Regime Change

Well, it's done! And yesterday, more happened than just changing one president for another.

On this day, we gather because we have chosen hope over fear, unity of purpose over conflict and discord. On this day, we come to proclaim an end to the petty grievances and false promises, the recriminations and worn out dogmas, that for far too long have strangled our politics.... What the cynics fail to understand is that the ground has shifted beneath them — that the stale political arguments that have consumed us for so long no longer apply.

Business in the light of day, rejecting as false the choice between our safety and our ideals, extending a hand to the unclenched fist. These aren't new ideas, but it has been a long time since we have seen them in action. It was time.

...Among the Pigeons

My urban spinoni are great hunters. I have learned never to think that I'm just taking them out for a fast poop, because there are several notable pigeon feeders on our block and there are always plenty of birds about. Oh, the stares we get. (Admiring, of course.) They spot a pigeon, and it's just like Niagara Falls (slowly I turned, step by step, inch by inch...) They lock up in perfect unison, and stay there.

The pigeons? "Feh," they say, and go back about their business. They don't move, the dogs won't move. Annie is no longer in the first blush of youth and can be persuaded to leave them and go on her walk, if you make an issue of it, because she knows we're not going to shoot anyone in the middle of New York. Pete, however, is young, and full of hopes and dreams -- he stays and WILLS me to do the right thing. I have to do a lot of explaining. Ten years down the line, the only hunter education class in Manhattan will be jammed with graduates of P.S. 11 who were treated to the daily sight of bird dogs in action in their formative years.

The other day, my mighty hunters decided that the pigeons did not interest them. Even though they were right in front of the playground where the pigeons parade about in great flocks, thumbing their noses at any bird dog that passes, MY little lambs were pointing the local bike rack. It turns out that among all those wheels is a tiny pile of oak leaves, the last ones that haven't blown away. In those leaves is a little family of sparrows, fluffed up like tiny tumbleweeds against January cold desolate.

Well, That's YOUR Opinion

It seems to me that dog world inhabits a very shaky place on the reality continuum. My inability to inhabit it myself must ever betray me as a mere dilettante.

I was quite delighted to see this in the Sunday papers; how it reminds me of recent conversations with the leading lights of the spinone fancy.

http://www.gocomics.com/nonsequitur/2009/01/11/

Baths

The problem with washing these big old bird dogs is that the only thing that smells worse than dirty dog is wet dog. And, while dirty dog is just on the dog, WET dog permeates everything. So to improve stinky Pete, who so sorely needs it, he first has to get much worse and it comes off on me and all our surroundings as well.

It might have been better, some would think, to just leave the dirty dog alone, because now the mess is everywhere. Drains clogged, hair on the ceiling, wet towels draped all over. Yuck.

But tomorrow, after a bit of Drain-O, with the towels in the laundry and the vacuuming done, Pete will be all minty-eucalyptus fresh and the world our oyster again. It has to be done.

Vicarious Vertigo

Oh, the sensation you get when considering the disasters that might befall you if only you were as careless as that other fellow!

Why, I once knew someone whose cousin who had a friend who told her about someone who didn't know how dangerous it was to lean your elbow out an open car window...or was that my grandmother? Well, whoever it was, that truck driver had to make a U-turn and chase him back down the road with the arm. It just makes me shiver to think of it.

I'm just as prone as the next one to pop my eyes at the imagined near-miss of some dreadful calamity. "Oh my lord," I cry, "I was on 81st Street just a couple of weeks ago, only three blocks away! Didn't you think about moving there in the '70s?" It's nearly as good as a roller coaster for a cheap thrill.

What's important is to be able to distinguish between vicarious vertigo and actually snatching up a nice pointed stick to carry on your run. And to be careful that you don't suddenly discover that the the person you think you're sharing a nice frisson of imaginary terror with is leaning across you to slap your hands off the window buttons. For your own good, of course.

A Day at the Dictionary

club
1. a heavy stick, usually thicker at one end than at the other, suitable for use as a weapon; a cudgel.
2. a group of persons organized for a social, literary, athletic, political, or other purpose: They organized a computer club.

Thanks to dictionary.com.

Which do you prefer?

Surrender, Dorothy!

I always enter the new year with hopes of better things, and here's one already. Has anyone other than the NY Times (and me) noticed that CNN has finally dropped the crawl? That constant stream of news across the bottom of the news, letting us know, since 9/11/2001, that there was something going on so much WORSE than what the reporters were talking about that we had to be told immediately, is gone. I remember 9/11 (and 9/12 and 9/13) all too well, especially the feeling of helpless fear that kept me perched on the arm of my couch, afraid to take the time to wash the ashes from my hair, listening to CNN and watching the crawl, sure that if I averted my gaze for just a moment....

Since then, because of fear, or the determination never to be afraid like that again, we have entered wars, tolerated torture, expected (and sometimes gotten) the worst from people who were not like us. And why are we so afraid? Mostly because people are so busy convincing us that we OUGHT to be, which is no way to live. It's nice to see some of the frenzy die out, even if it is just that running text below the reporter that makes you gasp with apprehension, no longer knowing where to direct your attention and how to protect yourself.

What does this have to do with dogs?

Well, lately we dog club types seem to have been spending a lot of time discussing the dangers that abound in the dog world. The idea of working together to accomplish things is scoffed at, and met with great lists of every thing that COULD go wrong in this bad world. I, for one, am tired of people who make their points by trying to make others afraid and who, rather than presenting a reasoned argument, warn me that if I am not careful my dogs will be stolen or, worse, I'll start getting SPAM in my email.

It's Locke vs. Hobbes all over again. Is man a noble savage, capable of accepting the give and take of the rule of law, or a savage beast who must form alliances in desperation to gain protection against the other (nasty, brutish, short, not like a spinone at all) savages? Well, some people seem to prefer to live in a world where the preemptive first strike is the only option; I don't, and playing upon my fears is not the way to make me change. Not this year.