It is our last trip of the winter to Lac des Mille Lac, and Mr. Magoo, the pug, is happy. Rather, he would be happy if he knew. In fact, he’d be ecstatic.
He is not a dog of the northern winter. The copious amounts of pristine white snow that have fallen since we last visited the cabin do not move him. The beautiful shining white expanse of Lac des Mille’s ice glittering on the horizon doesn’t mean a thing. He gives me a blank stare when I open the truck door to get out and doesn’t move a muscle.
Mr. Magoo doesn’t like the cold. So I stay in the warm truck with him while Dick unloads gear and starts a nice hot fire in the cabin fireplace. Eventually I leave the truck, step out into the winter day, strap on my snowshoes and break trails down to the lakeshore and around the cabin.
Mr. Magoo reluctantly follows but, at the first opportunity, makes a beeline for the still-warm pickup, stands by the door, and jumps up and down, telling me he wants back in. When I open the door, he hops up with amazing speed for a well-fed pug and settles in the passenger seat, snuggling down in the blanket I always keep there.
Within an hour, the cabin is sufficiently warm for dogs and people, but Mr. Magoo isn’t convinced. True, his doggie bed and special quilt aren’t toasty just yet, but they aren’t that bad. However he will have none of that and when I open the door, gallops out and runs to the pickup door letting me know he prefers it there.
Not until the cabin is so hot we are forced to open windows, is Mr. Magoo happy. He settles in his bed, snuggles deep into his quilt and stays put. He maintains an attitude of longsuffering for the rest of the weekend leaving his warm bed only to scrounge for crumbs as I fix dinner and to eat his doggie food meal.
That’s not quite accurate. He rallies for three other occasions.
Each time the refrigerator door opens and the possibility rises that a snack might fall his way, he moves with the speed of a whippet.
When the wood fire heats up and the cabin temp hits 85F, he manages to move closer to the stove.
The third occasion is when I force-march him up the road past our neighbor’s cabin to do his business. He shivers in the cold, lifts a frozen paw and hops along pitifully on three legs until he spots the resident fox tracks. Suddenly, this poor pug undergoes a personality change. His ears perk up, his tail wags and he aggressively lifts his leg on every suspicious clump of snow, leaving his sign, making certain that pesky fox knows Magoo’s been here.
Somehow he endures the weekend but never is a dog happier than when we return home, back to the conveniences of modern life.
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