Slippery out there

It's not so easy to live life as a dog in winter, when the lack of four legs and ice-cutting claws slows a body down.

Still, it is sunny, over 30 degrees, most of the newish snow is still pristine, and outside calls. We head to the dog park, where neither of us needs to be on a leash unless a stray sheriff shows up, hiding on his lunch break, as sometimes happens. It's not an official dog park, which makes it all the more fun.

Idgie meets her friend Sara, a saucy little black lab-basset hound mix with a pink bow collar, and they commence to run wild whackado circles around each other. As a dog, you must greet anyone who comes in your path, and so I do, exchanging big smiles and small talk with the other parka-clad owners, so glad of the chance to play outside and pretend we are called there by duty.

We walk a couple miles on hills and slippery half-packed snow. Which is a little like walking on half-wet sand dunes. I'm feeling pretty proud of myself. A couple months out of a knee and ankle injury, it's a fair workout that tests my proprioception, which is finally returning.

But while I'm feeling happy from exercise and a dose of Vitamin D, smug about getting my hiking game back on, a breezy young couple jogs past me on the woodland trail.

On snowshoes. And they are MOVING. And talking. And not breathing hard in the least.

Dogs do not suffer shame or envy, for the most part, unless balls, attention, or food objects are involved. But people: hoooboyhowdy, do we. I shake it off and remember that once, I too was young and sprightly.

Okay. Never was I that sprightly.

I return to the moment, which is where I belong. We hop into the car, Idgie lured by some nice aged Wisconsin brick cheese, me by a bottle of prescription Advil that awaits me at home.

Content now that we're back, Idgie sleeps. But I am in the human condition and I must think about tomorrow. There are jobs to apply for tonight. I will have to cement my ever increasing butt to the seat of this chair and commune with this screen until it's done.

But first, maybe, a teensy little nap.

Woof!