Reservations

Yesterday was a rough work day, but exhilarating. Then my exhilaration (after I won a motion that needed to be won) turned to exhaustion.

Running to make my specialist doctor’s appointment in Eastvale. Telling the young doctor of my embarrassing digestion issues with pink cheeks. Listening to him telling me he would make me feel better.

Rushing to pick up tacos for dinner. Potato taco for me, beef for Adrian, and chicken for his mother.

Let the dogs out. Frodo is missing his collar. I look in the backyard, on his bed, in our room. It’s nowhere. Adrian says someone took it off him. Maybe tried to steal him through the gate and I scream at him, “stop putting negative scenarios out into the universe!”

I obsess. Where did the collar go? He had it on in the morning when I walked him. I pledge to get one in the early morning hours at Wal-Mart. I can’t let him go without. There’s no walking without his collar and what if he gets out?

When I woke up at 4 am today, the collar was still on my mind. How I collar my dogs, and myself. We think we can protect our pets and ourselves from heartache. But can we? And is the collar just another way of trapping ourselves, like all of the damn possessions we have? At first, a car is freedom, and then it is a payment. A house is a home, then a mortgage. Bills. Work. Bills. Work.

Watching an episode of Parts Unknown at 5 am, I think, I could do that. Let it all go. Travel around the world. Write about my adventures.

As long as I can bring the shih tzus.