This entry was written a few years ago, the actual event took place in October 28, 1988. 

Are the best, especially when there are no expectations.  It's like, when growing up,  and someone, usually me, would bake chocolate chip cookies and Simon and Garfunkal at the peek of  "... Like a bridge over trouble waters... sail on silver girl, sail on by..'  or something like that.   That fresh baked aroma of the gooey cookie dough and melted chips permeated the house from carpet to shingle.

It was October 2005 at the labrador retriever national specialty where Nash earned his last agility title. Since then we have been struggling with the dropped bar, tenth-pole pop on the weave poles, wrong courses, faults, eliminations, time faults, and the endless tunnel smear.

Was that a Bear? “That was a bear… no that wasn’t a bear … yes, it was… maybe we should turn back… it looked like the end of an over grown woolly bear caterpillar…It was a bear and we really should turn back… it just strolled into the woods 50 to 75 yards ahead of us… Yeah, that was a bear, dogs we need to head home now. Lets walk elsewhere today.”

   Willow trots ten to fifteen feet ahead.  A steady rhythmical beat; trot, trot, trot.  It is hypnotizing.  With each step her tail wags from side to side.  She pauses here and there to investigate a scent, scrutinizing each particle.  I pass her by to not even a twitch of the ear; I am invisible. Her mind is totally in her world now. Engrossed in analyzing every last molecule of the blade of grass or twig.

 Get up predawn - go out, eat breakfast, back to bed and wait for sunrise.

Get up bwtween 7:30 and 9:30AM.  If I am not up by 9:30 my friends demand that I get Up and get going!

Open the Door - Surprise!

   (Photos to follow)

 I never know what I will find upon return from a day of work.  Willow and Nash had my Mother's company for the past seven days, so all were content. 

Swim On!

Three days of family fun, clear pond swims and sweet august air.   I love to swim with my dogs.  Nash, the worker, is focused on fetching his bumper and Willow, calm and docile, prefers the quiet paddle by my side as we swim together.  This is the best.  I go under water to watch their legs kick and retract in a methodical, hypnotic and repetitive motion silhouetted by the vastness of a watery clear blue sky.   I have to be careful swimming with Nash.  He is obsessed with saving me not by climbing on top my head, rather by pulling me to shore.  I give him a hand, which he grabs in his mouth, and in a word I say “SHORE” and he beats away towards land.     

Quarrel with Thunder 

     Thunder rumbled like a deep-throated grumbling growl in the dog’s throat.  His ears pinned listening for the distant echo as he stands, braced on all fours, motionless in the bay window.  The maples trees and pines wrestle with the wind.  Vibrations precede, give way to a roar, while the old cottage walls beckon and windowpanes rattle.  The dog launches into an echoing symphonic tempo straining vocal cords to match; the duel begins.  A protective defense against Mother Nature’s fury.  Soon the other dog joins in the dispute; one rumbling lion like bark followed by the other.

     Follow me as I follow my dogs, Willow and Nash, Mother/Son, twelve and eight.  The day is done. Ears ring with the hum of the day as it still rattles in head and bone.  It tingles.  Willow and Nash wait patiently and anticipate.  This is their time; this is our time, less work and more dog time.