Incidents

Nyxie has a fascination with sprinklers.  Obsession, really.  We have the kind that magically and unexpectedly pop out of the ground.  The kind that get sucked down into the earth with a foot tap.  Each night they come on and she seems restless to seek them out, hearing them with her satellite ears from inside.  If we're outside and they're on, her ears rotate  forward, her shoulders stiffen, and she pulls toward them like they're a slab of bacon.  She'll play bark and dance about, desperate to get to them.  She wants to bite them.  There's something about the water splashing in her mouth that gets her wonky.

The first time she showed interest in them, we laughed and let her investigate the sprinkler heads.  Then the attraction intensified.  Now, a walk is further complicated by errant sprinkler heads that haven't automatically been pulled to their earthly depths.  I can reset her with a yummy freeze-dried chicken treat (of course my girls aren't spoiled).

I was talking to a client at the vet hospital just the other day, who was explaining to me how she walked and jogged with her 2 Australian shepherds, one of whom is newly adopted.

"Well, it's not without incident", she revealed.  I couldn't help but laugh like a mad woman at this understatement.

This morning, my daughter slept in, tired from a late night and still enjoying the last few weeks of her summer vacation.  I quietly fed the girls, which was a challenge with Arwen's "WOO, WOO"-ing at the edge of the kitchen.  I slipped on my workout clothes, grabbed my phone, poopy bags and treats, and out into the great unknown we went.

When I take the girls out, this is our time.  My mind is focused on the terrain, the breathing of 2 creatures bonded and in sync.  We take one step at a time, eager to explore "our" domain, as the girls most certainly believe it is.  We are doing the most primitive of acts.  This is what people have done for a trillion, billion, gazillion years.  I'm quite sure poopy bags and clothing were not involved, the idea of a leash absurd in any truly pack-oriented, symbiotic relationship.

No two walks are ever the same.  They are never "without incident", good or bad.  Something new is always experienced, whether it's watching Arwen do her balancing tightrope walk on every short wall, or Nyxie's careful, gradual approach to giant construction equipment.  Something new happens, hurdles are surmounted, new poo is sniffed.  All urine-sprayed signposts are read.  And all this has a sense of urgency - we race the rising temperature of the Texas heat scorch.  (It went up to 105 today)

And for just a brief exhale in my busy life, I am one with my two wild things.  It's all simple for a moment.  They are working with me on the common purpose of movement, exploration, protection.  We return spent - the girls in full panting mode, me dripping in sweat.  They lay about exhausted and calm, content.  

My day is just beginning.  I need to check my email, get some coffee, "oh, honey, you're awake!..."  And a new day unfolds, surely "not without incident".  I suppose that's what it's all about.