Remember the Dogs at the Door

Unfortunately, these drawings are pretty dim when uploaded. Click on them - they will enlarge and you can see them better.

Dover Does Halloween

Dover is wondering:

When will this be over?

Amherst Parade [September 27]

Amherst, MA was settled by migrants from Hadley, MA, a neighboring town situated in the fertile Lake Hitchcock glacial bed on the eastern shore of the Connecticut River. Hadley is celebrating its 350th anniversary this year, while Amherst celebrates 250.

Both towns celebrated with great parades. Grace Church had an extremely joyful and exuberant crowd of about 30 in the Amherst parade. The day was dreary, drizzly, chilly and gray, but the hard rain stopped for the duration of our stroll.

Our bagpiper led our crew; he was followed by two Grace Church banners, a unicyclist, Saint Nicholas, babies, kids, young people, middle people, older people, a therapy dog (Dover, of course), several more banners, people in hard hats, people in cowboy hats, people with no hats, and a small dancing girl in pink. Happiness was rampant.

Dover Recovers

Recovery! [September 14]

Dover has received a clean bill of health ten days after surgery to clear an abscess in his throat, deep down near where all the vital bits are. His classy purple sutures are gone and he is back tearing up the yard in pursuit of tennis balls, whacked from one end of the yard to the other with, what else, a tennis racquet. He is free again to play in the water, strike terror in the hearts of the local squirrels, receive and give gentle love to friends and children, and leap in the air to snag well-thrown tennis balls.

Dog psych 101 - not that different from people!

The New York Times has reported that tennis players are a mite superstitious about the tennis balls they use and go through a ritual of choosing just the right ball (fluff matters) from several before serving. A friend asked whether Dover is as choosy as tennis players. Dover and his friends are indeed very devoted to tennis balls, but each has his or her own particular style in making these important decisions.

When Cisco (center, above) starts a game, she goes around the yard and sniffs each ball until she finds the one she likes. Then she uses only that ball for the duration - she won't accept or chase others. Dover considers it great sport to steal Cisco's ball - he will go out of his way to beat her to the fetch. Once in possession, he will parade and prance around the yard, taunting her, giving her meaningful looks, lying down with his chin on it or protectively placing it between his feet. Cisco fixes an unwavering stare on Dover, the ball, and Dover again, making very meaningful eye contact.

At some point, Dover will raise his head to take in the scenery, Cisco will move, whereupon Dover darts his head back over the ball. Eventually we can trick him and toss another ball, which he will chase happily, whereupon Cisco snatches her preferred ball - until the next time Dover beats her to it.

Dottie (above, right) will take any ball that comes her way; she hoards them - she is indiscriminent.

Dover is fickle. He will initially sniff balls out and chose one, but he easily falls to the allure of another.

He continues, however, to keep an eye out for Cisco's choice. Sometimes Cisco brushes her chosen ball by Dover's face as if to say: Hah Hah I have it and you don't. Dover, who is very fast, just lays low and waits his chance.

The two of them know exactly what they are doing.

Dover is temporarily on the disabled list, having had neck surgery to clean out a deep abscess of unknown origin. At first diagnosis the large lump was thought to be a possible lymphoma, but luckily, when the biopsy was done, what the vets found was gory abscess stuff. So DeeDog has to observe and only gets to look pitifully at the tennis balls, which for some reason are not on the fly.

The Friendship of Children and Dogs

During a hot seaside week in August, Dover got dressed up and attended a 100th birthday party, swam in the surf, canoed on calm days, played hide-and-seek with the kids, learned to pluck two tennis balls at once from the sea, and when the day was done, enjoyed the friendship of children.

Mists in the Field

When I mention that I am recently retired, people have one of three stock responses:

1. Oh lucky you!
2. Don’t worry - you will be busier than ever.
3. What are you going to do with all your time?

My responses are, in order:

1. Hmmmm.
2. What’s so great about that?
3. I don’t have the foggiest.

If the person has not fled, I might add (again, in order):

1. I loved what I did. I will miss it. I already do. Where else can I talk organic chemistry to people? Where else will I find a willing audience to hear about the toxicity of fireflies or color changes in squid?
2. I want to find a few things I can love as much as I did before retirement. In religious terms, this means I need to be still for a while and listen for what I am called to do during this next bit of my life. What is my vocation for the next decade? I am not interested in just “stuff” to do, busyness that fills up my dance card and keeps me running rampant and missing appointments, although that type of stuff will play a part of my next decade or two or three, just as it has been part of my last many decades. I am waiting to discover the passion that will have room for me, will give my life meaning, and provide a new community engaged in a common purpose.
3. It seems that some people want the recent retiree to have it all figured out, to be champing at the bit to get to do that which she never had a chance to do before retirement. My husband was indeed one of those people. He happily tossed his old chemistry books and disappeared into the basement to build a railroad, emerging periodically to join others passionately involved in the same pursuit.

I look back on lost loves, lost community, and lost engagement in the common good. And I don’t have the new love, the new community, or the new engagement in the common good in my sights yet. I do have faith that one day I will look in my lap and say: “Aha! There it is!” and skip off to jump in or join up.

I am not there yet.