Hedonic Rewards

With the ownership of Bela, my experiences have increased tenfold. My life got bigger.

This past weekend, out at the tender hour of 7:00 a.m., I reveled in the newly-cool breeze around me. Still tired, my eyes were half-open as I stumbled around the neighborhood.
Then I saw the first and second of this year's leaves fall from their trees in front of me.
I felt so special. I saw them! I nearly heard them, in their quiet descent!
Who knows; they may have been the first of this season...or, even if not the very first - they were the first for me. And they were then - at that hour, in the peace of the morning with no one else around - because I was out with her.

All weather affects my life so much more than it used to. It's raining? - Shit. It's snowing? - Shit. It's pouring? - Ah, shit!

But her body needn't hail the storm clouds. Her joy to exit into the great outdoors is neverending.

Last winter, we stepped out the door and into the white. The Blizzard of 2011. I could barely see her in front of me, much less anything in my path. She was definately aware that things were not the norm, but she just tended to her business as usual. While I was in something like a mix between horror and awe of the environmental tempest around me, I was also so grateful! Had I not needed to take her out - let's be honest - I wouldn't have stepped into that monster! But what an experience!

Our night walks end the day together. No matter how tired I am before taking her out, I am rejuvinated with the bounce in her step. Her little hipswing catapults me into appreciation. For everything - for her, for my capable legs, for the place in which I live, for the weather, in all its states, for the sheer opportunity of the opportunity to walk her. I look up - I look around; I observe every single night sky from the sidewalk now.

I have seen so many moons since she came to me. I pray she stays by my side for many more.