Before school was out for the summer, I ended up behind the school bus a few mornings each week. There are several “no outlet” streets in our neighborhood, so the bus will often stop at the beginning of the road to pick up the gathered children instead of venturing down each narrow country cul-de-sac. I began to notice patterns for each group: the parents that drive their kids to the end of the road as opposed to those who walk; the mom that goes with her little girls up the bus doors every day, hugging them and straightening their backpacks as they board; the little “thanks for waiting” wave she gives me while heading back to her own car.
But of all these observations, my favorite is the shaggy dog.
The first cul-de-sac stop picks up 3-4 kids, and at least two of them are siblings. One clue is that they stand together, and the other is the shaggy little dog sniffing around beside them. He investigates the ditches and bushes as the children wait, but jumps to attention as the bus approaches. He bounds after them as they walk to the door, circling their feet as they board. The bus pulls away and he, proud to have gotten them off on another days’ adventure, trots stalwartly homeward.
I picture their mom glancing out the window as he trots into the yard each day. Whether she’s busy washing dishes or feeding a baby or gathering up her briefcase and keys, his loyal appearance assures her that her children are safely on their way.
The unconditional loyalty of that little dog assures me that if anything were to happen to those kids, one of two things would happen: he would not leave their side, protecting them with all his shaggy might, or he would run home as fast as he could to bring help. I imagine the tightening in their mother’s chest if he didn’t come back, her thoughts of “what happened?”
I’m sure there are days when he’s distracted by a squirrel or an interesting smell, but I’m also sure he makes a priority of getting home. He’s got the rest of the day to explore and play. At seven each morning he’s there to send them off, and I’m sure that at four he’ll be there to walk them home.
Tuesday, June 14, 2011
Tuesday, June 7, 2011
Animal Escapades (Part 1)
Last night Matt and I were sitting out at my family’s pool, dipping our feet in the water and talking. We were seated beneath the one light bulb hanging from the side of the cabana, and the underwater lights were on, providing a shifting, watery glow. I heard a chuck-will’s-widow calling in the distance. I turned my head to hear it better and gasped in surprise as I was greeted by four masked, shining eyes. Two medium-sized raccoons were headed toward the water from behind the cabana. My startled reaction startled them, and their ringed tails disappeared again into the darkness.
Mom has been on a get-rid-of-raccoons campaign due to a recent slew of destructive events, so Matt and I turned off the lights and waited in the dark for them to return. My family has recently gained a pair of archery bows (one compound, one recurve), and Matt recently purchased sharper tipped arrows for just such pest removal (or at least scaring away) purposes.
As we sat in the dark we could hear the coons chirruping in the trees, but nothing reappeared around the corners. While part of me acknowledged the cuteness of the creatures, another part knows just how my mom feels. In the recent months they have inhabited my dad’s workshop (and you thought rats were bad!), eaten fish meant for the pond, stolen household items accidentally left outside, and continually muddied the pool and deck with their little food-washing feet. And if mom’s chickens keep laying in bushes instead of their nesting boxes, they will probably start stealing eggs as well.
I think what surprised me the most is that they were headed for the water even though the lights were on and we were talking. Like the deer, the raccoons seem to becoming more and more accustomed to close human proximity. The deer just don’t care anymore, strolling through yards and across roads at all hours of the day. If you step outside they’ll lazily look up at you, but not bother to move unless you shout or run toward them. They eat the fruit from the trees and chew young saplings to the ground. The other day I saw one sticking its tongue through the garden fence in an attempt to reach a corn stalk. Deer can still be beautiful to watch, but it’s hard to enjoy their majestic nature when they are destroying your summer harvest.
Wow. It's amazing how many results you get by image googling "deer sticking tongue out."
I suppose it’s just a constant territorial battle: as the area becomes more and more developed, the animals adapt and grow bolder in order to survive.
In other animal news, I saw a very large (and very dead) porcupine on the side of the road yesterday morning. I had no idea that porcupines were native Texans!
It looked exactly like this. Only...dead.
My dad saw a guy collecting the quills later that day, armed with heavy gloves and a sack. What are good uses for porcupine quills? Does that guy scour the roadsides for prickly roadkill, or what this a first-time collection?
That situation always makes me a little sad: “Whoa! A porcupine! I’ve never seen one in the wild before! Oh...it’s dead.” Live animals are just…well…most things are better when they’re alive. Unless you’re wearing or eating it. Then I am a firm believer in whatever you are wearing or eating no longer looking like a live thing at all.
So anyway…we’ll see how Raccoon Adventure Part 2 goes. Pretty sure the hubster is going to camp out tonight to try and scare them off more permanently by shooting sharp things in their general direction. Your cuteness can’t always make up for your troublemaking, you fuzzy little creatures.
Mom has been on a get-rid-of-raccoons campaign due to a recent slew of destructive events, so Matt and I turned off the lights and waited in the dark for them to return. My family has recently gained a pair of archery bows (one compound, one recurve), and Matt recently purchased sharper tipped arrows for just such pest removal (or at least scaring away) purposes.
As we sat in the dark we could hear the coons chirruping in the trees, but nothing reappeared around the corners. While part of me acknowledged the cuteness of the creatures, another part knows just how my mom feels. In the recent months they have inhabited my dad’s workshop (and you thought rats were bad!), eaten fish meant for the pond, stolen household items accidentally left outside, and continually muddied the pool and deck with their little food-washing feet. And if mom’s chickens keep laying in bushes instead of their nesting boxes, they will probably start stealing eggs as well.
I think what surprised me the most is that they were headed for the water even though the lights were on and we were talking. Like the deer, the raccoons seem to becoming more and more accustomed to close human proximity. The deer just don’t care anymore, strolling through yards and across roads at all hours of the day. If you step outside they’ll lazily look up at you, but not bother to move unless you shout or run toward them. They eat the fruit from the trees and chew young saplings to the ground. The other day I saw one sticking its tongue through the garden fence in an attempt to reach a corn stalk. Deer can still be beautiful to watch, but it’s hard to enjoy their majestic nature when they are destroying your summer harvest.
I suppose it’s just a constant territorial battle: as the area becomes more and more developed, the animals adapt and grow bolder in order to survive.
In other animal news, I saw a very large (and very dead) porcupine on the side of the road yesterday morning. I had no idea that porcupines were native Texans!
It looked exactly like this. Only...dead.
My dad saw a guy collecting the quills later that day, armed with heavy gloves and a sack. What are good uses for porcupine quills? Does that guy scour the roadsides for prickly roadkill, or what this a first-time collection?
That situation always makes me a little sad: “Whoa! A porcupine! I’ve never seen one in the wild before! Oh...it’s dead.” Live animals are just…well…most things are better when they’re alive. Unless you’re wearing or eating it. Then I am a firm believer in whatever you are wearing or eating no longer looking like a live thing at all.
So anyway…we’ll see how Raccoon Adventure Part 2 goes. Pretty sure the hubster is going to camp out tonight to try and scare them off more permanently by shooting sharp things in their general direction. Your cuteness can’t always make up for your troublemaking, you fuzzy little creatures.
Wednesday, June 1, 2011
June 1st
It's June. My last post was in April. Blaaaarrrrgggghhhh.
Every single day I have multiple moments of "I should write about that," "that would be a good blog topic," "I should write about this," "or that," "or..."
Why don't I do it? Probably because I'm either driving to work, at work, or driving home from work for 11 hours every day. 11 hours. If we lived closer this would only take 9 hours plus a few minutes out of each day. I love my job, but the long commute is slowly eating away at my soul. It doesn't help that on MSN yesterday there was a big ol' artice about the downsides of long commutes. Higher divorce rates, health problems, lack of productivity. Yippee.
As well as just making time to write more often, I also need to decide if I want this blog to be mostly contemplative and topic-y (as it has been up to this time), or more focused on daily life, with contempative-ness thrown in every now and then. Would posting daily events prompt me to write more often? The "daily" part of that seems to suggest that it would. But I don't want this to just become a "this is what I ate, bought, watched" blog. I love reading those blogs, and I know I'd have fun writing it, but I also want to keep writing on longer, more complicated subjects in order to hone skills. Writing a monthly editorial was one of my favorite parts of being a college newspaper editor. I still hope to make writing (especially writing a magazine/newspaper column) a career, or at least part-time career, at some point in my life. And, like everything, it means keeping those skills well-practiced in the meantime.
So here's a little of both. For the dose of daily life: I hope to paint my office this weekend. This prospect excites me, as I haven't gotten to decorate/organize/re-vamp a space of my own since we last had our own apartment. And that was over 8 months ago.
For the "deeper:" I've been thinking a lot about missions lately. What it means to be a missionary. What it takes to be a missionary. Be it long-term or short, missions are something you commit your whole self to. I think about doing short term trips but know we don't have the money. And I don't want to ask other people for the cash when I know they could use it themselves. Is it wrong to choose to pay bills over funding a mission trip? Am I selfish to think, month after month, "I'll contribute when we don't have bills, when we aren't scraping pennies to pay loans, when my husband's education is finally complete." Is that putting my life above God's will? I love hearing the stories of friends and family who have set out on a great adventure for God, reaching those in ways I never could imagine. While for myself, I think, "It's just not possible right now. It's just not me." And then I question it all over again.
Last one, I promise:
Blargh.
Every single day I have multiple moments of "I should write about that," "that would be a good blog topic," "I should write about this," "or that," "or..."
Why don't I do it? Probably because I'm either driving to work, at work, or driving home from work for 11 hours every day. 11 hours. If we lived closer this would only take 9 hours plus a few minutes out of each day. I love my job, but the long commute is slowly eating away at my soul. It doesn't help that on MSN yesterday there was a big ol' artice about the downsides of long commutes. Higher divorce rates, health problems, lack of productivity. Yippee.
As well as just making time to write more often, I also need to decide if I want this blog to be mostly contemplative and topic-y (as it has been up to this time), or more focused on daily life, with contempative-ness thrown in every now and then. Would posting daily events prompt me to write more often? The "daily" part of that seems to suggest that it would. But I don't want this to just become a "this is what I ate, bought, watched" blog. I love reading those blogs, and I know I'd have fun writing it, but I also want to keep writing on longer, more complicated subjects in order to hone skills. Writing a monthly editorial was one of my favorite parts of being a college newspaper editor. I still hope to make writing (especially writing a magazine/newspaper column) a career, or at least part-time career, at some point in my life. And, like everything, it means keeping those skills well-practiced in the meantime.
So here's a little of both. For the dose of daily life: I hope to paint my office this weekend. This prospect excites me, as I haven't gotten to decorate/organize/re-vamp a space of my own since we last had our own apartment. And that was over 8 months ago.
For the "deeper:" I've been thinking a lot about missions lately. What it means to be a missionary. What it takes to be a missionary. Be it long-term or short, missions are something you commit your whole self to. I think about doing short term trips but know we don't have the money. And I don't want to ask other people for the cash when I know they could use it themselves. Is it wrong to choose to pay bills over funding a mission trip? Am I selfish to think, month after month, "I'll contribute when we don't have bills, when we aren't scraping pennies to pay loans, when my husband's education is finally complete." Is that putting my life above God's will? I love hearing the stories of friends and family who have set out on a great adventure for God, reaching those in ways I never could imagine. While for myself, I think, "It's just not possible right now. It's just not me." And then I question it all over again.
Last one, I promise:
Blargh.
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