Enjoy Yourself

Hello, it is High Priestess Ruby Isabella with the word of Dog. Today's first reading comes from the book of Carol of Black Jack.

"Dogs have a way of figuring out what they like, and then enjoying it to the utmost."

The second reading is in the book of Steph, in which she quotes Anthony Bourdain.

"When you let pleasure control your life and not your life control pleasure, you'll find great passion."

People often think, "I shouldn't be doing this," "I should be doing good for someone else," "if I am enjoying myself, I mustn't be productive or doing good," "what will other people think." Some people think it's character building to be miserable. A happy animal (human, dog or other) will be spreading goodness wherever she goes. So I say, go forth and enjoy yourself.

This is the word of Dog.

Adogs.

Life is great when you figure out what you like and enjoy it to the utmost.

On Happiness

Happy again! Oh the joy of it all, I'm happy again!

"I just don't understand how animal experts maintain that dogs are physically incapable of smiling and that humans anthropomorphise their simple muscle reflex into emotion. Have these experts no soul? Not only can dogs smile, they do so in a range that extends coyly mischievous to shot-fox ecstasy. Sometimes within milliseconds." Murray Walden "Confessions of a Dog's Godfather" in Acts of Dog. Edited by Debra Adelaide.

See a different happy, smiling Ruby.

Life is great when you are smiling.

Homecoming

I am lying on the sofa. Just in a dreamy state, half way between asleep and awake. I hear, "beep, beep." I am up! She's home! I ran down to the back gate with glee. Tim follows some way behind. Tim finally gets there and opens the gate. I ran out and Mandy is in the car. She opens the door, I leap in and give her licks. We reverse up the driveway together, this is so that there is no chance I will get run over. Or I'm lying around on the back deck around the time Tim is due. I hear something at the back gate, I look up and there he is. I run down in an exuberant fashion. I immediately give him leg licks. He walks his bike up the drive and I lick each calf with each step. Oh, the joy of the pack back together again! How do you greet pack members on their return. I recommend you run to them with great enthusiasm.  

A Dog-Being

Dogs, can you imagine what it is like to be a human? Humans, can you imagine what it is like to be a dog? In the book The Lives of Animals by J.M. Coetzee, the main character Elizabeth Costello addresses this question but about bats and people;

What is it like to be a bat? Before we can answer such a question, Nagel suggests, we need to be able to experience bat-life through the sense-modalities of a bat. But he is wrong... To be a living bat is to be full of being; being fully a bat is like being fully human, which is also to be full of being. Bat-being in the first case and human-being in the second....To be full of being is to live as a body-soul. One name for the experience of full being is joy.

As we are all beings with a soul, of course we can put ourselves in anothers paws, hooves, fins or shoes. There is a big human word, anthropomorphism, to describe people putting human qualities onto animals. Of course, a dog wants to be treated and thought of as a dog. But some people seem to think that animals do not have souls and are somehow inferrior, almost robot like. I say all animals have a soul and all animals are equal. And no animals are more equal than others. Not even dogs. Not even fast, intelligent, good-looking dogs.

It's frisbeetastic!

There will be no photos today so I will rely on your imagination. First, picture a new, green, flexible frisbee. Then, me. There are lots of photos on other posts so that will be easy. Now, Tim and Mandy. Feel free to see them however you want, any size, shape, age or race. They don't mind, but attractive is better than not. Now, one rugby field surrounded by trees on three sides and a quiet suburban road on one. Add, one hot summers day just before the sun sets and it has cooled down a fair bit. Feel free to embelish it with anything which might add to the scene.

Tim and Mandy start by throwing the frisbee to me. I charge after it, coming to terms with the flight of this new object. I then pick up and run around with glee at my new possession. Then Tim and Mandy throw it to each other and I run back and forth and pounce on it when it missed its target, which was quite often as they are new to frisbee throwing. Now, imagine a tail wagging, smiling and laughing. This bit of rubber provided us with a whole heap of joy. It is proving challenging catching the frisbee but I have done it a few times. There is a border collier in the dog park who can do amazing leaps to catch a frisbee. I say go out and get a frisbee. If you're a dog, convince your person. If you're a person without a dog do it anyway, as Tim and Mandy enyoyed it a lot.