It was a dark and stormy night…

Last night was mostly sleepless for both my wife and me. Sometime late last night a violent, fast-moving thunderstorm struck Chicago. Rain. Lots of thunder and frighteningly close-sounding lightning. I felt a drip…drip…drip… A leak in the roof? No. It was my 65 lb. male Samoyed, Qila, standing over me, trembling and drooling (he becomes terribly agitated during thunderstorms).

We got Qila to calm down a little and lie down between us. We spent a good deal of the rest of the night comforting him, each of us with an arm over him.

3 comments… add one
  • Dave – our big old black lab, Shadow, is just like that in thunderstorms. He has to get up in bed with us and lay between us and he just trembles and trembles until it is over.

    Of course, our little dog, Houdini, also has to get in on the attention as do several of the cats.

    In fact, the first knowledge I typically have of an oncoming nightime storm is from the Donovan cats jumping on the bed and trying to get under the blankets with us – they can hear the thunder 15 minutes or so before we can.

  • You’re right, Beth, there’s more to the story. Our two year old Samoyed junior, Mira, jumped up on the bed to comfort Qila and our 6 year old Samoyed bitch, Tally, jumped up on the bed because she’s jealous of Mira. So it was pretty darned cozy, I can tell you.

  • Don Rubovits Link

    Dave – our neighbor, John Lionberger, took his dog on a recent four-day solo backpacking trip to Wisconsin. While huddled together under basic shelter during a thunderstorm, Sidney kept her head inside the big side vent in John’s jacket. She pushed to get as much of herself as possible into that jacket!

Leave a Comment