Dog Days Of Summer

#105 - While I was glassing the pelicans, she hopped back up on my lap, with muddy paws and underside and a piece of tree bark she dug up. She’s now black on white.

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                       Dog Days of Summer 

Nothing is getting any traction, so, I take my pen and paper, cellphone and binoculars, and guitar and go out and sit in the backyard shade and noodle around for a while. See if anything shakes loose.  

I have a new guitar. A Telecaster. It’s a beauty!  

I also have a new friend. A puppy, almost 9 months old now. She’s a sweetheart. Never thought I’d have a lap dog, but here she is.  

She’s crazy about my wife, and vice-versa.  

She figured out how to be the focus of attention early on, but that’s what dogs do, and we are easy. 

She’s not clear on the concept that my lap only has room for her, or the guitar. She competes for the coveted spot. She wins. She looks up at me as if to say, “What?!” I think it’s her eyes. 

Not getting much guitaring in, I set it aside and just sit back with dog in lap. 

Birds, bushes, trees, and in the distance, parched, browned-out, rolling hills lie baking in the sun. 

Also, clouds. And higher humidity. Monsoonal clouds, our seasonal shift in the weather pattern, come in from the south and southeast, bearing rain and lightning. Welcomed rain wherever it falls, if it does, but with the risk of lightning-caused fire in fire-ripe conditions. We get little to no rain from April to November. 

A few summers ago, a thunderstorm system produced a great show of tall billowing clouds with lightning and rain. It was intense, the likes of which are seldom seen here. You could smell the ozone, sweet and pungent. And petrichor, the smell of newly wet earth after a dry spell.

People up and down the street were outside watching the show and standing in the rain just to feel a summer shower. Never mind the lightning. It was better than fireworks from midafternoon into the evening hours. I saw neighbors I hadn’t seen in months. One who I thought had died. 

About thirty miles away, low in the southwestern sky, the King of the Skies, the A380, descending now at 30,000’, is on its last hour of fifteen from Doha, Qatar, to L.A. It flies almost over the North Pole en route. Still at plus 400 mph (info quickly retrieved from my Flightradar24.com app), it appears to be lumbering along as it drags a contrail that reaches back over the north horizon.  

In the southeastern sky, United Airlines from Chicago, and Hawaiian Airlines from Salt Lake City, make their way southwesterly in their flight to Hawaii. They are at 38,000 and 35,000’ flying at 500 mph.  

They disappear into my now overgrown bushes and trees. I didn’t do a good job cutting them back over the winter. It will really be a chore to cut them back this year. Being up on a ladder seems a lot higher lately. Maybe I'll just hire someone to do it. Normally I’d make a mental note but I'm getting in the habit of writing things down. Hand-written. Before I forget.. So, pen to paper - “Trees - hire someone.” 

Directly above, hundreds, if not thousands of feet up, and with the help of my binoculars, a squadron of white pelicans in V-formation cross the sky without a wingbeat, riding the thermals northwest. They can glide all day and night, covering hundreds of miles.

I recently covered hundreds of miles, making a second trip home in four months. Felt the need to visit the folks. It was an opportune time to go so I went.  

50-52 hours each way. I-5 to I-10 the whole way. I don’t eat much. I sleep when I must at rest areas, Flying J’s, and Love’s, wake up, and drive some more.  

The drive itself is the thing. It is a drug, a high. I have yet to tire of it. It is like something I felt when running long distance. The flow state and clarity one reaches when one’s attention is long-focused mentally and physically.    

I took the pup, now going on 9 months old. She took to traveling no problem. She received a lot of lap time.

When home, I don’t do much but eat, enjoy the family and environs, and rest up for the return trip. 

After our “warmest ever" month of July here in California, we enjoyed unusually mild weather and thunderstorms every day we were in Louisiana.

“Manna,” the pup, likes the rain but doesn’t quite know what to make of the thunder and lightning. I did a lot of just sitting around looking and listening to it but couldn’t resist a couple of walks in the rain.

Something caught Manna’s eye, and she hopped down to go investigate. While I was glassing the pelicans, she hopped back up on my lap, with muddy paws and underside and a piece of tree bark she dug up. She’s now black on white. She looks up at me, pleased with herself, and then again as if to say, “What?!” Sometime in the last minute or two, she made a stop at her wading pool followed by a trip to the dirt pile. I need to pay attention. 

Off she goes again, after a lizard in the rock pile, pawing at the rocks, nose in the gravel, following the scent. She brought me a rock.  

She seems to have a lot of tomboy in her. I know she’s just doing dog stuff but still she surprises me. She’s a mess.

Lots of lizards this year. They have their face-offs defending their territories. The young are almost full size. I wonder if they are overcrowded. 

Not many birds. Just sparrows and finches. They disappear for two or three days at a time then reappear.  

And ants. They are thirsty. The ground is dry and laced with cracks. They nest under watered plants only to be flooded with the garden hose deluge. They swarm. They rebuild. This repeats until the rains come this fall and they go deep. 

But for my note to self, “Trees - hire someone.” not much ink made it to paper. 

These are the dog days of summer. The dog star, Sirius, is riding high. 

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