Happy 7th birthday, Arwen
How can it be that seven years have passed since that terrible spring when we lost Mira, then went to Boston and lived through the bombings?
Just a few short days after our return from Boston, on April 26, 2013, I learned that your litter had been born, and that the yellow female I'd requested was for real.
You were a character from the get-go: your tail never, ever stops wagging, and you have become perhaps the most water-oriented of any dog I've had. You have a boundless energy: I don't think I've ever found the bottom of it, if there is one. You are an athlete, and you run like the wind and jump like an acrobat.
You can't even abide hearing the word ''bad'': you run and hide on the rare occasions when I forget your sensitivity and use that word on anyone else. All you want to do is be good, to please, to love and be loved.
The poem below isn't just about you; it's an amalgam of all the dogs who have ever walked beside me. But right now, you're one of those, and it's your birthday.
When we walk
Brown sugar eyes look up at me
Striding shoulder by my knee.
When we walk
Collar links to leash then hand
Symbol we both understand.
When we walk
Seems like no time at all has passed
Between our first walk and our last.
When we walk
You lead me and I lead you
We are one, and we are two.
When we walk
Mischief mouth steals my mitt
Tugs it off and carries it.
When we walk
I accept that there is no forever
Yet know our bond will never sever.
When we walk
The young you scampers on ahead
The old you ambles, sniffs, is led.
When we walk
We have our rhythm, we are a rhyme
Bide beside me across time.
April 20, 2020
I did not have to drive 1000 kilometres to race 42.2. I did not have to spend thousands of dollars on a hotel and travel. I did not have to juggle logistics of 3 dogs in a hotel room/in elevators/in the middle of a big city/chasing squirrels on the Common. I did not have to check the weather forecast 40 times and revise my race-day wardrobe choices just as many times. I did not have to endure security checks and the sardine-can experience of bib pickup and race expo in the Hynes Convention Centre. I did not have to wake up at stupid o’clock and bundle up in four layers of clothes and trek over to the Common to climb aboard a yellow school bus and join a convoy of hundreds of other yellow buses for the seemingly never-ending drive west on the MassPike to Hopkinton, listening to the excited chatter about training adventures and qualifying and past Bostons. I did not have to stand shivering on a school playing field, dressed like a hobo in throwaway layers, waiting 30 minutes to enjoy the sensory fiesta of a port-a-potty. I did not have to wait to start my run until a time of day when I am usually finishing my run. I did not have to walk a mile to the starting line. I did not have to stand in a corral, still shivering and now minus the throwaway clothes, waiting for the start gun along with thousands of others. I did not have to run shoulder-to-shoulder and elbow-to-elbow in a river of spandex and sneakers, dodging and weaving and heel-clipping and sharing a small ribbon of road for 26.2 miles. I did not have to run through the scream tunnel at Wellesley College. I did not have to get to Wellesley Centre and think ‘’Only halfway already?’’ I did not have to worry about giving high-fives to kids along the road. I did not have to listen to Neil Diamond or slightly-drunk Bostonians singing ‘’Sweet Caroline’’, nor listen to fellow runners singing it back (‘’And when I hurt/HURTING RUNS OFF MY SHOULDERS’’) I did not have to navigate traffic at water stations. I did not have to hear people yelling ‘’you’re almost there’’ at mile 20. I did not have to smell roadside barbecues and picnics along the grassy boulevards in the Newton hills. I did not have to slog up Heartbreak Hill. I did not have to ask myself ‘’where the hell is that Citgo sign already?’’ I did not have to squeeze through the Fenway crowds at Kenmore square. I did not have to scan the crowds for Tim and the dogs in Brookline. I did not have to look for my friends in the 5-deep crowds on Commonwealth Avenue.
I did not have to turn right on Hereford and left on Boylston.
Today it was just me and the wind.