At the time, pig ears seemed a logical special treat.

I know. There are various reasons to be grossed out. But the pig ears called out to us, and we bought two, one for each dog.

When we got home, Lexie and Charlie were more interested in a trio of stuffed chipmunks we picked up at Petco. They each grabbed one, and ran off, squeaking away, occasionally tossing one up in the air and catching it.

Once chipmunk mania subsided, I pulled out the pig ears and gave one to the dogs. Even though it had been years, Lex knew what was at stake. She bit into the ear, ran to the rug by the front door and coveted her booty.

Our puppy Charlie had other plans.

At first, he eagerly took the ear, then as he ran away, he acted like it was super heavy and let it drop from his mouth. As the ear hit the floor, Charlie jumped and scurried in the other direction with his tail buried deep between his hind legs. Matt picked up the ear, and tried to give it back to Charlie. He recoiled. Charlie lowered his head, and … was that a growl?

At one point Matt got Charlie to take the ear. Charlie took a few steps away, then returned to Matt, nudging the ear back in his hand.

“I do believe this belongs to you,” Charlie said.

We were dumbfounded.

Lex soon lost interest. Her mouth motor skills just aren’t that sharp anymore, and chewing a pig ear appeared too exhausting for this 14-year-old pup. We put her ear up on the counter, but left the other one out. After snapping a few blurry pictures of Charlie running away from the ear, Matt and I gave up. We left the ear on the kitchen floor and moved to the front room for some TV.

A few minutes later, once we realized Charlie didn’t follow us to the couch, I went looking for him. I found Charlie spread out on the kitchen floor, his front paws and mouth wrapped around the pig ear.

While he was engrossed with his tasty treat, we decided to slip out to the store. When we came back, most of the ear was gone, except for small ear chips that we found, evidence that Charlie finished off the snack on the couch.

I guess I’ll never know what was going through Charlie’s mind. I’m sure that being presented with a dried out pig’s ear is enough to scare anyone, let alone a little puppy.

From now on, I think we’ll stick to dog biscuits. I’ve never seen Charlie run from a Milkbone.

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