walking miss rosie

 I'm quite fond of writing the titles of these blogs as plays on famous novels-- Butterflies in the Garage, Flowers in the Attack; Walking Miss Rosie, Driving Miss Daisy. Keeping the articles, changing the main verb and noun. Anyway.

This blog post follows the creation of my part of our culminating project for this class. We took a video of our nature spot and voice-overed one of our favorite quotes from this semester. I originally picked two from Henry David Thoreau's Walking, but only one was able to fit in my minute-long video, so I'll share both here. 

"When sometimes I am reminded that the mechanics and shopkeepers stay in their shops not only all forenoon but all the afternoon too, sitting . . . I think they deserve some credit for not having all committed suicide long ago."

"The walking of which I speak has nothing in it akin to taking exercise, as it is called, as the sick take medicine at stated hours . . .but is itself an enterprise and adventure of the day.  If you would get exercise, go in search of the springs of life. " 

I think of these quotes often, and they are usually what inspire me to go outside. The Sante Fe Trail on the outskirts of Downtown Dallas is mine and Rosie’s favorite place to walk because she walks off leash, exploring the small animals living in the tall grass and the shallow ponds, often taking a swim at the end of our hour-long hike. We begin our walk right before sunset, so over the course of our trail, we can see the sky changing colors and the air cooling our skin to the perfect temperature to return home. A Texas November is similar to any normal state's August, so the cool we feel is a brisk 65 degrees, fit for shorts and tank tops rather than a windbreaker and joggers. I am grateful for this ability to tan during the winter, but always feeling bittersweet that Rosie will never experience real snow to frolic in unless we take her elsewhere for the holidays. She most certainly doesn't mind though, and is happy to go on a walk at any time of day, any temperature, and any place on the globe. HDT would be fond of Rosie, because she sees everything as an advneture and enterprise of the day--even a short 5 minutes outside--because she is always in search of the springs of life. I see this in the way she bounds yards ahead of us as soon as she is let off leash, tail high and ears bouncing with each and every trot, checking in that we are following her every few minutes before returning to her solo trek. She walks in a criss-cross or a diagonal rather than a straight line, gallumphing back and forth again and again so as not to miss any particularly intriguing smells. She has played with other dogs on the trail, racing them in the fields, as well as chasing the egrets flying over the depleting pond. She plays with fuzzy caterpillars and centipedes meandering across the cement, and greets each person on a bike with a smile and a wide berth, unsure of what kind of creature this may be, and unknowing of whether a human on wheels is something worth saying hello to.

She also hunts, often, and adorably so. We know she has caught some scent or movement when she shoots up her head from sniffing in the tall grass and stands erect, foot bent, nose pointed, tail up, and all of her body weight shifted forward. We wait while she she contemplates, only for a moment, before leaping like a gazelle through the grass for a dozen or so paces, flying through the grass yard at a time before delving into the floor again and sniffing for her prey. She has yet to catch something, but it is an honor, a pleasure, and an entertainment to see her do this with the same cadence and energy each and every time, happy as a clam whether she comes up with a new toy or not. She is very much a glass-half-full kind of creature, and it shows each and every day. There is much to think about when considering how she does this with no reward over and over again. If a human were to try something multiple times to no avail, we would certainly give up after the third or fourth try, and Rosie is on her three-hundreth, at this point. It is rather inspiring to watch this repeated hunt.

Although this trail is far from what HDT describes as wilderness, as there are forests of electric lines instead of forests of trees, and the skyline is the distance, but it is still a patch of wilderness in a developed nation that brings me comfort and joy after a day inside an apartment building. I include the first quote from HDT because, like I can tell my blood sugar is low and I need to eat when I'm in a bad mood, sometimes I need to go outside and get some Vitamin D to keep myself from ever-abating depression and anxiety. HDT has a point to his thought about how shopkeepers and those who are inside all-day are living an abysmal life that if he were to have, he would kill himself. Though rather polarizing options, there is truth in the statement. If I were to not have the ability to enjoy time outside, I would be extremely depressed, and I don't think I would know why. We do not know what we are missing until we experience it, and those who have not experienced the comforts of a daily walk outside scoff at those who rely on it, simply because they have not tried it before, and do not know what they are missing.