Inevitably age takes its toll on all living creatures, and our little toy poodle Riley is no different. The older he gets the more curmudgeonly he becomes. Ill temper becomes him. Only because he is so small and actually inoffensive. And his temper is aroused only when he is disturbed. At age 14 he has aged temperamentally and physically so that he is more aware of cold temperatures and the discomfort accompanying them. When the sun shines he is in his comfort element.

He rarely goes about without a little sweater; light ones at home and heavier types when outdoors over which a winter coat protects his little body from the elements; freezing rain events or snowfalls, and even without either of those, the prevailing cold that winter brings us.

He now spends most of his day dozing. In front of the fireplace, on a soft cushion, all his own, permanently stationed there. He has his own beds scattered throughout the house for those times he wants to use them; the one in the breakfast room beside the patio doors gets the most use when the sun shines and warms it up and he is able to ensconce himself within it to take full advantage of the sun's warming rays.

He accompanies us daily for a hike through the forested ravine we access up the street from our house. He starts off agonizingly slowly, reluctant to actually proceed. Nothing new about that; he's been doing this for the last five years at least; slowly, grudgingly making his way down the first hill accessing the ravine. He picks up his leisurely pace eventually, so that by the time we're halfway through our usual hour or two-hour ramble in the forest he's trotting along quite nicely. 

He always dreaded being bathed, unlike our miniature poodle Button, who loved water. Bathing Riley always required that aside from being carefully dried with a succession of fluffy towels, he would have to be wrapped in blankets -- or in the summer lie out in direct sun contact -- until his body core temperature had corrected the temporary chilling effect of the bath. Which is why he seldom gets bathed anymore at all, as he ages.

He does, however, require grooming, and although I no longer brush his hair regularly as I had done when he was younger because his hair has grown so thin and he dislikes those ministrations, I do from time to time, have to cut his hair when it grows too long where it does grow; on his face, his legs and his paws. And that's an ordeal for both of us.

But it's when his nails need clipping that we come face to face with real resistance. When the little fellow whines and pleads, snaps and becomes helplessly belligerent. And no amount of verbal and physical reassurance serves to sufficiently allay his fear and his annoyance.