Occupation of Independence

In real life or in the world of drama, most people have run across an archetype: a woman who has buried two husbands and is now married to her third husband. She prefaces most topics with, "Well, as my first husband used to say..." How her third husband resists strangling her, we never learn. I thought about that when I adopted my second (and current) dog. At first I wanted another miniature poodle, as my first dog was. But what if I started comparing the second miniature poodle with a nostalgic and romanticized view of the first miniature poodle? Number 2 would always suffer by comparison. Unfair. It would ruin what would otherwise have been a good experience.  Thus I chose a second dog who was opposite of the first dog in several ways, and was glad that I did. How could that logic be applied to Number 3? My best guess is to choose a dog that is different that the first two. Let her shine in her own limelight.

If you want to feel like the world is crazy and that everything is stacked against you, try looking for a dog. You can do so much searching and get nothing in return but discouragement. There is a reason for this: most dogs simply don't fit reality for most people. Most dog species were developed to perform some function that no longer matters much: retrieving dead ducks from a pond, protecting a herd of sheep from wolves in the mountains, chasing rodents away from the corn crib, pulling a dog sled in the Yukon, hunting wild boars, patrolling the barbed wire perimeters of POW camps, etc.  What do people need today? They need a small dog that doesn't shed too much, and loves being a good companion. But those are the dogs that are instantly adopted by somebody else, so you never get the chance. And what is left to choose from? Losers. There are several mistakes I must avoid when choosing a dog. 1. Don't choose a dog with your eyeballs. Choose behavior, not appearance. 2. Go

I did something yesterday that I hadn't done all summer: I sat outdoors in a chair. Some people do this all the time, but I don't know how or why. But it was cold yesterday at over 8000 feet of altitude. Wyoming doesn't mess around with winter. It felt so good to have the trailer's door facing south towards the sun and to finally be able to open that door in the afternoon.  Sitting in the chair was even better. My clothing was dark. I placed the chair between the white van and the sun. It felt like a solar cooker. I felt like the Australian shepherd pup, photographed on his bicycle in Quartzsite one winter: How was that for a look of pure snowbird-contentment! I cooked up some potatoes in the pressure cooker -- something I seldom look forward to, in summer. Then I dragged the winter-sleeping-bag out of the van. If only my dog liked snuggling in the bed with me! Some people might think that such things are too trivial to write about. Long-suffering readers of this blog k

One of the most admirable sounds in the right sort of place is that of a train: its rumble and whistle. The "right sort of place" is likely to be an isolated rural or backwoods area. From my blissfully lonely camp I hear a busy train track that parallels the Old Lincoln Highway, which was built over the Oregon/California Trail, as it hooks around a small mountain range. If you can actually see the train, its aura and mystique erode. A modern road just blasts right through the mountains. Such is the power of the diesel engine, caterpillar treads, and Blaise Pascal's hydraulics. Old routes follow the contours of the land instead of trying to annihilate them. I learned just yesterday how rugged this small range of mountains was, as I mountain biked through them. It has been several years since the sounds of trains have affected me so much. How do you explain the mood that overtakes the hearer of train rumbles and whistles? A look at the Merriam-Webster's might give a cl