Monday, August 6, 2012

Bear’s walk



“Okay Bear,” I call ahead to her retreating form. “I think we should turn back.”

Bear glances at me over her shoulder. “I don’t think so,” say her big brown eyes. “You don’t have to come, but I’m going on.”

And so we push on through the thickening bush, doing the loop we started last fall before everything grew and grew in the sun at the back of our woods, filling in every space with lush green life.

I worry about Bear getting too tired in the summer heat, but I don’t force the issue, just follow along behind, Murdoch and I, attached by leash, arguing over who gets to go first while Bear is swallowed up by the underbrush and small trees that tumble out of our forest into the full sun.

These are Bear’s walks. Short excursions through our woods into the next patch of woods behind our property, she forges ahead, refuses to stop. She has a plan and keeps going until she reaches the spot, undefined by anything obvious to me, where she sits in a splash of sunshine and smiles into the treetops.

4 comments:

  1. Such a sweetness to this post. Lovely

    Colleen

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  2. Ahhh... I love Bear. Reminds me of so of Lucky. I just posted about a hike we went on this past weekend. Lucky just radiates joy when he's in the woods. It's hard to describe, but I can tell you know what that looks/feels like.

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    1. Lucky would love living here I think if he is so joyful in the woods. I always tell Bear she is a lucky dog as she has the woods at her doorstep and wanders off on her own for about fifteen minutes every day doing her loop of the woods. I love watching her wander back down the trail when she doesn't know I'm watching. She looks positively blissful.

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