Thanksgiving

The weather is shifting around a bit lately. One day there is a snowbound rabbit in the yard, wriggling his nose at the howling wind. A few days later people are wandering around in their shorts, kicking their toes into the still-green grass.

Today was a shorts day I guess, even though the bird bath water was pretty stiff this morning. Or maybe everyone ate so much food recently that they are burning up extra calories, producing so much body heat they don't need winter coats.

I wouldn't know. I never get enough to eat. No matter what my Person says as she parsimoniously ladles out my meager Super Supper.

Though last Thursday was a day to be thankful for. I visited my Best Friend's family, having received a Personal Invitation to come dine. Once I knew where my Person's car was heading I could hardly stay in the back seat. In fact, my front end kept finding itself in the front seat even though I was obediently being a Backseat Dog. But I knew where I was going and could hardly contain myself: I was going to the house with the Turkey Room!

It is so wonderful I can hardly believe it exists most of the time. Imagine this: a nice place, with windows and doors and sofas and beds and water dishes and people and all the other nice things about a home. Plus a special small room, adjacent to the kitchen, completely dedicated to the resting and carving of freshly roasted turkey! Maybe there are other purposes for the room, but none that interest me. I am only interested in its Turkey duties. What a room! It is a small bit of Red Dog Heaven.

Every time I go to this house I run inside and right on by the row of hands waiting to pet me. I head straight for the Turkey Room and survey its contents. If there is a turkey in there, waiting to be carved, my joy is unbounded. My tail will wag for hours on end for I know that these particular people, at this particular house, love to share their turkey with me.

During dinner I sidle around the table, moving from person to person, neatly avoiding a certain Person who does not approve. Bit by bit, mouthful by mouthful, I have the best meal of the year.

But I am an excellent guest. And this year I helped by cleaning up the turkey board after the meal was done.

I am not really sure why this wonderful dinner happens every fall. And I am not sure why my Person doesn't make a Turkey Room in our own house. I do know that it makes me count my blessings and remember that sometimes the cold wind blows an invitation to a fine feast my way. And for that I am very Thankful!

Transformation

At dawn a pale sun wanly lit the morning world. I watched the morning unfold through the bedroom window, lying on plumped up pillows. Outside, the riotous birds began to breakfast, boisterous and contentious as birds, and people, only be can be. There is not much "sweet" in the bird world. Life is serious business, with the added glory and fun of being able to fly.

The morning crept on. The cats went from morning slumber to morning nap time. I looked out of the window and watched the day grow grim. It got darker instead of lighter. The wind came up but the trees did not throw their limbs about in wild autumnal abondon. Instead, they stood stiff and cold and they shivered from the base of their limbs to their outermost twigs.

And then the sleet began, small round balls of snow and ice packed together. And then flakes began to fall and the leaf piles swiftly disappeared into a bumpy white landscape. Evergreens grew a frosting of white and the leafless deciduous trees held crusty white ridges along the lengths of their slender branches.

The yard rabbit showed up in a great rush and found a new hiding spot under snow-bent branches. He snugged inside and is waiting out the winter's first gentle storm, peering out at a world that in one short day is completely transformed.

On this day

On this day the wind and the squirrels conspire
To knock over the bird feeder
The dog and sparrows eat together, nosing though the leaves.

On this day the wind pushes leaves back up from the ground
They land on branches
Like birds that forgot it was passed time to fly away south.

On this day a small red dog runs up the bottom of a rocky gorge
A small red fox awakens
Steals over the gorge top and disappears among umbered leaves.

On this day the last mulberry leaves have fallen
Leaving only buckthorn trees
Green against the soft fawn of oak and maple and cottonwood.

On this day the sun paints the other side of the river in ochre light
Snow dances in the air but does not fall
The red dog runs through leaves that whisper of his passing.

On this day the robin's knocking call announces evening
Crows argue with their kin
A hawk takes the day's last sail over the thick pulse of the gray river.

A break

If you are lucky enough to have a Person, you might be extra lucky enough to have one who will drive many miles in a cramped but fuel-efficient car to take you somewhere interesting for a walk. And she might take the money she saved on gas and buy you a nice item off the dollar menu at MacDonalds for your super supper. And she might rent you a little cabin to sleep in over night that has a little porch and yard and in the morning you can sniff the scent of red squirrel feet or gray fox feet or wolf feet or bear feet or even moose feet while the sun rises up over Lake Superior and ravens call gruffly as they fly over your little red head. And she might take you to Grand Marais and share a cinnamon-sprinkled donut with you while people admire your size and shape and brown eyes and ask about your origins. And she might take you hiking in a ferny grotto and clamber up the sides of a rocky outcropping with you and sit on the top of a bluff looking out over at the Poplar River and share an apple with you. And she might make you wait in the car while she eats with your Best Friend but she might bring you a piece of fresh bluefin herring to eat for a snack.

I am an extra lucky Red Dog and that is what I did this weekend for fun!

What are you looking for?

Let me tell you, chances are you will find something different.

I was just out on a little jaunt with my Person leashed up behind me and we were both looking for foxes. Or maybe baby racoons up in the tree branches. Or an eagle.

But instead we found a Lost Dog.

We were tromping through our favorite oak savanna, and we passed a group of leaf watchers. There was a dog with them. But when we passed them the dog followed us. "Is this your dog?" my Person bellowed. "No," they bellowed back.

My Person looked at the dog and said, "I hope you are not a Lost Dog."

The dog followed us a bit and then it ran ahead. "Aha!" my Person said. She thought the Lost Dog's Person was up ahead and the Lost Dog was not lost after all. But there was no Person up ahead. We stopped and the Lost Dog stopped too. Then it ran toward us and kept going back where we had first met it.

"Aha!" my Person said again, thinking the Lost Dog's Person was really behind us, not ahead of us. So we turned and followed the Lost Dog. But it turned too and ran back to us and then a little ahead. It really was a Lost Dog. So my Person called it, trying all sorts of names like "pup" and "dog" and "hey you." Finally she clapped her hands and yelled "Come!" and the Lost Dog ran right up and sat down and waited for one of my treats.

It was an old dog, brown and short and grizzled and pleasant. It had a collar but it didn't have any tags that said what its name was or its Person's phone number was or anything useful. (Now I remember why I have to wear those jangly things, since I was once a Lost Dog.) It also did not have a leash. And I needed to use mine to keep the number of Lost Dogs in this story to one.

Now my leash attaches to my sporty harness and my collar is mainly a holder for my tags. Every now and again my Person does something handy and on this occasion she fashioned a short little leash by slipping my collar though the Lost Dog's collar.

Off we went, my Person bent sideways to hang onto the short leash of the Lost Dog and I sped along on her other side stopping to sniff and snort and entertain myself. "Stop that," My Person growled.

We traveled along like this until we got to the main road and my Person found another Person to help us. She had a cell phone, being a better prepared sort of Person than my Person. And she called Animal Control, which does not help lost animals on Sunday nights. They suggested letting the Lost Dog go loose again!!

So the helpful and prepared Person called her husband and he came to meet us and he brought a real leash. I got my collar back and the Lost Dog trailed home after them to spend the night in a more comfortable place than an oak savanna. He is there now with a dish of water and a bowl of food and a blanket to sleep on. And in the morning those nice people will find that Lost Dog's real home and he won't be Lost anymore.

And my Person and I will go back to looking for foxes and not adventures.

Follow me where I go

Sometimes my Person lets me run free, like a wild thing. And I am a wild thing when I run free. I tear through ravines, across sandy beaches, into the woods. I have even run right up a tree trunk that was reclining a bit.

My nose is even faster than my legs and I sniff and snort as I run, skimming over fallen logs, diving into bushes, tongue and ears flapping, hot on the shifting trails of creatures with stinky feet. When I catch the scent of something I might like to hunt I bark and yelp as loudly as I can. I create quite a commotion.

But most of the time when we set off on an adventure, my Person hooks herself up to me with a leash. One end attaches to my handsome red collar and the other is clutched in her hand. And I lead her about. I think she is prone to getting lost and needs me to find the way for her. She certainly lacks my discerning nose and couldn't sniff her way home if her life depended on it. So she must follow me, attached one to another like mittens to an idiot string. She calls this "Taking the dog for a walk," but we all know what the real story is.

I might have more fun on my walks if I weren't lumbered with a great clumsy and slow Person. But sometimes it is nice to have someone along to share interesting experiences. Today, for instance, I discovered a red fox curled in a neat circle on a pile of fallen yellow leaves, dozing in the late afternoon sunlight that peaked through the trees. And I was happy to have my Person along to share this with. Of course I would have been happier if she had unhooked the leash so I could chase the fox around. But instead we watched a bit and I whined my regrets and we left the fox in peace.

And perhaps because I didn't chase the fox it won't be scared of fierce Red Dogs and the next time I take my Person on a walk we might have a fox sighting to share again.

More goodbyes

I might as well give in to my Person's lachrymose mood about the seasonal change and say farewell to another summer companion.

I am a pretty swell creature, but even I realize how phenomenal is this little bird. It is so petite and so full of bravado, so hungry and so speedy. Wait, am I talking about myself again? No, I am talking about ruby throat hummingbirds, our tiny summer-long visitors, who sup nectar from my Person's flowers that she buys just for them, and who bring their young ones to my yard as they grow into tiresome teens and who fuss and bother and zoom about the yard with their buzzing wings and sonic chitters.

They are endlessly fascinating to watch, sitting on the clothes line, and sticking out their tongues to catch passing gnats and scratching their tiny chins with one little foot. From their looping pendulum courting dances to their mad aerial bombing routines, they are proof that there is always something interesting to watch if you go outside and sit quietly. Maybe it will be a spider that creeps out or a shy sort of bird or a cloud that looks like a white version of a Red Dog. Maybe it will be a squirrel that is all red or maybe, if you are lucky and have lots of red flowers, it will be a hummer!