Daisy’s New Perch

My suburban house is dumb. The small bedrooms are on the front of the house, with the family room tucked behind the garage. There are no good windows for Daisy to see out of, no couch to jump upon to watch the street.

Until the day I cleaned my office. I ended up pushing a file folder bin in front of the window, not realizing that I was creating the perfet perch for Daisy to stand on to watch the comings and goings of the neighborhood.

I live at the end of a court with a park next door, so lots of people walk by with their dogs. We have three families working from home, and one guy sells wine (I think), or maybe he’s just a big drinker. He gets lots of FedEx and UPS deliveries. Lately the blue Amazon trucks have also been seen up and down the street.

Then there are the gardeners, one on Thursday, one on Saturday, and one another day of the week. Three of us do our own, two of us with not one blade of grass. Who needs grass when it is right next door in the park?

But I digress.

Daisy has two barks, her high-pitched, oh-I-think-you-are-about-to-feed-me bark, and her lower what-are-you-doing-on-my-street bark. I’ll take the lower bark any day. In the kitchen, the high-pitched barking is accompanied by jumping up and down. I give Pepper her treat first since she can maintain a sitting position. Daisy finally catches on and does a one-second-butt-on-the ground sit before she grabs the treat out of my hand.

This is progress, people. She didn’t sit her first six months, no matter how hard we both tried. I’m her third owner. She came to me housebroken and ready to play ball, but she couldn’t maintain her butt on the floor.

Her fave thing to do this time of year is to get get cozy under the quilt I use while watching TV. I’m at that age where my legs are losing the protective layer of fat, and they get cold, even in blue jeans. Therefore, the quilt. Once she is tucked under it, there is no way I am going to make it through the TV show. One warm dog equls tranquility and sleepiness.

My son was over for Christmas. We were watching Zach Ephron travel the planet to study longevity in Sardinia.

“Where’s Daisy?” he asked.

He had a dog on his lap, and my youngest had a dog on her lap, too.

“She’s under here,” I said, lifting up the quilt. “Don’t distub her. It took us three years to get here.”

It really did.

Daisy, you’ve come a long way. You still have your issues, especially jealousy when Pepper gets attention. Then your tell-tale growling that got you given back twice comes out.

“Stop it!” my son says.

Daisy ignores him.

“Stop it!” my daughter says.

Daisy ignores her.

The best thing to do is to throw the quilt over her, and the behavior is interrupted. She stops growling. We all go back to our positions, a dog on every lap.

As Nature intended.