It’s not lost on me that while teachers are dealing with the hardest days of their careers, while the pandemic rages on with disproportionate impacts on vulnerable populations, while folks in BC and Western Washington are dealing with epic floods, while some in DC are fighting for the very survival of our democracy, I’m writing about a dog.

Well, if there’s forest therapy, maybe there’s beach therapy, and blog therapy, and…here comes the rationalization…dog therapy? For what it’s worth, between bouts of foolishness like this, I do what I can to help make the lives of teachers just a little better.

Yesterday’s therapy was of the beach variety. What I did not capture on camera was of course the most beautiful moment where Cedar waded into the pastel wavelets and followed them to shore – a little celebration of some brand new aesthetics.

Having recently read about the dangers of too-long walks (there goes the forest therapy)…I had a plan to use a tennis ball to lure Cedar seaward, in hopes of soon unlocking the world of swimming. She was almost there on her own volition…sort of moonwalking after the dappled light, so I figured it was time for the nuclear option.

Here I’ll confess a bit of last-dog trauma. Soon after I introduced the tennis ball to Bella, her brain shrunk to exactly its size and stayed there for pretty much the rest of her life.

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Cedar was at first reluctant to go after said nuclear orb, which did sort of please me. But then she made a few retrieves (none quite requiring swimming) and I was almost ready to lob it just beyond moon-walking range.

Then she did the thing: Jumping up in excitement, facing me, going backwards a bit and jumping again as I walked forward. Ball crack.

The nuclear option has gone back underground while we find other ways to play, other enticements to swim.

As the daylight does its slow pour over last night’s snow, I’m thinking about teachers in South Carolina and Massachusetts reckoning with new levels of violence, and others who are reporting young people showing all kinds of asocial responses to trauma. I’m mulling my own significant climate impacts, and what lifestyle changes I will make to do my part. Cedar is chewing on a rawhide, seemingly confident that she has some dog-therapy job security.

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level up

1. To bring something to an equal level or position compared to another thing. In this usage, a noun or pronoun can be used between “level” and “up.” A late field goal has leveled up the game between these two powerhouses!

2. To achieve or advance to the next rank. Said of a character within a game, especially video games. You’ll probably need to level up a couple of times before you try to take on the boss in this stage.

Cedar is leveling up and I’m behind in the game. While she spends most of my Zoom meetings curled up on the bath mat next to the recycling bin or on the floor near the heater or on her dog bed in the pen area, last week she decided she needed my full attention and after biting my shoes and hands and knees repeatedly under the table, then tearing my sleeve, when I tried to push her out of the way (while I nodded attentively to my colleagues), she did her best to climb up to table level and join the action.

My puppy proofing is looking quite passé at this moment. I’ve had to move the hamper, previously keeping socks and slippers safe, to the top of my dresser. Shoes near the front door are now above waist height, and…sigh…it looks like counters are potentially fair game in Cedar’s view of new-level adventures. Basically, I have to raise my gaze another couple of feet to a) remove temptations, and b) accept the fact that we’re at a new pain-in-the-butt level.

AKC’s missive for Week 14 is called “Four on the Floor: Stop Your Puppy from Jumping”. They recommend I keep her out of the kitchen. Not going to happen. And that I keep all food off counters. Nope.

I’m going to make a command decision here on a Monday morning. When she goes high, I’m staying low–a low voice and a low tolerance for getting up on the furniture and especially counters.

When I asked Teri, her breeder, to describe her personality among her littermates, Teri described her as a “first sergeant”–not the alpha leader, but not so submissive either. My first sergeant will NOT level up to challenge the Commander in Chief.

Stay tuned.