I was going to continue on to Mogadischu, but I need to get the Somali dust out of my clothes. It is quite surprising how writing about those trips brings them back to life for me – hopefully for you, too.
But what is really on my mind today is dogs, or rather how to deal with three large beasts on a daily basis in a small house. I love watching them, imposing my interpretation of their thinking and decisions, appreciating their intelligence and abilities, even as I throw them out the door or berate them for yet another transgression…a loaf of bread snatched from the counter, a shoe snitched from beside the bed, a sprawl on the couch of such profound abandon that to disturb it would be shameful.
Two of them are ours – an old golden retriever, born in Bangladesh and transported back via four years in Geneva to Maine. He is fat and no longer has the speed he did as a youngster, but still can get feisty and impose on the younger set when he wants to, which is less and less. His tactics are patience and persistence, combined with singleness of purpose, and excellent senses of sight and smell. He needs them all to contend with the two year old Lab, who is at his prime: fast and sleek, smart and passionate – he could dominate, but that doesn’t seem to be foremost in his character. He just wants to retrieve, and run – over and over and over and over – there is no off button. Watching him allows me to understand what peak performance might be. And then I look over and see him, all fours in the air, totally vulnerable with Onyou, the Astro Cat (full name) curled up between him and the back of the couch like a pillow and it is hard to imagine his virile speed.
The third is my daughter and her partner’s - a young Walker Hound taller than the other two and lanky with a gate like a horse. He is sweet and gentle, but I firmly believe that at some point in his lineage, the olfactory lobe of his brain took on ascendant qualities and somehow crowded out the rest. To say that he thinks with his nose would only be partially correct. He is led around by the nose, pulled through life on a scent, overwhelmed by the perfume of life. Which would all be OK, except for the fact that a loud and repeated baying seems to be hardwired to the same part of the cerebrum, and so regular concertos in the key of random odor have become common.
This too would be fine, except we now also have four cats…but they are another story.
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October 1, 2012 - Begin
3 comments:
I had a few days off internet, so I got to read Somalia, the music, the dogs.. in one go. I love how they all weave together and in the end create a sense of wholeness and coherence, because they are all a part of you and somehow that comes through, the common denominator that ties it all together.
It's a real shot of what life is, great scale shifts, zooms in and out, thoughts global or passing or... and all weaves to leave an impression of, well, a life.
Enjoy your post and look forward to each one.
the dogs... the dogs... I read your personality discriptions once, then turned each into a human and read them again... OMG; they exist and I know them all! Adding years does make one crafty and selective; fewer years allows abandonment through assured invulerability. Love it.
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