I went for a walk yesterday. It was a beautiful day, and I wanted to feel the sunshine on my skin. My knee and shin were bothering me. (I am sad to admit it, but I have arthritis in my knee and ankle due to injuries.) I was limping along and saw a wooden bench. It was as if the universe put it there just for me because I’d never seen it before on Main Street, not near any houses.  So, I sat down.

 

Across the street, a beautiful golden retriever looked at me through a fence. I watched it. After sitting on the bench for a few minutes, I started thinking (as I do a lot) about what people would think of me sitting on this bench on Main Street. Would the drivers think I’m waiting for a bus? I thought about Cape May, N.J., and how the Promenade that runs along the beach has many benches to sit on and enjoy the ocean view. If anyone sat down on one of those benches, it would seem normal, and probably no one would give it a second thought walking by. I know I wouldn’t.

But sitting on that oddly located bench on Main Street seemed like I was doing something unusual and would be judged for sitting there. Then I watched the dog rubbing its behind on the fence, and it got me thinking about this post.

Dogs do some pretty funny things and don’t seem shy about them. They will lick their private parts and then run up to us, wanting to give us a big kiss. They don’t care! They might lay down, put their legs up in the air, roll around, flip over, straighten out, maybe shake a little, and walk around like they are the big cheese of the house. They have no concern for what people think of their behavior.

I love to watch dogs. They are amazing creatures with a lot of intelligence, yet they don’t have one thing humans have – insecurity. I once saw a dachshund wearing a metal wheelchair contraption that allowed it to walk on two legs while rolling its back legs on the wheels. It moved around like there was nothing attached to it, with its tail wagging and looking proud as ever to be moseying around.

There was no insecurity there. Yet, there are some people, like myself, when I could not walk on my ankle, confined to a wheelchair after an injury, and I felt like a wounded bird, embarrassed to use Target’s electric chair/cart. When I got caught on a bread rack in the produce section and took it with me, people were looking. I saw them.

Dogs don’t have the same sense of shame we possess unless they mess on the rug and get yelled at. But guess what? It doesn’t last long. They forget all about it a few minutes later when the mess is cleaned up, and they are off the hook. They will run around with that silly grin as if they never did the wrong thing in the house. It’s truly amazing.

Don’t you wish we could be like that too when we do something wrong, get scolded, and forget it happened a few minutes later? I know I do.

I don’t think dogs care what people think about them. They are just living their best lives from moment to moment (hopefully with people who love and care for them well). Children are like that, too. They live in the present moment. That’s why kids are generally happy-go-lucky.

 

We can learn a lot by watching dogs. One thing I know for sure is that I feel a sense of calm watching a dog or a cat well cared for, living in a home. There’s something relaxing about them. They feel peace. You can see it in their eyes as their eyelids want to close. I wonder what thoughts are going through their intelligent minds.

If you have a dog or look at dogs you see outside, take a page from their book of life, don’t let things get you down. Pick yourself up and move on to the next moment, live in that moment, and make it better than the last. That, to me, is the secret we can get from watching a dog.

Thank you for reading this, and I hope you have a furry friend to stare at. Sure, they might think you’re strange, but it’ll all be forgotten in a few moments, and you’ll be the best thing in their life again.

To watching dogs,

Francesca