I almost killed my mother

We called him Rufus and I wanted to love him.  But it was hard. Memories of him as a puppy are hazy, but I clearly remember my mother and I trying to take him for a walk on what was called 'The Ladies Mile' - a stretch of green that ran parallel to the sea.  Rufus dog just didn't want to walk, he dragged behind us and clearly didn't enjoy the great outdoors.  Maybe it was because of his epilepsy and the drugs that we (or rather the vet) prescribed to manage it, but he was a doleful dog and his fits were frequent. 

Our vet, who we all seemed to call 'Griff', but I feel sure he had a longer name laid, down the law about Rufus's pills.  They were to be given twice daily with food.  We were not to forget.  Now Rufus was a very fussy eater, food had to be cut up daintily and fed by hand, no hiding a pill in a lump of cheese for him, the smallest whiff of pharmaceticals and he was off. Finally we found something he liked - butter and more butter - and at breakfast every morning, as Rufus was basically my dog, I was allowed to wrap up a small yellow pill in a lump of butter and if I smeared my fingers in butter too, it seemed that we had Rufus fooled.

One Friday, breakfast over my father dropped me off at school and my elder and rather seriously grown up sister (she had her hair in a beehive and wore mohair jumpers) setttled down to the domestic task of doing the laundry.  The story goes that my mother was sorting and my sister listing items in  the small red laundry book when my mother just toppled over.  Bang.  Down she went into the laundry basket.  Apparntly she didin't come round for some time. My worried sister sprinted downstairs, grabbed the black bakelite phone in the hall and called the hospital.  I think she caught my father just before he was going in to operate