March 24, 2013
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A Return to the Thrilling Days of Yesteryear
It is a gray and moody day. At some point I need to gather together my tax papers so I can deliver them to my people tomorrow. I am worried I will owe money. I accidentally looked at the sheet my pension sends me every now and then to let me know what I get, when I get it, and how much everyone else gets to keep and I had to mutter bad words and stomp my feet. I was prepared to live on a ‘fixed’ income: between my health insurance and state and federal taxes, my income appears ‘fixed’ to steadily decrease. I am sure I am the only woman on the planet who has this problem.
Yesterday Riley and I went to the dog park. He knows the route: he knows when he’s within three miles of the dog park. The dog normally snoozing in the back seat is poised like a masthead on my console, his lab/beagle/golden/mutt nose pointed at 3 acres of dog heaven. Two miles from the dog park his tail begins to swing back and forth and he’s panting.
Omigod, omigod, Cheryl, he said excitedly, the place is full of mud!
He ran through the front gate and greeted the dogs already at the park with a warning growl, Don’t mess with me, I came for the mud, and off he went, running, sniffing, peeing, sniffing butts all over the park.
He is the official park greeter for as long as he’s there: whoever comes through the front gate meets Riley. A man and his son and his dog came through the gate and Riley was there to greet them. Hi. Stay away from me, I just came to sniff your butt. What did you have for supper last night, anyway? The man reached down for a pat and Riley danced away. Forget you, unknown human, he laughed, I already have enough people in my life and I have running to do.
I am sure I have said this before. Riley is a pretty dog. I spend a lot of time taking pictures of him, or admiring his head and trying to pinpoint the exact dog he reminds me of. (And I know what dog he reminds me of. Unfortunately I never knew what breed she was, either.) To me he looks like about two-thirds of a golden retriever. Smaller body, slightly shorter hair, beautiful face. Most people at the dog park ignore him because there is nothing about him that particularly stands out and because he is self-entertaining. Even when he runs with other dogs he is always a little behind and a step outside the loop (sadly my Riley has never been a speedhound.) He may occasionally see people at the park that interest him and when he does he runs toward them and when they put out their hand to touch him, he sweeps off to the side, just inches out of reach. If he is known for anything at all at the park, he is known for growling for no particular reason. Or he is known for having an old fat woman who follows him around commenting that he is ‘just an old Boopsie Growler.’
In this Year of the Encroaching Cold–which may say more about the age of Riley’s people than it does about the weather–we haven’t gone to the dog park as much. There may be a little husky buried in Riley’s genes–he loves the dog park and he is morely likely to hang back in the heat than in cold. Tiny crystals in the air do not concern him when he has three acres of fence line to sniff. Trees to mark. The back gate to investigate. We have fallen completely out of the loop of knowing when who goes when, so if he had dog friends at the park, we never show up at the right time. (Not that he cares. Riley is a nose-driven dog, not a social butterfly.)
I sat on the bench and talked to Elmer and his Mom for a while.
I marvelled privately that while I know enough to skirt mud, my yellow dog came back with a mud-colored undercarriage, as if he ran right through it. He never gets quite as dirty as Izzy can, but the, Izzy has special skills.
On the way home Riley sat in the back seat, looking out the window, and panted. This was good, Cheryl, he assured me. We need to step up this going-to-the-dog-park thing. Whew! Did you see me run?
