Find a Black Hair Band

December 23, 2010.  Thursday.

Situation:  I wake up late, and Moi tells me she’s already taken Mway for a walk, “or least out to fetch stick” as she immediately qualifies it – I begin to wonder how often she really takes Mway for a walk.  How often has she taken her down to the creek this past year?  A couple dozen times?  Even less?  I rush to read emails and get paperwork in order then get ready to go to work.  Moi asks me if I’ll be home in time to help her carry out an air conditioner she wants to give back to Ezra before she goes to work herself tonight.  I tell her I should be.  Work takes longer than I expect, and to get home to help her, and also before dark to take Mway for her walk, I make a number of questionable maneuvers in my car as I encounter heavy traffic on what locals call the Golden Strip, including illegally driving up the berm along a stalled line of cars to reach a turning lane onto back roads (in my defense, I can only say the berm looked like the turning lane).  When I get home, Moi has already carried the air conditioner out herself.  Mway follows me from room to room, up and down stairs, as I get ready to go out.

State of the Path:  I’m still having trouble walking.  Although my gait is not halting, there’s definitely a stiffness in my walk, and probably a perpetual wince on my face.  The sky is yellow on the western horizon.  Gusts of wind blow in my eyes.   Where the side path comes back around to the main path, I spot a flouncy black hair band in the path.  Must be Moi’s, I think, and I pick it up and put it around my wrist – then think to myself, she definitely goes at least this far on some of her walks.  Near the wigwams, I hear the ground creaking beneath me.  My walking stick makes a hollow thump against the dirt.

State of the Creek:   I stop at the former log jam, looking at nothing in particular.  An oak leaf falls into the water then floats to the edge of some ice.  As I walk along, I realize most of the ice in the pools has melted, and I’m surprised it was that warm today.  There are still quite a number of thin white ice shelves along the banks.  I try to break some of the ice in the swale from bug land, but it’s pretty hard.  I don’t look at much more, as words are going through my head, phrases like “stiffness to my walk” and “wince in my face.”

The Fetch:  When I reach the clearing, the western sky is turning pink.  Mway is waiting for me, smiling.  We make the circle, and a few fetches into the second round, she starts coaxing me to play “Put it down.”  I play it a couple times, then tell her “that’s enough.”  Back in the house, Moi is gone, and I realize I don’t know whether she’s already fed Mway or not.  I pour out some dog food for her – maybe she has two suppers tonight.  Then I remember Moi asked me to check for eggs, and I have to put my boots back on to go out to the coop.  I find one.