When despair grows in me
and I wake in the night at the least sound
in fear of what my life and my children's lives may be,
I go and lie down where the wood drake
rests in his beauty on the water, and the great heron feeds.
I come into the peace of wild things
who do not tax their lives with forethought
of grief. I come into the presence of still water.
And I feel above me the day-blind stars
waiting for their light. For a time
I rest in the grace of the world, and am free.
— Wendell Berry, The Peace of Wild Things
When we picked up Luna and Argos, they were fat, squirmy little babies. They were the biggest puppies I'd ever seen, like polar bear stuffed animals come to life. They lived the first few weeks of their life in a barn surrounded by sheep, and you could smell it on them. We gave them a bath that night, and every single week that month, and with each bath, the smell of wet sheep slowly dissipated.
Read MoreWhile Argos is the baby and master attention manipulator of my two Great Pyrenees, Luna has always been the smart one.
When we were potty training the puppies, we tried out the bell system. We attached a dangling bell to the knob of the door we most often used to take the puppies out and hit it before every potty break to associate the bell sound with going outside. It took Luna all of one day to figure out a way to trick the system. The house rang with the sound of the bell constantly as Luna attempted to capitalize on her newfound powers. She believed she now had the magical ability to make the door open at her own free will, her human slaves available at her beck and call. She was more than dismayed when we discovered her ploy and removed the bell.
Read MoreHere's the truth: I never knew shedding until we got Luna and Argos. They shed year round. They shed when it's hot outside and when there's snow on the ground. Sometimes they shed enough that you can pull out fist-sized clumps of fur with your bare hands. If you don't vacuum for a week, there aren't just hair balls in the corners—you've got a new carpet made of hair. They can't rub against you without a thick layer of white hair left along your pants. When you do laundry, you find hair balls interwoven in the fabric of your shirts and filling the dryer vent. You have to keep a lint roller in the car because you know you'll be covered again by the time you make it from the bathroom to the front door.
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