What a face! Dolly the Shepherd lookin’ at me with the same expression most folks find available when seeing me scamper about in my crazy shoes. She was pretty sure my zany ways – jamming buns, frozen raw meat, and coolers into a van across the street from her – matched what ideas she had about me in her astute, shepherd brain. The crooked smile. Those arched eye brows. I’ve seen it all before … many times from folks’ faces, too.
Not to say it’s a bad thing. I like to think, “wonderment”, or perhaps, “fascination”, just to keep my wits intact. Dolly, on the other paw, may have thought, “What the hell is he doing?… I’m across the street, looking all cute and adorable, yet, he’s unsuccessfully attempting to maniacally run around – doing that van-jam thing … Not really paying attention to me.”
True ‘dat. I was busy. Life in the prep-lane for a 530 student, out-of-town, (what turned out to be a literal stuck-in-the-mud) event took a lot of mental energy out of already stagnant, slow steps. Focus had to be forward, not so much sideways toward that leashed bundle of spunk across a happy path of asphalt.
All she had to do was sit there and make sense of it all. After looking at the picture hastily snapped, I started to understand why her particular expression easily appeared. Her life is simple: sit there and look delightful. My life is complicatingly unlovely at times. Our roads intersected at that moment.
“He’s not over here petting me! I am the giver of joyful moments … That silly seller of delicious delicacies is rushing around too much and needs to get over here – like now – and rub down some fur, itch a little ear fuzz, skritch some nozzle neck whiskers, and talk some lovin’ to me! .”
She’s not wrong. After getting home at 11:35 p.m. from a mud-soaked, less-then stellar event, I should have – hours earlier – drained more captivating canine time out of my reserves than frenetic beef frank foolishness. Golly, Dolly … I didn’t know. You were right.
A few minutes would not have changed a thing.
Isn’t this a lesson for all of us? “Too busy doing the big to appreciate the small.”
My “big” was stuffing a van full of product – something I can do backwards, blindfolded, and with a medium-size monkey tied to my back, playing Czardas on the harmonica. The “small” could have been taking a few moments to walk across the street and pet a kind, wonderfully propped up, goofy smiling, german shepherd …
Moments, right?
These may not be four paws in your life. For pause, look carefully. They may not be deliciously grinning dogs that cause you to stop what you’re doing and appreciate a “small”. Your “bigs” are really consuming. Mine are. I’m almost always ridiculously ahead of myself. Takes work to see these smalls AND act upon them.
Find some smalls. Appreciate them. The bigs will always be around for you to fret over, with, and among.
If peoplefolk I see continue to fuzzy eyeball me, chances are excellent that won’t be a small moment for me to scratch under their chin. Although that confused look is common, it is guaranteed to only work when dispatched from dogs.
Whatever you decide to do is your business for sure. I like dogs, words, music, and thingies crossing my path making life just a little bit more ease-able.
Dolly would be open to a pet, or two, if you’re free sometime. I doubt you’d get the look I got; however, you may be as crazy as I. In that case, she’ll be cuter than ever. Hope you can handle the overload of delightfulness.
DougHugs 