On the trail

Those of you who know me well know that I am officially an unofficial bluebird trail monitor. My Person is officially official but she couldn't monitor the trail without me. She eyes the stuff up high and I keep my nose to the ground and between us we do a good job.

Today we saw newly hatched bluebirds in their nest box and also a tree swallow who was so devoted to its egg clutch it refused to leave when we peered in the nest box. Such brave creatures birds are!

On the way home we walked across the Mississippi River, using a helpful bridge of course, and looked down over the riverside tree canopy stretching out below us. A cowbird, that much maligned songbird (look it up, you can start with the westward movement and the slaughter of the plains buffalo herds and you end up with this little bird living in my city, humans are the problem as usual) was perched on the bridge railing, calling in distress and looking out at the trees as well. Suddenly a cooper's hawk lifted up out of the trees, a bird in its talons.

I guess we saw it all this morning: a homeland lost for one species and regained for another and the cycle of life and death played out before us by our fellow creatures.

Contemplation

A summery day is just the perfect time to lie in the grass and meditate. Or fall asleep. My Best Friend always falls asleep when he mediates so maybe it is all the same thing.

I have been pondering a bit between snores, getting in touch with my inner self. My inner chicken, my Person says. That is just because I ate an entire chicken carcass a few days ago, and so far no remains of it have, well, emerged. She thinks I am plugged up, but I think I am really a wolf in Red Dog clothing and can eat a lot of bones without ill effect.

But my inner chicken isn't limited to my diet. It also includes my feelings: feelings about conflict and the rough and tumble life of dogs, how some dogs are friendly and some are not, some playful and some want to fight, what people expect from dogs and what dogs expect from each other. My Person signed me up for an outdoor advanced obedience class and I get just a little scared of all the things we have to do and the other dogs in the class, all the direction and correction going on. It all makes me feel a little chicken.

Maybe I would like to be a simpler sort of fellow, not a dog signed up for advanced classes. Maybe I would like to be a rural rustic and lie on my side in the shade with a grass blade between my teeth, a bird singing over my head.

Of course if the bird is a chicken, I'll just have to eat it.

At swim, one dog

There is a freeze warning for the northern part of my northern home but just look at me in my swimsuit, enjoying the sun and having a sip or two of enriched water.

I hear that some people drink coffee and energy drinks and tea and all kinds of flavored water that they pay for with money that could instead purchase things like dog toys and dog treats. Why, you might wonder, as I often do whenever my Person buys something for herself and not for me, why on earth buy some fancy juiced-up liquid when you can just come down to the shores of the Mississippi and jump on in and drink as much enhanced water as you want for free?

This river water probably has lots of caffeine in it and lots of roughage besides and little fish parts and some greenery and wiggly guys and paramecia and twigs. This is water you can chew as well as slurp.

Of course you might end up with some uninvited guests living in your gut. So begins my summer of giardia once again!

I've had enough!

Too much has happened to this little red dog lately. First I get my lights punched out and end up in the hospital, and then my Person up and leaves me and I have to spend a week in a prison for sad dogs. And then today, on this gently sunny spring day, we bravely brave the dog park for the first time since the Incident and who do I see the minute I arrive? The dog that beat me up!

It seems this dog was a fighting dog found on the mean streets of the city. I feel badly for him but I would just as soon NEVER see him again.

After that uneasy encounter I continued on my way into the park and calmed myself down by running as fast as I could and swimming and playing with a Shiba Inu who was just my size. I even joined my friend Tasha in a game of Chase the Person around the Tree. I thought it was a little tame but it got Tasha pretty wound up. I spent my evening watching my Person babysit and it was nice to stretch out on the grass and feel it tickle my bare chest and watch the birds sail into the yard. Life finally seems peaceful once again. Oh I hope I am right. I've had about as much excitement lately as I can take.