The nights are dark now, around the new moon and with snow clouds blotting out the stars but not releasing the powder we need for the trails. At least the ground has finally frozen, so chopping wood is easier. The marshes and black spruce forests are slowly opening up for exploration as the muskeg solidifies for the winter. The ice on the creek below the cabin is solid enough finally that I no longer hold my breath when Ersta runs across the snow-dusted glaze, slipping a little but now without the danger of falling through.
In the mean time, there are other things to worry about. Specifically the barely-a-puppy anymore and my ability to be patient with her teenage phases of defiance and selective deafness. There are secrets I have kept close about the puppy. Particularly that I have never been sure she was a good idea at all. I didn’t get her on a whim, exactly. But I also knew that the timing wasn’t ideal, and stubbornly brought her home anyway. Her little personality, thoughtful in the midst of her energy, people-oriented despite a million distractions for her little puppy brain at the breeder, was too good to pass up.
First night home at 11 weeks.
A rare pause from puppy antics.
Existentially in need of a project, I may have overstepped myself when I picked the project of a working German Shepherd with search prospects. I am starting graduate school, Pete has sunk deep into the abyss of medical school, we don’t have a fenced yard anymore, we will be moving at least two more times in the next two years. Her hyper-alert interest in the cat has left me worried and wary, back in Iowa. Many times over the last nine months, having her and her energy bounding through my days has felt like too much. And I was right about it being too much in many ways, but on the other side of it, I have had more time to spend with this little black ball of fur in the last nine months what with our move and my subsequent lack of regular employment. She has had more attention and training and one-on-one time, more road trips and socialization, new situations to learn to deal with nearly every week, than she ever would have had if I’d been working full time and we’d been in a stable location. In many ways, given her early stages of development, this has been ideal.
Snow Bear
My expectations for her and for myself with her are high, though, and I have certainly not lived up to them. She is a ball of working-dog energy, and is, at times, much smarter than I give her credit for. At others, she acts dumb as a brick, though lately I wonder (know!) if it is willful stupidity she uses to try and get her way.
Visiting Texas at five months.
She is a sweet little beast, with an attentive, mellow temperament clear even through the gamboling antics of her puppyhood, especially for coming from working dog stock. We play fetch constantly, honing on her ball drive and work on basic obedience almost every day, but the almost haunts me. Am I doing enough with her? We have worked on find it games and occasionally a run-away when I can find help … but is it enough? Am I engaging her fast growing puppy brain to the extent it needs, or is all the kennel time required of her (and my lazy days just playing fetch instead of real games) damaging what she could be figuring out, learning, doing … will I ever know?
With Janelle’s kids at nine months.
Or is all my anxiety about her simply another manifestation of protestant guilt? She is, after all, just a dog. And a good dog, no, a fantastic dog. But she can still be overwhelming. Last week, she decided that she doesn’t like getting into the truck in the morning, and refused to do so as we were leaving for work. And refused to be caught, of course. She never ran away, but stayed out of reach for nearly an hour as I cajoled, tempted and tried to trick her into getting close enough to lay a hand on her collar. The command “come” which she knows perfectly, which I have spent cumulative days drilling into her little puppy brain, she now clearly also knows isn’t mandatory. My things were in the truck, and she wanted to keep playing, not be confined for another day. And she suddenly realized she very well didn’t have to be.
Leashed for the rest of the week, she never protested our morning hike out to the truck and, clearly without another option, jumped right into the cab like it was her favorite place in the world every day. Saturday, I decided to play fetch with her before truck time, thinking a week of leashed walks out and no protest meant we were past a short phase of truck defiance. I was ever so wrong. As soon as she got wind from my body language that I was done playing fetch and ready to load her up, even though she was nearly worn out, she dropped the ball and sat just out of reach. For another half hour, we played the game (to her) again of keep-just-away. I was so flustered and frustrated and disappointed that I could hardly think straight to figure out how not to reinforce this behavior. And I doubt I did a good job of it, although when I finally did catch her it was all praise and love and sweetness and not a direct walk to the truck, even though I was shaking and angry and wanted badly to just throw her in her kennel and then have a good frustrated cry.
So what of this? I have a dog, now over ten months old, that I feel unworthy of. Whose energy, some days, many days, feels like more than I can handle given everything else on my plate. With whom I’m still not sure how I’m going to manage once graduate school starts and my weeks are more full of commuting and school work. Yet so far, she has also been a savior of sorts, forcing me out of myself and out of the house when all I wanted to do was sit on the couch and sulk. Making me think when we hit walls in training, forcing me to learn hard lessons in patience with the same brick walls didn’t seem breachable, giving me joy when we have a breakthrough and move suddenly forward in leaps and bounds. Her cold nose on my face in the mornings cuts into the requisite loneliness of being here, away from Peter, away from Pico and Duncan.
Arriving in Fairbanks at 10 months.
My self-doubt about Ersta, though, is really only a jagged piece of the bigger puzzle of self I am constantly trying to put together. The demons of my own inadequacy to live up to the expectations I have of myself seem always perched on my shoulder, whispering in my ear, darkening the sky. The writing projects that sit stagnant. The hours of footage that have yet to be edited into usable clips. The gym only occasionally visited. The kayak sitting latent in the garage for the second half of the summer. Cards left unsent and email unwritten. Projects on standby. Laundry piled up. There are whispers about everything from the epic (when was the last backpacking trip?) to the mundane (how long have the dishes been neglected in the sink?) Yet these are the things that weigh heavy, a paralyzing force that is a challenge some days just to push through.
entelechyproject 