Eat Dirt

Very tired after a human brawl at midnight.

“Why do you eat dirt?” demands Joan. “Don’t I feed you enough?”

Well, frankly, dirt is sweet, raw, damp, gritty, and full of history. A bowl of Dick Van Patten's Vegetarian kibble mixed with canned food is lovely, and I appreciate it. But, nutrition doesn’t have to come in a package.

Shane and I like to eat dirt in winter, especially when the temperature rises just above freezing. Obviously, this is something no human can grasp.

But, let’s put things in perspective.

The other night, a great mob of humans woke us up at midnight with piercing screams and all sorts of cursing and yelling. It looked like a dark parade was marching down the street, only there was no music, and there were no smiles or baton twirlers. And instead of drums, there were great booming noises that sounded like gunshots. And some of the people screamed, “Oh my God.” And other people belched out curses and did little boxing dances with one another, punching and pushing and pounding against whatever they could or couldn’t see. They finally swarmed over the yard across the street, and it looked as though they were going to settle there for a big hellish get-together. Joan didn’t like that idea, so she called the police.

And the very instant the police shined their wide-angle spotlights into our neighborhood’s raucus midnight, the screaming erupted into deep silence, and the cursing humans scattered like a hundred Medusas slipping into the slimy alleys of hell.

That’s how humans behave.

So, Shane and I eat a little dirt, and it’s not such a big deal after all.

Best wishes, Juno

Biking the Dog

Pondering life during the frigid days of January when breathing in is hard labor and breathing out curls my tongue.

I'm aware that the Riverside collection of Shakespeare is right behind my bed, poised for the taking. Alas. I have no energy and long for the azaleas to spill into the yard with the pink petals of spring. But, waiting for spring to come is like waiting for water to boil or the phone to ring or the sun to rise. It won't happen if you want it to happen. And so I ponder or sleep or slip into a transcendent state that might well be the envy of all who seek to release themselves from the nuts and bolts of life. Oh, the things I could teach the Marharishi.

In the best of all possible worlds, people are kind. Sometimes, I think the people in my neighborhood are mean to their dogs—not brutal, not beating, just uncaring. But, today I was looking out the front door saw one of our neighbors walking his dog. Actually, the neighbor was riding his bike, and the dog was walking next to the bike. It was funny. We all smiled and waved. Well, Joan waved. Shane and I just looked, but we were very impressed, indeed. It’s freezing out today, but the man didn’t mind the cold as long as his dog got some good old oxygenated blood pumping through his veins. Anyway, thinking about that nice neighbor gives me hope that the world might not be as bad as I suspected.

Best wishes, Juno

Winter Rays

Cold weather tempts me to steal the couch. Sometimes I climb over Joan when she's sprawled out under the electric blanket. But, usually I wait until she gets up. Shane thinks a lot about the couch, but he’s too nervous to get up there when it’s occupied. Me, I don’t mind. I live here, too, don’t I?

Today, however, Shane beat me to the couch and I’ve had to take refuge on my lowly dog bed. To compensate for my second-place status, Joan decorated me with this blanket, which clearly is a little overpowering for a patchwork dog of black and white.

It’s very still outside. Everything has come to a frozen halt, even the people down the street who fix cars and long for the hot days of ice-cream trucks and lemon-flavored slurpies. Thankfully, the trees know how to hibernate, the ivy is cuddled up under the fall leaves, and the squirrels are too smart to peer from their hidden nests. It’s almost always dark except for an hour or so in the early afternoon. That’s when Joan opens all the curtains to let the sun spread its rays across the living-room floor. It gives us all hope.

Best wishes, Juno

"Juno is a Must See!"

Did you all watch today’s OPRAH show? I heard the news right from the Queen’s lips: “”JUNO IS A MUST SEE.” Wow, thanks, Oprah. I know Joan has made a few cautionary finger-wags about you on her grammar blog—you know, everything is “amazing” and the way you do terrible things with the word “badly”—but, I see you’ve overlooked her transgressions and embraced me as the beautiful dog that I am.

Did you hear that, reading public? I’m a “must see.”

Oh, oh. Shouldn’t that be “Juno is a must read”?

It’s a film?

Best wishes, Juno

Sharing Space on Memory Foam

I got here first.

It’s not as though we have only one bed for the two of us. We each have a bed. But, there are times when Shane needs to be near me, and I'm not sure why. I try to look indifferent, but sharing sometimes rattles my nerves. We have such different senses of personal space. It’s genetic, I'm sure.

Shane probably doesn’t realize that the two of us on this little memory foam bed add up to about 260 pounds! That’s a lot of memory for a piece of foam to keep in its basic DNA. It's something to think about on a long winter night.

Best wishes, Juno

Lying Down and Taking It (Breakfast)

They say that you should never skip breakfast, and so I never do. They say dogs shouldn’t lie down to eat, but I always do. Why not? Didn’t the Romans lie down to eat?

Once I visited a vet who said it was terrible that I refused to stand up and eat. I wanted to ask him if he stood up to eat, but I didn’t think he’d get the connection. We never went back to him because he was mean to Shane. Didn’t like his frazzled nerves or his dog-like attitude. The truth is he only liked dogs like me who don’t get pushed out of shape when strangers poke at them, examine their teeth, stick things into their private flesh, or trespass on essential personal space without so much as a polite hello. Even though Shane was wearing a muzzle, the vet got all flustered and lost his breath. Of course he lost his breath, for he was a very overweight man—at least 100 pounds overweight—and, if can you believe it, he pronounced me fat. Me.

The vet we see at Babylon Animal Hospital says that I’m just right. “Look at the size of those paws!” Dr. Schmid said with admiration. “You’re a very fluffy dog; that’s why people think you’re so big,” she added with a smile. On the other hand, she said that Shane could stand to lose a little. But, she wasn’t mean about it, and she seemed to understand that all dogs are not of the same emotional stuff. I like a vet who understands what she’s talking about.

Best wishes, Juno

Freezing, Short Days in the Western World

It’s too cold, even for me, so you can imagine that Shane wants no part of the frigid world beyond the front door. He’s much relieved to stretch out on his flowery bed and dream about springtime—a time when the rabbits are eager to be chased, when the ground begs to be dug up, when butterflies chase dogs around the azalea bushes. It’s a time for long walks instead of a hurried buzz around the block with Joan going "brrrrrrrrrrrrr" the entire time. And, best of all, it's a time when night doesn’t cover the grass until dinner is long over. It’s a little unnatural the way it’s dark around here before the Oprah Show is over. I mean, isn’t it supposed to be a daytime show?

We’re kind of lucky to have bad days—freezing days, early nights, noise, rain, ice, and misery. Otherwise, life would be too much of a good thing, and then it would be too hard to figure out what was good and what was not so good. Let’s take tranquility, for example. You know, I can’t stand loud noises; but, if life were always quiet and easy, I wouldn’t appreciate the silence as much as I do. (Not really; I’m just trying to sound positive.)

When the days last two minutes and the nights go on for eons, I always say, “Relax, Juno; this too shall pass.” It’s an expression I picked up from the philosophers of long ago. The way Shane looks in the picture—deeply relaxed and looking quite comfy on his soft bed—I think he already knows about life’s fleeting travails.

Best wishes, Juno