am not going to eat the leaf and I am not going to eat the dry food. I am going to use the last bit of remaining energy I have, to walk away and sit in front of the patio doors in protest.

I just made it to the mat in front of the doors. I am feeling so weak from hunger. How could she try to feed me a leaf? I am not a rabbit and I may be shaped like a caterpillar but come on a leaf? I am a dog for goodness sake.

As I lay there accepting my fate, death by starvation, I heard a noise. A familiar noise. It was him. He was awake and he was coming downstairs. I thought about how he is always eating the leftovers.

So, I made a conscious decision. I ran over to my bowl and I devoured the entire contents, including the leaf, before he decided to finish it off.

‘Awww, I think Lillia likes the lettuce! Same again tomorrow, Lillia!’

If only I understood what she was saying!