Crazy About Cosmo

Sometimes I am concerned that my neighbors will look through my windows and see me. It has nothing to do with being caught naked. I am pretty sure that if that ever happened my neighbors  would immediately recoil in horror. Abhorrence of my nakedness is probably enough to make all my neighbors close their shades---they do not want to see me—not the other way around. No sometimes I worry that my neighbors will look through my windows and see me interacting with my dogs and think I am a crazy person.

I really really love my dogs. I hug and kiss them all day long—I kiss Jasper on the nose and Cosmo on the lips. Cosmo is a tongue kisser—he also like to take little love bites as his tongue molests you. The poodle side of him is definitely French.

Throughout my day, Cosmo and I play tag—he bumps his nose into my leg and then I chase him.  I chase Cosmo around the dining room table--technically I walk while he does runs laps. Sometimes Jasper barks at us and tells us to stop. And I would play tag with Jasper too, but he is too old. And honestly when Jasper was young he still wouldn’t have played tag with me anyway—he was never that much fun---he was always too serious. Jasper was always on patrol. Jasper was a dog work-a-holic. And when he was off duty Jasper’s idea of fun was chewing on a bone. That isn’t an activity humans can really participate in all that well.

But Cosmo is different. He could care less about policing the house. His spirit is much more free.  Cosmo only wants to be my playmate, not my security guard. Cosmo is a goldendoodle—not a terrier like Jasper. Cosmo loves to retrieve. Cosmo loves to jump and catch balls. He also plays soccer on my Pergo kitchen floor. He also runs to the top of my stairs and drops a ball so it bounces all the way down to the bottom landing. Then he runs down the steps, picks up the ball, and runs back up the steps to do it all again. I laugh out loud every time I see him do it.

And Cosmo has a favorite ball:  “red ball”.  “Red ball” is a super bouncy red rubber Kong ball—it is especially smooth. Cosmo sometimes rolls it around in his mouth while simultaneously rolling on the floor. When Cosmo goes to sleep at night, he takes “red ball” with him. And since Cosmo sleeps at the foot of my bed, I am often awakened to the sound of bounce bounce bounce when “red ball”   rolls off the mattress on to the floor. Cosmo loves   “red ball” so much I think I should get him Traveler’s insurance—just like on that commercial.

I did not have electricity for almost 3 days this summer after hurricane Irene. And I was typing a blog post on my battery operated laptop when the power came back on. And when it did, I jumped up and down and danced with Cosmo around the kitchen singing We have lights! We have lights! Yayyy everybody we have lights!—and Jasper wagged his tail while Cosmo and I did the Samba. I probably sang and danced for a full 3 or 4 minutes before I exhausted myself. It was so much fun.

And then I remembered that my windows were open and my neighbors were home. There was a good chance that they heard me singing and may have watched me dancing like a fool with my dogs. There was a good chance that they would have thought I was a crazy dog lady. And had they seen me they would have been right. Because I kinda am. I am crazy for my dogs. I am out of my head in love with them. They give me unrivaled pleasure—unconditional love—no judgement.

But then again maybe if the neighbors do look through the windows from time to time and see me kissing and playing with my dogs they might smile and think—how lucky it must be to be her? how lucky is she to share in the free spiritedness of dogs? Maybe they think I wish I could be her—not caring  about dancing and singing in her kitchen  with the windows opened and the blinds up.

 Maybe they envy me and close their shades not to be reminded of the joy of unabandoned play. They close their shades because silliness doesn’t have to belong exclusively to children and puppies---51 year old housewives can own it too.

 Dogs are not our whole life, but they make our lives whole (Rodger Caras). Dogs keep     the heart young and the soul filled. I am not crazy—I just know better.