Irish Short Story Month XIII 2024
April to ?
If your life has ever at least partially revolved around a dog then "Dog Collar" perfectly depicts such a highly emotional relationship. The married with children woman on whom the story centers seems at times closer and more honest with her dog, Sid, than to her husband or children.
"Sid looks like a happy dog. He’s a small terrier with tufted black fur and a jaunty, uncut tail. There’s a red scarf around his neck. The scarf and tail lend him a rakish come-at-melife countenance, but this is not who Sid is. He’s a furred barometer of grief, and wherever she goes, he is watching. When her mood dips, he begins to tremble, trailing her from room to room, studying her face as if she were the weather and he a lone skiff. On the days when tears she doesn’t feel pool at the corners of her eyes, Sid finds a shoe of hers and pees in it. If, like today, she has waited till the house empties, till her husband has left for work and the boys for school, waited till the door clicked shut, the air stilled and she with it, so that she can let her smile slide off her skin into the breakfast things, Sid begins to whimper, and the sound of it fills her with a quiet and pointless rage."
The story explores via her interaction with a priest on whether or not she considers
Oonagh Montague is a writer from Cork, Ireland. A former journalist and editor of Arts Ireland, her short stories have been included in 'Winter Papers' (Curlew Editions), the anthology ‘Cork Stories’ (Doire Press) and the 2024 Bournemouth Writing Festival flash winners’ anthology, ‘Lines in the Sand’. She was also awarded third place in the 2024 AIS Creative Writing Awards, judged by Prof Sarah Moore Fitzgerald, Donal Ryan, Roddy Doyle and Marion Keyes.
avid reader for fifty years, Cook Stories, published by Doire Press, will delight you with 18 Stories.
The best way to purchase this marvelous collection is via the Publisher Doire Press
https://www.doirepress.com
Mel Ulm
The Reading Life
"On the days when tears she doesn’t feel pool at the corners of her eyes, Sid finds a shoe of hers and pees in it."
ReplyDeleteWell, no romanticizing the life of a human-owned-by-a-dog then. hee hee
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