Mt. Pisgah, Eugene

I was going to write about how Bill Sikes is a kind of latter-day Jehovah or Allah figure, given his personal anthem “(Nobody Mentions) My Name,” and how he is mighty and fearsome but lacking in mercy or goodness, and that might be as close to musing on Spiritual Matters as I’d get on this holyday, but then as the snow started to fall we saw four deer high-stepping through the brush on the slope above, and they stopped to regard us while Jones kept quiet for once and just stood alertly, returning the gaze.

Cat poop consumed: no

 

Washburne Historic District, Springfield

Booty: rescued, warm

A puppy’s urgent call sounded over the houses and back fences of E and 12th, Outside! I’m outside! It’s snowing and I’m outside! I listened to all the other barking dogs left out in their yards on this chilly evening and thought about how rescue dogs aren’t necessarily safer or more loved once they get out of lock up and how I want to save them all and bring them inside and settle them on warm pillows and tell them how wonderful they are, but I can’t because there are diminishing returns once I get past two so long as one of them is Ramona. (Booty is a very genial houseguest but we have had to navigate some dominance issues vis-a-vis bed real estate and growl interpretation.) This is the heartbreak an idealist must accept, I suppose, but still. They’re cold.

Cat poop consumed: yes

 

Island Park, Springfield

God bless the Pacific Northwest, land of little snow and less ice, because only a few inches and everything shuts down, mostly. Today is a day when SUV owners find vindication. Kids are out in packs, trying to work the dry snow into missiles and sliding on anything resembling a slope, like the three girls on a sled careening down Kelly Butte on the ice. Booty wore his sporty red insulated rain coat with the reflective trim, and I dressed Jones in Booty’s plaid smoking jacket. It’s so nice to have a stylish houseguest. The temperature stayed resolutely at 20 degrees, at least on my back porch, which made it a good day to hunker down at the homestead with two warm dogs and soup on the stove. Plus there are only nine knitting days left until Christmas.

Cat poop consumed: yes (through 3+ inches of snow)