The Doodlebug

Sometimes I watch Dixie and shake my head. How did I get this dog? I know the answer. It was impulsive. I saw the hand painted sign, "Coonhound Puppies," and decided if it was there when I passed the following day, I would stop by, just to take a look. I pulled onto the dirt and grass shoulder from the long Texas highway I was driving and I saw her face and her tiny body and, well, we became us.

She refuses to be house trained if left alone for more than five hours and I refuse to be okay with that. She acts like she expects the privileges she has, acts like she's Paris Hilton, all long and tall and without a second thought as to how she drew the lucky straw. I scold her and she completely dismisses me.

She has taken over the green chair in my living room. If I sit on it, she will whine because suddenly that is the very spot that she wants to be, needs to be and nothing in the world can ever be right again until she gets in that chair.

She curls up in the smallest of circles, looking like a buttered biscuit, hiding those skinny butterscotch sticks of legs, tucking them way up underneath her long curled body. She is a wonder of shape and expressions and surprise.

She does not eat, this one. She can't be bothered. There's air to breathe out there, a leaf might fall, someone might walk past the house. OMG! Her whole life is all caps OMG excitement. This is nothing half-ass about Dixie -- everything she does, she does 100%.  Run becomes RUN. Bark? Oh her bark, she has something to say and by gosh she is going to bark at you until you understand you HUMAN. She whines when she's not understood. She paces in circles when she whines. When she sleeps, she's OUT. I can lift her ears, move her legs, play with her lips, nothing will bother her because she has checked out.

She has pretty much chewed up my coffee table over the past two years. I have purchased a new one but I'm afraid to put it in the house since I busted her the other day nonchalantly chewing on the arm of the wooden chair on my front porch, nibbling with her front teeth. (sigh)

She is sweet, very sweet. She is curious and entertaining and a constant source of amusement to me.

Dixie is her own girl, preferring to take on life in her own unique way. Including travel.

On the road

Good morning and happy 4th of July! Just as soon as I finish this wonderful cup of caffeine, I am throwing some shorts and t-shirts in a bag, some groceries in the cooler, and heading to the cabin for the long weekend. I can't wait to spend the day there, but mostly its the dusks and dawns that thrill me, the quiet moments of fading light at the ending day and the equally quiet moments when the morning light stretches across the river and touches the house. I love that light. I need that light. And I'm going to get a good dose of it this weekend.

It's sad for me though that I am not travelling with my Cheyenne. This is the first time in over ten years. Since she came into my life, I have not been to the cabin one time without her by my side. Not once. She is all over that place and I am so happy that I had a place like that for her, for her to be nothing more than what she was, a dog. I am so happy for the wide open spaces and the water's edge, for the big sky and thick woods across from our house, for all the spots that she loved to stick her nose in and explore.  After so much time, she is part of the cabin itself. She is the porch and the grass, the blue chairs in the living room, the rug under the kitchen table. Her dog bowl is sitting on top of the refrigerator.

And so it is that I will be scattering some of her ashes there this weekend. In the morning light, the light she and I would take our walks through, along the path we shared together. Cup of coffee in my hand, my brown friend beside me, that strange and wonderful morning mist hanging in low clouds around us. My sweet girl is going home.