Adirondack bliss

Our sojourn in the Adirondacks was not only a chance to groom Dizzy, but also a vacation, a chance for Fozzie and Lamar to run free in the wild fragrant forests and flap around in the fresh gurgling streams. 

A chance to return to the lush vegetation and mountain air and babbling brooks of my childhood, while spending time with my beloved parents and supping on my Mom's scrumptious zucchini casseroles.


A chance to let all the cares of being a responsible adult drop away for a while as I drove around and shopped for Adirondack kitsch with my Mom, and accepted my Dad's gifts of weird old tools that he found at a garage sale that I restored with a whetstone and some WD-40. 

The biggest worry was--how will these three big male dogs get along? Fozzie and Lamar already have their struggles, and Lamar has never been a huge fan of Dizzy--are we assembling a ticking time bomb by putting them all together?

My worries were, for the most part, unfounded.

Not only did Dizzy love Fozzie, but Fozzie politely tolerated his attentions, even when they tended toward the overly attentive (read:humping) end of the spectrum. 

Fozzie was in heaven in my Mom's garden and its lingering smells of chipmunks, woodchucks, raccoons, squirrels, snakes, and whatever else has been enjoying fresh salad. 

Fozzie and Lamar delighted in our walks in the woods and both stayed close by, checking in with their human despite numerous temptations to stray.


I love those woods, love every blackberry bramble and non-photosynthetic plant and backward-scooting crayfish, adore the fragrance and the fact that you can just wander for hours and never worry about the dogs happening upon something dangerous or someone who might complain. 


 

And the fact that you can always find your way home just by listening to the water. 


In the house, Lamar as usual staked out a territory and Fozzie bonded with his grandparents. 












Lamar seemed a bit more at ease with sharing the bed with Fozzie, a good thing for me of course because it allowed me to take full advantage of the rare joy of being alone in bed with my dogs. (Of course I missed my human, but there's something about the occasional two-dog night....)

The best part was the reminder of how to relax, deeply...something I seemed to understand intuitively as a teenager in my parents' house but seem to have literally forgotten how to do. 

And the re-connection with my mountain roots--the place I learned to love critters and green things and the quiet joy of a really cool rock and to feel that bryophytes are among my closest friends (they really are) and the place I learned that even when no one else understands, the leafy and furry and scaly and feathered people probably do.