I Love Lucy

My sister, Michelle, and her husband, Adam, have a beautiful and somehow wild German Short Hair puppy, about 6 months of age. Miss Lucy, the dog, is not overly well trained at this point. She knows how to sit, how to fetch, sometimes how to drop the fetched item to allow it to be thrown again, and at times, comes when she is called. She has more energy than she knows what to do with and loves to swim, chase birds, and run. As my dad says, she plays hard and then she sleeps hard.

For the last week and some days during the last month, I have had the great pleasure and torture of watching Lucy. This is quite the responsibility on the farm, as Lucy is known to find and eat most anything, like an old piece of tubing, a glass rain gauge from my mom's perennial flower bed, the bird feeder, an aluminum pie plate, my mud-garden shoes, the front door mat, the wood frame on the front door, the picnic table, wild flowers, couch cushions, door mats, and dead birds.

Lucy is very much attached to the people in her life. Thankfully, as Auntie M (how Michelle refers to me), Lucy knows me as a beloved friend. She greets me in the happiest 'wag the butt and tail' dance you can imagine in the mornings. And when she is lonely, she will whine and bark for attention.  Once we've taken off her perimeter collar, she adventures about the farm on her own and I go to work.

This past week, I was busy weeding in our giant 16 row sweet corn patch (mind you, each row is 190 feet long). Lucy would check in on me every 15 minutes or so by tearing through the patch at breakneck speed and then slowing to a halt causing dirt to fly with her paw-brakes. Then, she became a lap dog, as she sat her 50 pound-self on my lap, while dripping wet from a swim in the creek. I'd give her some good scratches and push her off my lap getting back to my delightful task of weeding. Still unsatisfied, Lucy then would sit beside me, begging for attention. At times she would dig holes in the dirt, bite off and chew on what was a nicely growing sweet corn stalk, or steam roll whole sections of corn stalks--green snapping them in the process. Then losing focus, she'd sprint away on another adventure. When I would even think about calling her back to the patch to make sure she wasn't getting into trouble or going up on the road, by which the occasional vehicle zooms, she would appear panting and ready for more attention.

Lucy caused me to have to chase her down while it was 100 degrees outside, when my dad's crop consultant drove into the yard, as she was chasing the truck and attempting to jump up on it. Quite unfortunately, this required me to greet this man while I was sweaty and gross, wearing a nasty old sports bra from 8th grade and an old pair of gym shorts. Lucy required me to sneak out the back door of the garage with my bike to prevent her from tagging along on my longer trips in the mornings. Lucy has even puked a giant pile while sitting on my lap.

Still, I can't help but love the puppy -- she's too sweet!