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Well hello, my wonderful San Saba friends, and I hope you have had a wonderful week since last we spoke. I have to admit I have really enjoyed the cooler temperatures. I ask to go outside a lot more. In fact, I have become a bit of a bug about it because that is what I hunt for on the back and front porches when I go out. One morning while out on the front porch with dad, I saw something I had never seen before! I approached the thing carefully, flipped it with my nose, but before I could pursue it further, dad forced me inside. I heard the conversation between the parentals, and evidently my encounter had been with a frog. I heard words such as toxic, foaming at the mouth, and it would make me very sick. I suppose like any stubborn dachshund, I sat at the front door whining to go back out to kiss a frog!
Dad took me to Brownwood to the groomers, and when mom is not with us, I sit in the front seat with him. We were driving along, and I suddenly screamed and told dad not to get near this large truck in front of us! Dad was upset and asked me what in the world I was talking about and I said… “Look, read the print on the back, it says…Drivers needed! No one is driving that truck, dad! It is a headless, unmanned vehicle, so stay clear of it!” I really do not know why dad said…“Backseat driving is bad, but having a wire-haired dachshund front seat driver is insane! Herman, let me keep my eyes on the road!” If you ask me, he should have kept his eyes on the truck with the sign that asked for a driver… to me that is like being in the air and flying by an airplane with a sign asking for a pilot! A little common sense, people!
I always tease mom about being a vegetarian, but this week I may have gained some understanding for her choice. I have always been very fond of broccoli and will even bark if mom doesn’t give me bites of it off her plate fast enough; it is delicious! Well, this week mom began preparing broccoli with asparagus. And let me tell you - it is a powerful combination, and I can totally understand why the woman is in love with vegetables. I am not sure mom is so happy I have developed such a liking and even said if I ate too much I would turn into the Jolly Green Giant. She said…“You already have the physique for it, you know, a long body.” She said one day I might wake and be a long green asparagus! How very disappointing, mom doesn’t usually stoop to such childish measures.
I was watching a show the other day, and in it a man with obvious mental issues avoided cracks in sidewalks when walking. Well, he was a suspect in a murder investigation, and the detectives were assessing him, profiling him and spoke of O.C.D. And one said…“You know, he has that fear…Step on a crack break your mother’s back.” Umm, excuse me? Poor moms, they are always singled out. Now I admit, the other day when mom was organizing things, came across her high school diploma, I asked her if it had been written in Sanskrit? And when she puts on make-up, asks me if it looks nice, I always have a smile on my face when I tell her it makes her wrinkles look brighter. Moms deserve all our love, and my mom gets every ounce of mine.
It is so weird they ran out of storm names so had to name a storm Beta. There is fish named Beta, and it is a fighting fish. This storm is supposed to dump about 15 inches of rain on the Texas Gulf Coast. The parentals know all too well what a disaster that will be. They told me twice when they lived in Friendswood they saw motor boats putting down the streets of their subdivision, only rooftops exposed above the waterline and more devastation. I was recently extremely insulted and all because I walked into the living room chewing on something. Dad was on his couch and says…“Herman! What on earth are you chewing now? You are a tornado of destruction!” He grabbed the storm buster which happens to be Chez Whiz, out dropped a plastic bottle cap from my mouth and all was well. A few minutes later I walked into the living room with the plastic gallon jug the bottle cap had been on…I decided it was my hurricane to the previous tornado! Hey, don’t mess with Texas and don’t mess with Herman!
I have been thinking a lot about the turmoil this world is in, and it has occurred to me there is little we can do other than be the best hearts and souls we know how to be. We cannot control the horrid, the wrong, the bad, the misguided in this world, only that which we do. For every wrong in the world, if we make it our mission to go out each day to do one small right, to care, to say, act, perform, and set in motion one positive action, then no matter how small, we have changed the tide of negativity. So often when life becomes overwhelming it is easier to retreat, shelter in the comfort of memories better day, but to acquiesce, to accept, to give in and give up is not living but to exist in suspension. As a dachshund, my only purpose on earth is to love. It is the reason I was born, and it is all I do with my life. While it brings me great pleasure, I have to say, the pleasure I see it bringing others is immeasurable. I cannot help but think those who seek answers, who want magic in life, who search for treasure already have what they so desperately look for right inside them…the truth is…we all do.
Well, my beautiful San Saba friends, I hope you have an amazing week until we speak again. Take very good care of yourselves. I hope you know how very much I love speaking to you each week. I realize I am very strange, unconventional and weird, but hey, I am a wire-haired dachshund, what do you expect? You should see me wearing my kilt and trying to play bagpipes…you would laugh until you foamed at the mouth without ever touching a frog!
Thank you for always being around, and well, just thank you for being!