❤️ The joy of dogs 💚

And comedian Kyle Dunnigan

Happy Friday! 🥳

After a few weeks on some dark topics, I’m going to take — and give you all — a break from the creeps I’ve been writing about of late. (This week I also I wrote about men in women’s prisons and the misogyny in mainstream feminism for Meghan Murphy’s Feminist Current, you can check that out here.)

The best way I know to lighten the mood is to tell you all how my dogs are doing. Because it is impossible to be in a place of darkness when you are in the company of your dog.

They are furry little love factories and their emotional availability has no end.

Take this morning, for example. At breakfast — which in our house during the week is very early since we live far away from everything — my husband made a joke that cracked me up. Like, I could not stop laughing. So I got up from the table and walked over to him and gave him a hug.

It was just one of those random, sweet moments that we should all treasure but probably don’t treasure enough. A moment that would, without our canine companions being so damn extra, soon be forgotten in the busy-work of the day.

But in our house live two dogs, who, to the degree that I am sometimes concerned about them, love us so much they must be involved in every.single.thing. we do.

So when I went to hug Brian, the dogs — who had been chilling on the kitchen floor in the pre-dawn darkness — went into activate mode.

As I hugged Brian, I looked down to see the big expressive eyes of my Border Collie, her snout pushing into our hug, twitching, to be let in to our moment of affection. And then, on my shin, I felt the meaty little paws of my Dachshund, on his hind legs, tail wagging as fast as a helicopter blade. 

Every hug is a group hug now. 

Also, every trip upstairs or to the bathroom is a procession, as I have the two dogs trailing after me, their id tags clinking against their collars, their paws scratching against the wooden floor. If l do manage to leave a room without them, I turn to see Bo’s snout pushing through the crack in the door, just to check I’m ok. Then silently she goes back to her post.

There is a comforting routine to every day as well. Max is not a morning pooch — the trip from the bedroom upstairs to the living room downstairs is hard on the little guy —  so he spends the first part of the breakfast hour sleeping on the couch or in his doggy bed. When I start to make my son’s sandwich for school, opening and closing the fridge door, he is roused from his slumber and comes mooching into the kitchen, looking for a piece of cheese. He usually gets it. Then, just like a baby, he wants up. He spends another half an hour in my arms sleeping, as I sit with Brian at the table drinking coffee.

Max taking a mid-morning nap

When Brian gets ready to leave for the day, Max rouses once again. And every day he does the same thing: he starts freaking out that Brian is leaving, he jumps up on him, nipping at his trousers or his coat, trying to pull him away from the door. This activates Bo, who slides around the tile floor in a panic. Max, barking the whole time in protest, follows Brian to the door, and after Brian walks out, he runs under the table, out of the kitchen, often jackknifing as his back legs skid out, and rushes to the living room window. Bo follows behind, leaping over the furniture, sofa cushions flying everywhere. They take up their stations at the window and watch as Brian, with my son in the car, drives away. After they leave, Max spends about 20 minutes with his snout pressed against the window, bereft.

And then in the evenings, they rejoice when the pack is reunited.

Until we got Max, I was never interested in dogs and thought they sounded like way too much work. And they are. They are messy, time-sucking, energy-demanding, pissing, shedding, puking, barking pains in the ass. 

But goddammit they make me happy.

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Here it is, your moment of Zen

You know what else made me happy this week? Discovering comedian Kyle Dunnigan. May you laugh at this video as heartily as I did.