A puppy is a good distraction from farming, especially in August, when a vegetable grower has had enough of farming. In fact, our daughter, who loves cats, and who told us that getting a dog was a Bad Idea, has lately taken to saying, “It’s good for you to have a dog. It makes you work less.”
Working less sounds pretty nice. For example, sometimes my fellow farmer is walking purposefully along to do some farming, when he sees a puppy half-snoozing in the grass. The puppy thumps his tail on the ground. The puppy rolls over on his back, ready for a belly rub. My fellow farmer obliges, and soon I find them both half-snoozing in the grass.
For my part, I’ve wished for years to take regular summer walks in our fields instead of always working in the garden or greenhouses. With a dog, I get to walk morning and evening.
I get to remember what it’s like to be upright, rather than crabbing along on my knees, ripping out weeds. I get to enjoy the wildflowers in the pastures. I get to see the turkeys and their children as they grow over the season. I get to visit the horses, chewing on grass, or snoozing in the woods. I get to watch a puppy run and run.
Also, a farm puppy reminds us that we have to stop working and eat. Whereas a farmer’s hunger results in a generalized grouchiness while continuing to work, a puppy’s specific freak-out about needing his supper is highly motivating, as he escalates from nose-nudging to tiny grooming nips to full-on launching himself at a leg and gnawing on a farmer’s knee.
Sometimes, I have to admit, when the puppy is all riled up, in an over-bitey way or an over-barky way or an over-bouncy way, I also think having a dog is a Bad Idea. I have to remind myself that I am the mature responsible adult, and that this puppy, is yes, a puppy, and my job is to help him learn to live nicely with humans.
Recently a visitor, a vet of all people, said to the puppy, “Stay down! Down! You’re filthy!”
Granted, the mature responsible adults, my fellow and I, had let go of the puppy’s lead prematurely, so we were to blame for the jump. But after the vet left, I said, “He isn’t filthy. He’s just a little wet. Aren’t you, pooch?” The puppy wagged his tail in agreement.
In a few minutes, after a vigorous excavation project, the puppy looked up at us. His furry face, his paws, his chest, were all covered in dirt.
“Now you’re filthy,” I laughed, and gave him a good scratching around the ears, as the puppy wagged his tail again.
Another nice thing about this puppy is that he likes people. CSA pick-up days, when members come to the farm for their produce, mean a lot more tail-wagging. The puppy also loves to go to the Farmers’ Market, which is ideal. One, it tires the puppy out tremendously, and he sleeps all afternoon. Two, it means that the farmer (me) who stays at home gets five hours to herself, which is plenty of time to write a farming column, for instance.
Just last week, the puppy was so excited about the Farmers’ Market that he got in the cab of the truck a good hour early, and watched us get everything ready. When I was loading the back of the truck, the puppy put his head out the sliding back window. He put his paws up on the tool box. It was very fetching.
“Yip!” he said. “I want to come back there with you! Aren’t you ready yet?”
“Almost, pooch,” I answered. “All this working less on account of a puppy means we’re a little slower than usual.”
“Yip!” said the puppy, which I took to mean that having a puppy is a Good Idea.
Originally published in the Monadnock Shopper News, Aug 21-27, 2024