What's That Sound?

How well do you know the night-time noises of your home? The water heater that turns on at six? The slamming of the neighbour’s car door half an hour later as she leaves for work? The individual snoring patterns of your home’s inhabitants?

I recently woke up in the middle of the night unsettled by the sounds around me. Lying there silently, surrounded by the darkness, I tried to define one from another.

(Of course, before I did that I really needed to be sure of which house I was sleeping in, the pets we were sharing it with, where they were sleeping, what surrounded the house… You know the stuff that gets a little confusing and befuddled when you can’t see it and it changes from one month to the next!)

The main thing that confused me, though, was the fact that I was listening to three different kinds of snoring - even though I knew it was only Steve and me in the house! And let’s face it, I knew I wasn’t snoring! After all, I’m way too gentile and ladylike for that - besides I’ve never heard it so how could one of them be me! Which left two unaccounted for…

At this point I did consider getting up and sneaking around the house trying to find the cause of the extra sound, but what if it was somebody who’d snuck into the house… maybe a big burly burglar who’d fallen asleep, or a relative of the homeowner who had a front door key, or even the homeowners returning early?

Hmmm? No, it seemed wiser to stay, silent and still, in bed trying to remember where I was.

But then, without warning, the three snoring became one. Instantly followed by a scuffle in the hallway, hurried feet racing towards me and a sudden kerflumpf that vibrated through the room, announcing extra weight on the bed. A second later I felt the familiar series of pressure points as two small animals walked up and over my body, rotated a couple of times then snuggled against my body. A little while on, the one snoring became three again and the world returned to normal.

I never knew dogs snored. Did you?