A Love Story - And A Happy Tail

From the moment Zozo saw Max, she was captivated.

It may have had to do with his sharp clothes, stylish sunglasses, and side tilted ball cap.  (It didn't hurt that he spoke French either.)  Zoe was a goner.

In her extreme joy, Zoe whipped Max's legs a few times with her 16:" inch tail.  Zozo has something called "happy tail syndrome".  When she is happy, she yields the tail like a whip, sometimes causing herself to bleed from getting cuts on her tail when it hit furniture and walls.  The blood splatter and spray left the surrounding area looking like a mass murder had occurred in that location.

I too have sometimes suffered from "happy tail syndrome", but that's another post.

Max more or less misunderstood Zoe's devotion and screamed bloody murder upon being whacked repeatedly with that whip-like tail.  We got Max out of Zozo's reach and soothed his cries.  Zoe was very upset that the object of her affection screamed every time she got close to him.  When Zoe finally spotted Max asleep later that evening, she crept in to his room and up on his bed just to watch him with worshipful eyes.  She curled right in the corner of the bed and did not take her eyes off of Max for hours.

Zoe was discouraged.  All of her attentions seemed to frighten Max and make him move away from her.  She wanted so badly to lick him, to play with him, to sniff him.  Zozo even stopped wiggling really hard every time she saw him.  Sadly, it didn't help.  Understandably, Max wanted nothing to do with this dog with the whip-like tail.

My daughter Sheila; and my grand-daughter Arianna paid us a visit on Friday morning.  This visit totally changed Max's perspective of Zozo.  He laughed with real joy as Zoe kissed, smelled, rubbed against, and otherwise made a pest of herself with Sheila and Arianna.  When Sheila and Arianna petted Zoe, Zozo threw herself on the floor and stuck all 4 legs straight up in the air to encourage a tummy rub.  Max was finally convinced that Zozo was just trying to play with him all along and not trying to hurt him.

From that point forward, Max laughed at Zozo when she approached him.  He tossed balls and toys for her and let her lick him on the nose!

After Max left for home on Monday, Zozo climbed up on the bed and sniffed his pillow.  With a sigh, she put her head down and looked forlorn.  Zoe  looked everywhere for Max for days. Her tail ceased to wag at all. 

Finally,yesterday, I showed Zoe a photo of Max on the computer.  Her tail swung back into action and she whacked me a good one right across the shin.

Zozo has her happy tail back, thank goodness!