Day 18
I have a labrador retriever … Moby. Queen Mobius. Mobius the Wonder Lizard. The Wild Nibbler. Mobes. She is the mother of 30 babies … 3 litters in 3 years by some breeder up in the mountains. We rescued her 7 years ago and doing so was one of the best things I’ve done in my life.
She is a wonderful creature. Mellow, sweet, does a great impersonation of the Big, Bad Wolf, keeps the foxes and coyotes out of the yard, is the resident baby sitter and guard of the pugs, my buddy and bed companion. She also drives me crazy because she is a counter surfer … to her defense, I forget and leave things within her reach! And if you have a lab or know of someone who has a lab – they are food sluts. Whores. Gluttons for garbage (or food) of any kind.
My girlfriend, Sue, had several labs. She warned me. I dismissed her advice thinking … not my sweet baby. Not MY Mobius. Ha. Again, if you have a lab – you know, eventually, that they turn into food mongers and do naughty things … like get into the garbage and spread it house-wide. Or eat a brisket off the counter. Or take your possessions outside.
Anyway – Moby is all lab. At one time she was 108 lbs (not looking good) … but we’ve whittled her back to a svelte 84 lbs and she, again, has a waist. She is a big, happy girl … a white-yellow field lab and pure sugar-cane sweetness. Or honey sweetness. In any case – she is SWEET!
Labs, in general, like mouthing things … she is a retriever, after all. She has more toys than my kids did when they were children. And still her favorites are the tennis balls … sometimes it’s the pink pig … sometimes it’s something squeaky … but MOST of the time it’s the tiny pillow off the chair in my bedroom!
I have – it’s missing at the moment – a tiny, deep purple, rectangular velvet pillow with gold fringe on the shorter sides. A tiny, decorative trinket. Moby LOVES that thing. In the morning she’ll go over to the chair and get the pillow and come to my side of the bed and present it to me – my daily morning gift. Now how sweet is that?
Well, of late – the pillow has gone missing. It’s been missing for some time now – and I know where it is … I just can’t get to it. It’s in Moby’s “fort”. Her fort is the area south of the garage … it’s kind of wild and has the warmth of the sun off the garage wall and the front split rail fence (which she has never once jumped over – though she could practically WALK over it if she tried!) that gives her the open view of the park. It’s a jumble of grapevines and climbing roses and a great hiding spot for a large dog. Warm in winter – cool in summer.
Anyway, the pillow is there … somewhere under all the snow we’ve gotten lately. So, without the pillow she has been lost in the mornings. She has been coming to my side of the bed – empty handed (or empty-mouthed in this case) looking so apologetic that she has no gift for me. And so, lately, I’ve been putting out socks for her! At night before I go to bed I’ll put a sock on the chair or on the floor and in the morning – there she is in full body-wag, sock in mouth, bringing me my present. And, as is her tendancy – she takes these offerings back from me and then outside to her fort … where they get stuck to the snow and I have to lay a new sock out at night for her.
When the snows finally melt my yard is going to look like a slum … littered everywhere around my yard will be socks and one tiny purple pillow! Lovely! And though I don’t look forward to that extra cleaning up and laundry – I hope the snows melt quickly because I’m running out of socks!