The Dog Days

Sometimes things in life just don’t work out they way I want them to…things like meetings and interviews and outfits and projects and timing and bills and bank accounts and coffee with white shirts and lunches and the weather. Those little burdens are about as bad as the simple things are good. The simple good things make the little burdens worth experiencing. Some examples of simple good things are new sheets, clean pajamas, and howling at the moon with Crandall. Also, any show on television starring Claire Holt.

If the moon were out, we’d be howling at it!

But, sometimes the little burdens can also be the simple good things. And, then shit gets real confusing. Each morning, one of two alarms goes off in my house: my phone alarm for work, or my dog alarm for absolutely no reason. It doesn’t matter if I go to sleep at 9 pm or 4 am, those dogs wake me up at 6 am regardless. It’s not the worst way to wake up in the morning, except that sometimes it is, but even when it is, it really isn’t. Are you still following along?

It’s important to keep up.

Eddie and Jax jump into our bed at 6 am each morning, and as soon as Jax’s feet hit the bed, Casper is up puttering around and Jack is howling like a seal. Then there’s little Blanco. He just lies there, sleeping away, until I stroke his head to let him know it’s Ok to wake up and follow me downstairs. Since he’s deaf, he doesn’t hear all the commotion from the other dogs, and his internal clock is still a little confused I suppose. As soon as I do wake him, he’s on his feet, butt wiggling and happy as ever to see me. It’s hard not to melt when you meet Blanco.

Eddie & Blanco

The other day I was sunbathing on the back porch, and Blanco stole my bathing suit top. When the neighbor stopped by to say hi, I had no top to cover myself because Blanco was snuggled up with it under the umbrella. Privacy isn’t something I get much of these days. But, there’s been plenty of sun to speak of, which means our lives have gone to the dogs—literally.

Once it gets hot enough to swim, we take Casper and Eddie to the river to chase sticks. They both like to swim and fish for leaves and rocks, but Casper will just keep swimming until he drowns if I let him.You know you have a lot of dogs when most of your summer plans involve an entire pack. That, and, when you catch yourself throwing pieces of food on the ground at a restaurant.

Now, we’re looking at buying a farm for the dogs near the PA line. We found a beautiful property with seven acres and an awesome little farm-house right in the middle. It’s more like a cape cod, but it has a wrap-around porch, and I will be adding alpaca’s so I can call it whatever the fuck I want. The Harm Farm. That’s where I’m heading with this.

We can grow more fruit and veggies than we do now, and the dogs will have sheep and chickens to herd. It’s amazing to think we would buy a farm just for our dogs, but they’re what gets me up every morning. Literally. The world’s largest dog toy. That’s how I see it. Besides, if we’re going to make a family, we are going to need a lot of space so I have plenty of places to hide.

If you would have asked me 12 years ago if I would ever consider living on a farm, I probably would have laughed at you. But, I didn’t know shit 12 years ago. In fact, most 22-year-olds don’t know shit, and it took a weekend with a bunch of them for me to figure that out.

But, I also spent the weekend with some awesome friends, and they had this full-sized deer that reminded me of the Bloggess right away. And, anything that reminds me of Jenny Lawson is like a tiny piece of heaven sent for my blogging pleasure.

Hello, beautiful…

Awesome friends…

Awesome Ciara with our awesome herd…

Anyway, it’s funny how much life changes over time. We don’t even realize how different we’ve become until the world reminds us. I always wanted to live by the beach; now I want to live by the beach on a farm. I always wanted an off-roading vehicle. Now, I want a convertible I can drive off road. But, all of that is just stuff. Really, what I want is peace and quiet. And for my children to skip their early 20’s. And their teenage years. And middle school. Maybe we ought to just stick with dogs. They age in quantities of seven, and 22 is NOT divisible by seven. Perhaps that’s why they’re so much less annoying than humans.