Archive for April, 2005
Saturday, April 30th, 2005Escape!
When you are little, everyone else looks so big! Good thing Argus had a head start.
Sunday, April 24th, 2005Hawk Therapy
I dreamt a lot last night and the theme seemed to be about some creep plying my dog with dog cookies and stealing my camera off the seat of my car. After seeking help from law enforcement to no avail, I marched up to the thief, confronted him, and triumphantly retrieved my stolen property. I’m sure the dream has something to do with the fact that my camera has been sitting in a repair shop for five months because no one can seem to find the parts to fix it. I’ve just about had it. Confrontation time.
I woke from this dream to the haunting cry of a red tail hawk. Outside rain dripped from the cedars and pines and the sky showed just the faintest tinge of dawn. The red tail has been gone all winter. She migrates to warmer climates sometime in November, but returns to our neighborhood every spring. I have never seen her (I imagine her nest is well hidden in the highest branches of a towering cedar) but I hear her. Her cry wakes me in the early morning, but unlike the scrub jay’s irritating squawk, it is a soothing sound that brings images of tall mountains, cool streams, and endless blue skies.
This morning, I lay among tangled sheets and replaced the unpleasant confrontation dream with the plaintive voice of a hawk. I don’t know when I’ll ever see my camera again, but at least the red tail has returned.
Forlorn
Have you ever felt abandoned by someone you care about? Someone you thought you could count on? Someone who knows how to scratch your itch?
Thor feels like that this week. His parents are on a trip and they left him with a sitter. Now don’t get me wrong, the sitter is pretty cool; Thor adores her…and she has a labrador retriever with whom Thor plays each night. He even still gets to come into the office because the sitter works there. But it just isn’t the same.
Yesterday I dropped by the office and saw Thor squeezed beneath a desk, head resting on huge paws. He looked dejected. He didn’t jump up to lick my hands. He wasn’t interested in his toys. For a 5 month old puppy, this is odd behavior indeed.
“What’s wrong with him?”
“His parents are out of town; been gone since Saturday.”
I knelt beside the desk and dragged Thor’s silky body toward me. “Ah, Thor,” I whispered against his huge german shepherd ears, “they’ll be back.” He gave me a weak lick on the chin and thumped his tail twice. I hugged the puppy to me and kissed his head.
“Everyone’s been doing that,” the sitter said, coming up behind me. “Thor is getting more attention these days then he ever gets.”
I looked into the pup’s brown eyes and saw a tiny glint of light. A smile played around my lips. I’m sure Thor does feel abandoned; but, sometimes abandonment has its perks.
Friz B. Dog
Dogs love jobs. I met a dog the other day who has two. Mr. Friz B. Dog is a wonderful mix of golden retriever and collie; he has the cute factor of the golden and the herding drive of the collie. Friz certified as a therapy dog several years ago. His owner takes him to hospitals and nursing homes to offer unconditional love to those people who need it the most.
On Friz’s days off from working in therapy, he lives in a comfortable home bordered by a large yard and trees. He shares his home with several cats, an albino scrub jay, and a pond of goldfish and Koi. And chickens.
Friz loves the chickens. The chickens are Friz’s second job. They reside in a spacious enclosure in the back yard. On a recent visit out to Friz’s house, his owner led me out to the chicken enclosure.
“Would like to go see the girls?” She asked Friz. He bounced on his front feet, barked madly, and did several impressive 360 degree spins.
Friz’s owner unlatched the chicken pen gate and Friz sprang into action. He raced around the outside of the enclosure to the back, and hunkered down a distance from the gate. The chickens clucked and moved away from the big dog…out the gate. Friz wagged his tail. He waited until the last of his girls had left their pen, then trotted after them. He moved them into the back yard, keeping them together by weaving side to side and occasionally mouthing a chicken that wandered too far away from the group. He moved them to the azaleas; then to the Koi pond; then to a gravel path; then back to the azaleas. After about ten minutes, Friz herded the chickens back toward their pen. He expertly guided them through the gate and then ensured that they all ended up in the hen house at the far corner of the pen. He never took his eyes off the chickens until his owner closed the gate and announced “the girls have gone to bed now.”
Friz wore a satisfied smile, collie ears cocked up with a fold at the tops. His whole demeanor was one of joy. Dogs love jobs.