Ollie the Poodle

This is Ollie, my beloved standard poodle. Ollie was smarter than I’ll ever be and had a great sense of humor.

His only fault was that he was a terrible garbage hound. After several attempts at locking the garbage away failed to keep him out, he broke a child-proof lock, my last attempt to thwart him. The resulting dog-sized feast spilled through the kitchen into the dining room.

At my wit’s end, I asked our handy man if he had any other ideas. His response: “Well, we could try a padlock, but he’ll probably figure out the combination.” Thereafter, I kept the garbage under the sink because that door didn’t have a knob and the lack of knob finally stymied my brainiac poodle.

In Willing, I put Ollie in a black poodle body and named him Oberon, Obie for short. Obie is the only character in the novel drawn wholly and shamelessly from life.