Isn’t this an interesting picture? This is our older golden retriever, Ellie, steadfastly refusing to come in from the cold. I took this last night, during our church choir party . We decided that we had to keep the dogs sequestered in the laundry room for fear that their exuberant greeting might lead to more than a few sprained ankles and/or broken bones. Our way of tricking them is to put them out in the side yard – and while they’re outside, we close the door between the laundry room and the rest of the house, so that when we let them back into the house, they are exactly where we want them.
Except that when I went to let them back in, Bobbi bounded in quite happily, but Ellie took one look past me at that closed door, realized that she was going to be shut in the laundry room all night, and immediately planted her stubborn butt exactly where it was, on the side stoop, refusing to come in from the cold. I coaxed, cajoled and bribed with all of the normal dog treats – and when none of those worked, I actually tried to drag her in …. but when Ellie doesn’t want to be moved, she has this ability to suddenly weigh 3000 pounds! Finally, I had no choice but to shut the outside door and let her live with the consequences of her choice: a very cold rear end. Fifteen minutes later, I came back to the side door, fully expecting a shivering Ellie to be all-too-eager to come on in from the cold. But nope, Ellie stood her ground as firmly as before- and not even a slice of flavorful and odorous Braunschweiger liver sausage. . . her very favorite treat. . . could get her to warm up to the idea of spending the evening in the laundry room. So she remained outside – seated on her stubborn tush – for another half an hour. Only after all that did she seem come in from the cold, finally resigning herself to the laundry room, but quite sorrowfully. And just in case we weren’t fully aware of her unhappiness, she laid down right in front of the laundry room door, her snout pressed right up to it, like the world’s heaviest and loveliest doorstop.
There was actually something kind of sweet and almost inspiring about how firmly Ellie refused to be imprisoned in the laundry room – preferring the cold outdoors to the warmth (and the treats) to be found inside. And once several of the older guests had departed and we had the all clear from the remaining guests to let the dogs loose, Bobbi and Ellie nearly flew through the house, with incredible joy and delight. Those few moments were maybe my favorite moments of the whole night, just to see those dogs so happy.
By the way – our dogs provided some extra comedy and drama in the night. The drama came at one point when we let the dogs out into the big yard, and Bobbi managed to find a lightbulb and seemed intent on treating it as a chew toy – which would not have worked out very well. And it was my fault because earlier in the day I had changed the bulb in our front yard pole lamp, and in the awkwardness of that maneuver (wanting not to drop the screw) I just dumped the old bulb on the ground- fully intending to retrieve it – but obviously forgetting all about it in the pre-party rush. I scared our remaining party guests half to death when I went racing into the kitchen, tore open the refrigerator door, frantically grabbed something, and went running out into the front yard. (It probably looked like I was going to drive off an unwanted coyote with a bottle of russian dressing.) What I was doing was grabbing a couple slices of the aforementioned Braunschweiger liver sausage- which didn’t work for getting Ellie in the house, but which did in fact entice Bobbi into dropping the light bulb. Disaster averted – but narrowly.
Now the moment of comedy – (although the sight of me running out in the front yard with a slice of liver sausage had its own comic merit) – At some point late in the afternoon, Kathy decided she had just enough time to bake another pan of brownies. She mixed up the batter, filled the pan, and popped them into the oven. Then as she went to wash out the bowl, she couldn’t figure out why it felt so funny – so slimy. She definitely felt something besides the batter residue. And then she remembered- this was the same glass bowl in which we earlier mixed up our chicken/sausage concoction for sandwiches. . . and once the meat had been put into the crock pot, we let the dogs lick the bowl. And they did such a good job that it looked like it had been washed. Fortunately, dog saliva must have some semi-permanent qualities to it or Kathy never would have figured out that she had just mixed up a batch of brownies with an extra and most certainly unwanted ingredient. (I was going to crack a joke about how we went ahead and baked the brownies anyway and sent them next door to the neighbors, except that such jokes are dangerous to tell in print or on screen – and because we love our neighbors. So let me say clearly and without hesitation that those half-baked brownies came out of the oven and went right into the garbage. Kathy and I may have our faults as party givers, but I can state without reservation that we never have and never will serve dog saliva to our guests.)
So the dogs added some unexpected excitement to the evening- but the greatest pleasure was in having the men and women of the Holy Communion Senior Choir in our home . . . a way for us to say thank you for their great generosity and friendship over the years. They are such a neat group of people and we are so blessed to know them.
In fact, I don’t blame Ellie a bit for wanting so desperately to have the pleasure of their company!