It’s a Doggy Dog World

 

                        It’s a Doggy Dog World 

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My friend Peggy used to ask me, in her booming voice, “What’s your motive?” She caused me to examine stuff I’d really rather have left swept into the bulge under the rug. Peggy is gone these many years. But Peggy’s big Irish voice lives on, in my head, whenever I make a decision, large or small. “What’s your motive?” I hear as if we are sitting at the table, coffee mugs in hand. Voice followed by laughter.

Months ago I began thinking about getting a pet. Motive? Not that I necessarily wanted a cat or dog or goldfish, but, with my enforced solitude due to this on-going pandemic, my isolation, and hesitancy to travel, perhaps a pet would force me out of my comfortable selfishness that seems a necessary component of so much alone time.

Motive? I hear Peggy ask, “What’s your motive?” I don’t really want a pet. I don’t really want to be juggled out of my comfort place. So what is my motive?

I need somebody with whom to talk, selfishly, with whom to talk whenever I want to talk. Because I’ve been talking with myself entirely too often. All hours. Middle of the night. Talking with myself. Commenting on all manner of things. Having two-way conversations.

Back toward the end of May I put out a feeler to Ana and Michelle, the girls from Oconahua, friends who rescue dogs.

Cats? I adore cats but cats are out of the question. My neighbors next door have six cats. If I had a cat, either it would slither over the wall and abandon me or I would be inundated with visiting felines. No cats.

Besides, I rationalize, having a dog is a requirement to living in Mexico and I’m not sure how I’ve avoided detection this long. It’s a wonder I’ve not been picketed or had a doghouse burned on my lawn or some other kind of retribution.

“So,” I ask, “Do you have any dogs in your collection who might want to live elsewhere, one who is not comfortable in the pack, one with a quiet disposition?”

My friends looked at each other. “Lola?” they echoed.

“What size is she? I want neither an ankle-biter nor a huge dog who tends to lean on legs.”

This is the Reader’s Digest Condensed version of our several conversations which actually spanned weeks.

On Sunday I prepared a brunch feast of scones with fruit and heavy cream, soft-scrambled eggs and grilled ham steaks. My friends, dog in tow, came for the initial home visit, a meet and greet.

Today, Lola is mine, living with me on a test-drive, trial run, money-back guarantee, no-questions-asked try on for size.

Lola is a medium-sized mutt, street dog, rez dog. The best kind. Within an hour she found her own observation post, where she can watch the goings on in the neighborhood.  

Already Lola has run to the gate to bark at Luna, a neighbor dog who got too close. She growled at a man walking by on the lane. She seems to have taken possession of my yard and patio.

Whew. Now perhaps I can stop talking to myself, stop talking with inanimate objects, and at least have the positive feedback of a cocked ear and a tail wag. 

I think I have a new dog. Or is the other way around?

Sondra Ashton

HDN: Looking out my back door

July 22, 2021

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Birdsong, Toe trucks, Garden buckets and other lore

 

            Birdsong, Toe trucks, Garden buckets and other lore 

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You know how I love the rains, right? As with grandchildren, I love them more when they behave. You know. Sunshine days and rain in the early evenings. Another morning listening to rain pound down while the stupid birds are singing at the top of their lungs, “Here comes the sun”. Stupid birds. There is a lesson in here somewhere.

After a leisurely trip visiting relatives along the route from Mexico to Minnesota, John and Carol wrote that they are home, having been towed the final 125 miles of their trip, when their elderly VW camper, Vincent Van Go gave up the power steering and sulked to the side of the highway.

Tow trucks bring me mixed memories. The iconic bubblegum pink Toe Truck in Seattle, with the likeness of a huge human foot atop the cab, advertising towing and recovery services, now resides at the Museum of History and Industry. I loved driving past the Toe Truck when I lived in Washington, although it grabbed one’s attention so strongly it might have been considered by the glum and grumpy to be a road hazard.

Riding in a tow truck is a unique experience. My own earlier, memorable and equally iconic tow truck ride happened in the fall of the year during hunting season. Iconic, I say, because I’m sure nothing much has changed.

Even then, when I was still young and not yet crippled, climbing up into the high cab was a stretch. We were returning from a week-long hunting trip in the mountains, and in retrospect, we might have been every bit as “ripe” as the driver, who reeked of cigarette smoke, stale beer, grease and slopped gasoline. Please forgive me, Mister Driver, if you are the exception.

The floor of the cab was ankle deep in clumps of mud, iconic Montana gumbo, of course. The dash cluttered with invoices, candy wrappers, empty cigarette packs, tattered maps (no GPS in those days), crushed aluminum drink cans, wrenches, and other everyday detritus.

The driver cheerfully delivered our ancient pickup truck to the repair shop and us to the bus depot where we sat on the curb, waiting for the Trailways arrival. Memories are made of such as this.

Also heard from my longtime friend Jerry from Washington, who lives on a high bluff overlooking the Hood Canal. He and a buddy went clam digging. When they’d filled their bucket, they walked back to thank the landowner, sitting in a wheelchair on his deck, who’d given them beach access. Jerry noticed tomato plants in nursery pots.

“May we plant those for you?” he asked. The gentleman graciously accepted their help and directed them to the greenhouse-garden shed and for the white five-gallon industrial buckets. Jerry immediately thought of me with my own Bucket Garden tomato crop. 

I told Jerry that when I next travel to Washington, he will have to introduce me to my Bucket Garden soulmate so we can hash over our gardening successes and failures.

While friends in Washington and Montana are sweltering, it’s hard to believe, but in this cool damp weather, mid-afternoon when the wind brings rain, I want my lambs-wool slippers, which are showing signs of falling apart. I was muttering to myself about things not being made to last when I had a vivid memory flash of the day I bought the slippers.

While on a road trip from Harlem back to my home in Washington, I stopped in a favorite restaurant/tourist haunt in Hungry Horse for huckleberry ice-cream. This place, like the Toe Truck, is long gone. 

I remember picking up the slippers, sinking my nose into the wooly softness because I like the scents of wool and leather. I put them back with a sigh because of the price tag, wandered around the store, dashed back and bought the shoes before I could change my mind. That was at least twenty years ago.

I feel chagrinned. Poor slippers, much stepped into and upon, should be falling apart. Much like John’s ancient Van Go and the Seattle Toe Truck, we all have a limited life span.

Thinking of my own limited life span, I have determined that perhaps in my solo life, I’m getting to be too selfish. (Does selfish have a scale for measurement?) After consulting with my Oconahua friends who rescue abandoned street dogs, I’ve arranged to take Lola for a test drive. I’ve not yet met her, but she sounds like we might be a good match. She’s a black-haired mutt with a nice smile and an overall disreputable look about her. You know what they say about dogs and their humans!

What does this have to do with selfishness? I have heard that what Lola wants, Lola gets.

Here comes the sun and the whistling ducks just flew overhead.

Sondra Ashton

HDN: Looking out my back door

July 8, 2021

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