Day: May 21, 2013

I took this photo at the hardware store a few weeks ago, and I love it. Happy, healthy, much loved dogs waiting for their humans at the animal store. Many people loved it, many people shared it, as I did. It speaks to me of affection and loyalty, two of the things most of us love about dogs. This morning, I got several messages from the animal world that shows how we can take love and twist it into darkness, warning, anger and fear – benchmarks of our phobic and increasingly self-righteous world.

Anita wrote that she wanted to share her concerns over my “dangerous” message in the photo, especially given the nationwide reach of my blog. She offered me a lecture on how leaving dogs and cats in cars can be dangerous on warm days, and lethal to them. The two large dogs were getting air, she observed, but what about the little guy? This photo endorsed a dangerous and even illegal practice, she said. She offered me a link to a website that offers information on the dangers of pets in cars, and she hoped I would link to it to to undo the damage the message in my photo sent. I would be quite surprised if there are people reading my blog who don’t know cars can get hot in the summer, but if there are any of you, I’ve attached the link.

There are many strains and streaks in the animal world I love, some I do not. One I truly do not is the part of the culture that thinks loving animals gives them the right to write messages like that, and in that suffocating tone, and to believe it makes them somehow morally superior. Doesn’t work with me.

I did write back to her, and I said that my photo had no message, other than to evoke the love and loyalty dogs have for people. I see these dogs quite often in the hardware store lot, they are lucky and happy and healthy dogs. Not to mention the fact it was near freezing that day and the dogs were warmer than I was. Red was in the car right next to them, as he often is.

I told Anita I don’t need lectures or websites to tell me when it’s too hot for my dogs to be in cars, although I am sure there are some people who do. I told her I don’t tell other people how to live with their dogs, perhaps one reason the blog does have a nationwide following. I have always had trouble with self-righteousness, the need people have to tell other people how to live, it is as epidemic in the animal world as in the political world (there is only one way to get a dog). It is obnoxious to me, as is the blizzard of warnings, alarms, cautions and doomsday warnings about life, health, politics and surely, animals. I suggested to Anita that if she loves warnings and lectures, this may not be the blog for her. There are so many others that will keep her engaged, alarmed and pleased with herself.

I love the message of the dogs at the hardware store. It speaks only of love, and the sad thing is to pollute that message the faux morality of the times. God, please help me to not tell other people what to do. It is the black plague of the mind. I’m very happy to run this photo again, and perhaps a few more times in the future. You are all, of course, free to take any message you want from this photo. I might put it up on Facebook and ask you to post your own sense of the message. I’m on the way.

I was happy to see Florence’s irises unfold in one of our gardens yesterday and I was out there early to catch them in the morning sun. Irises got me thinking and feeling.  I was looking at George O’Keefe’s paintings recently – she loved to paint the Iris – and I remember reading her comments about them. She thought they were the most sensuous of all flowers, she said she was shocked by their sensuality, their mouths opening like the libia, O’Keefe wrote that they were the vaginal flower. I read a few months ago about a Midwestern legislator who was banned from the state assembly for a few days for mentioning “vagina” in a debate about health care. The men in the chamber were shocked and horrified. If you want to see a grown man fold and run, just come up to him and whisper “vagina” in his ear, and he will shriek like a frightened piglet and head for the door.

Vaginas are  not something much written about in our tense and conflicted culture and this, I think, is because our society is still most controlled by men, for whom the very thought of the vagina would be frightening and disturbing.  The vagina is all about intimacy and most men dread intimacy. I wanted to speak up in defense of the vagina, and add my voice to those discriminating people who appreciate its sensuality and special beauty. I love vaginas and am sorry it took me so long to write about them. For some years, they were missing in my life, and I am eternally grateful that is no longer the case. I hope to never be far from a vagina again in my time on this earth, they are the sweet part of life’s garden, the symbol of the loving body.

Men would do much better in their own lives and on behalf of the world if they didn’t ban vaginas from public discourse, but embraced their wonder and spirituality.  Rather than ban vaginas from public life, they ought to be on billboards reminding us what life is really about. When you think about it, the vagina is the purest and most delicate manifestation life and love, it is a portal to sensitivity and to the art of the human consciousness.

I wonder if Florence thought of them that way – she planted them all around her house. I bet she did, even if she didn’t mention it. I doubt Maria will pick the Irises, they are too fragile, they just collapse and wilt. But I hope she does. I can’t imagine anything sweeter or more beautiful or inspiring than seeing an Iris – the vaginal flower – right next to the computer where I work.

So once again, I’m grateful to Florence for inspiring, however indirectly, my own vagina monologue.

Being dishonest was once a habit, and now being authentic is becoming a habit, and I like it better. Another chapter from the story of the real world of real animals yesterday. After shearing, I sent Red out to move the shorn sheep and Ma, the sheep on the right above, veered off and away from him, and he broke out of his outrun to go after her. Border collies will often grab wool to control a sheep – Red does it rarely – and this time there was no wool so he grabbed her shoulder and the underside of her belly. When we looked, we saw she was bleeding and the skin on the belly wound was hanging down in a flap. We put antibiotics on the wound, wrapped it in gauze and locked her up for the night in the barn stall with another ewe for company.

Zelda spent the night trying to break open the gate and get her out. My first impulse was interesting – I wasn’t going to write about it, I’ve been so glowing and admiring of Red. But this is another chapter in the real world of real animals, and the true nature of real sheepherding on a farm, which is rarely as pretty and orderly as the herding trials one sees at fairs or on television. I don’t like herding trials and I suspect the sheep don’t either.

In the real world of farm and herding dogs, sheep get gripped, run down and bitten sometimes. Maria and I had a bit of the same reaction we had when Simon went after Rocky – we were disappointed in Red, he is so often a nearly perfect dog that I just don’t expect him to mess up, and he didn’t really mess up any more than Simon did. A ewe took off, he went after her and grabbed her in the usual way, but there was not the usual wool. And it was a hot day and he had worked all day and was tired – sometimes border collies grip when they are worn out and aren’t moving as fast as usual. End of story. This morning, the wound looks dry and there is no blood showing, so we will confine her for another day or two. I called the vet yesterday, but called her off this morning. I worked Red a bit and he was his poised and professional self.

I’m glad I didn’t think of withholding this story for more than a second.  Our shearer was much impressed by Red, he said he was one of the calmest and most professional dogs he had seen. Red did nothing wrong and this is the real world of animals. I want honestly to be as much of a reflex as being dishonest or manipulative.