Zoot and Sandy and the Rain

Sandy the elephant and Zoot the dog were, without doubt, the best of pals in the whole wide world. They loved to sit by the river and watch time floating past their little seat.

“Where are the birds?” Asked Zoot, concerned that they weren’t any flying above them.

“Those birds ain’t the rain kind. Those folks tend to stay indoors when the sky decides to water the earth.”

And Zoot looked at his pal with respect because his pal, Sandy knew everything there was to know about everything and probably more besides.

That got Zoot to thinking why they were out in rain when the rest of the sensible folks were indoors.

“I hate sleeping,” said Sandy, leaving Zoot wondering where he was going with this one. “I hate sleeping, ‘cause there are so many brilliant things on this planet and I don’t want to miss a minute.”

And to Zoot that seemed fair enough. “But nature says we got to sleep, so sleep I must,” added Sandy. “But there ain’t nothing in the rules that says folks have to stay indoors when it rains, now is there?”

And Zoot thought that probably on reflection, Sandy was right once again.

“I once asked the big elephant in the sky that maybe I could put off sleeping until it was time to hit the elephant’s graveyard. I have to report, however, that no response was forthcoming and so I am condemned to sleep whenever and wherever this old body tells me. Just think of what we could achieve, if we didn’t have to sleep.”

“Just think what we could achieve, if we didn’t have to die,” added Zoot.

Sandy thought and cogitated about this for a time and then told his pal, that although it was a nice thought everything had its season, its time, and if you didn’t leave there would be no room for those who were coming.

“This beach would be full of millions of elephants and dogs and no room to slip a paper between them,” said Sandy all knowing.

Zoot looked at his friend and then up at the umbrella and he decided to ask a question that was bothering him.

“Why do you get wet yourself but you hold an umbrella over me to keep me dry?”

Sandy smiled at his pal.

“It’s ‘cause you’re my pal and my best friend. Getting wet don’t bother me none. Whereas a wet dog ain’t a good thing. No sir-ee, it surely isn’t.”

Zoot nodded and liked when he was called a best friend.

Then Sandy added, “Now I ain’t too sure if there is a great all-seeing, all-knowing elephant in the sky.”

“You ain’t?” Asked Zoot.

“No, I ain’t but if there is a big elephant then being nice is a way of getting on their good side, and if there ain’t, then me being nice to my bestest pal is a way of showing that we’re more than just animals. Look on it as a kind of protest. I ain’t behaving like an elephant should, because I choose not to.”

And with that the rain stopped and so Sandy said goodbye to his pal and told him, he’d meet him tomorrow. 

bobby stevenson 2015  
http://randomactsstories.blogspot.co.uk/2015/06/zoot-and-sandy-and-rain.html