Seeing Double

No, you’re not seeing double; neither is it a double exposure. Explanations follow.

Last week, around 11:30 at night, I heard a puppy crying in distress together with the bark of a number of dogs apparently giving chase. I went out to check what was going on but it was pitch black without moonlight and after calling to the distressed puppy for a good twenty minutes, I gave up and came back in.

Next day, my neighbour from across the road came to me with a bundle in her arms. I did a double take thinking, “… what is she doing with my puppy in her arms?” until I looked down and saw that Mindy had been inside all the time. As Guadalupe came closer, I noticed how much smaller and skinnier this puppy was compared to Mindy. Lupe said she had found her scratching the soil in her garden looking for a bite to eat. I offered her dry puppy food and she replied that she’d give it to her but then would let her go to fend for herself. My heart went into a major flip flop and I told her I’d take the puppy in. No way this 2 month old puppy could survive by herself. Besides, Mindy had already recognized her sibling. Lupe was nonplussed and told me that I was encouraging neglect and a lackadaisical attitude towards animals, as if I hadn’t already noticed, predicting that I would be swamped with rejects from the neighbourhood. Ni modo, I replied—never mind! I’ll care for both.

And this is how I got Tina and Mindy. Tina is a bit shorter than Mindy but it may have been caused by a serious lack of nutrition. I figure that she’s the runt of the litter and was picked on by litter mates and even bigger dogs. She had a fresh bite wound on the top of her head and another on her jowl.

Queenie had a fit of jealousy when she noticed a few days after Tina’s arrival how the two played together. So now, I have to isolate Tina for a while so that Mindy can have playtime with Queenie. Tina, on the other hand, is very affectionate and Queenie basks in her licks and little bites. Ahhh. . . all is well under the sun.

Tina is on the left, Mindy behind her on the right. Both sleeping the sleep of the just, wouldn’t you say?

A Measure of Happiness

Despite construction concerns and the training of a new puppy, or perhaps because of those? I’m kind of waxing philosophical today. The sun is high and bright in the azure sky, the wind from the west is providing a cooling breeze, all my clothes are clean and drying stretched between the four corners of the “castillos” , the metal contraptions that will eventually arm the cement corner posts of the storage shed; all couldn’t be better with the world.

The last contingent of sheep has traipsed by baaaa..ing their way through the pasture north of the lot, Queenie has stared hard at the whole lot while Mindy tried with her high-pitched bark to intimidate the passers-by, without much success, I’m afraid.

Besides the wind flapping my clothes this way and that, and the birds chirping in the trees, there is hardly a sound attesting to the proximity of the “civilized world”, all its attendant technologies, and the myriad motorized rumbles on a nearby road feeling so distant.

Old Maria, my only neighbour, has called to me to give me a bottle of purified water, so afraid is she that my “unclean” water may make me sick. I hadn’t the heart to tell her that I have a countertop filter that serves the purpose quite well. Apparently, she isn’t known for such gestures so I wouldn’t want to thwart her budding kindness. . . Besides, I think I haven’t reached such a level of fluency in Spanish!

Am I such a simple soul that I feel I need for nothing except what I already have? I think that many years ago, I opted for happiness rather than the pursuit of pleasure, a rather transitory affair since it must always be renewed or heightened; and is costly. This I learned in the Desert Southwest and in the foothills of the Rockies. So, to paraphrase a song by Bill Miller, I offer Praises to the Creator for all that surrounds me, the Beauty of it all, and offer Thanks for my Children, and for all the Creatures that make our World such a wondrous thing to behold, and of which to be a part.

Yes, I am grateful. And happy. And wish the same to you all.