The past two weekends we’ve had crappy weather. Memorial Day has to be one of the coldest on record, at least since I’ve started keeping records. Last week it got hot and humid. Between both weekends it was hard to find the motivation to get out and walk the dogs. Except for yesterday.
Tropical Storm Andrea (the weatherman pronounced it On-Dre-Ah, I don’t know about you, but I have a cousin named Andrea and we pronounce it An-Dree-Ah, but I digress.) Tropical Storm Andrea blew through here starting Thursday night and all day Friday, and it rained. I mean, it rained. Actually it poured. Buckets. It rained so hard on Friday that even my dogs didn’t want to walk, and they walk in any weather.
Yesterday however dawned clear and cool, a perfect day for walking. I pulled up to the park and a car pulled up behind me, there were two young men inside. They apparently thought it was a beautiful day too and were attempting to gather some friends together for football in the field.
I plotted out our walk and thought we’d hit the field first, then catch a trail from there, thereby avoiding the field once the boys were using it.
I try to keep the dogs away from the edges of the fields to avoid poison ivy. Sampson was being a turd and running the edge of the field. I called him three times and then decided to run with Delilah. Sure enough, we’d run about 10 feet when I heard him jingle up behind us. I turned to treat him, when all of a sudden he stopped. His head and tail stood at attention.
I assumed the boys had made it to the field, but Delilah and I turned to look and she snapped to attention. A deer ran into the field.
I braced myself for what was to come, Sampson took off, heading for the deer. The deer tentatively began her run across the field, Delilah crouched, prepared to get her run on.
“Nooooooo! Sampson.” He continued forward
“Stop!” I shouted.
They all stopped. Sampson, Delilah and I on one side of the field staring at the deer. The deer on the other side of the field staring at us.
What a perfect picture. Instinctively my hand reached around to my back pocket to grab my camera. it was empty.
Too late, I realized I’d left it sitting on the couch at home.
This photo is courtesy of Wendell on Flickr under Creative Commons.
By the time I pulled my cell phone out and activated the camera, the deer said, “Sorry, no photos please, there are hunters in these parts, you know,” and ran back into the woods.
Whew. I slipped my cell phone back in my pocket and realized a second too late that Delilah was still intent on catching that deer.
Have I mentioned you need strong bones to walk a Lab? Thankfully my Calcium supplements are working and my wrist the leash was looped around held up. Still I think I jerked a few steps forward.
I called her back, “Do you really think you can catch that deer?” She nodded.
Okay, I made that up. But if she could have nodded her head, she would have.
I un-clipped her leash and gave her permission, after all the deer had a good head start and if I needed to I could have just told it to run faster. I mean, it understood Stop.
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