The weather’s been warmish and drizzly lately so I experimented with taking the dogs on their first walk to the park this year. I’ve taken Poupoune on short excursions to the fabric store from time to time, but not anywhere she was just allowed to run; and Pepe has been entirely confined since October.
Pepe’s experience was mixed. While he was happy to be able to play his favourite game (pee-on-it*) with more scope than the usual kitchen chairs, the excitement and stimulation of all those sights, smells and breezes gave him diarrhea. And he was less than thrilled with the falling-through-wet-snow and plodding-through-slush aspects of the walk; even less so with the occasional swimming-through-snow-melt aspects, and had to be carried most of the way.
Poupoune being generally hardier, with longer legs that allow her to traverse difficult terrain without dragging her belly through it and a larger brain case that allows her to walk around puddles instead of through them, was happily unambivalent. She took full advantage of the opportunity to freely express her landmark-sniffing, stick-carrying, territory-inspecting canine nature.
We walked through one park over a crust of wet and icy snow. The next park had a large lake in the middle. Earlier in the year the snow was deep enough to cover the benches by the path; now the runoff is deep enough to cover them up to the seats. We took the sidewalk around one side but were able to pick a way back through the other side.
The dogs are now peacefully flaked out, and I am full of that warm fuzzy feeling that comes from having made someone happy.
*Pee-on-it is played thusly: approach an object. Lift your leg and pee. It’s not a very complicated game, but Pepe is not a very complicated dog.
[originally transmitted by e-mail March 23, 2003]