rhapsodic.org is a weblog by Valette Keller

Can't see the dog for the forest

There is a well-established routine that our small household goes through every morning:

• B is up at the ungodly 4:30a, putters about and does... whatever until he leaves at 6:30, kissing me on whatever bit of me is poking out of the covers. Usually the forehead, maybe the nose.
• I roll over, lift up the covers and Lacey burrows under, collapsing at the precise point my body curves so that optimal spoonage can commence.
• My alarm sounds at 7:00a. I shower, dress, and then take the dog out to empty her bladder (unless it's the dead of winter, then I take her out first, start my car, and then shower).
• She gets fed, then goes straight to her kennel to await my final preparations until I can lock her in and tell her I love her before leaving.

It's easy, it's well established, it's routine. It's how mornings should be.

But this morning there were Complications around step three, complications involving giant wild grass, sap, and the entire forest sticking to Lacey's coat when we came back inside.

I have no idea how she got so much sap on her. Did she stand on her hind legs and roll around the trunk of the spruce tree without my noticing? I know I'm pretty out of it in the mornings, but I think I would have noticed. But she was sticky from the tips of her huge ears to the pads of her tiny feet. And none too happy with my pulling leaves and grass and sticks and whatever else off of her sticky body.

But she was even less happy with the bath. The bath that is not part of The Routine. I couldn't let her get in her kennel so sticky, knowing that when she emerged this evening her blanket would be stuck to the side of her face and her kennel stuck to her butt.

She flailed about in the tub, refusing to stand where I needed her to stand, refusing to let me prop her up so I could wash her belly, refusing to shake the water out of her coat when I instructed.

She instead just glared at me.
And then made me late for work.

Thanks, dog.