NSP Meditations

More Dog Thoughts

In The Teachings of Don Juan, author Carlos Castaneda digests six peyote buttons, gargles with tequila, and shortly thereafter receives a visit from an “iridescent” dog that had “water flowing through him, kindling him like a bonfire.” Castaneda then went to the ground and drank water from the dog’s pan and “saw the fluid running through my veins setting up hues of red and yellow and green.” The dog and Castaneda began to play with one another. “We played and wrestled until I knew his wishes and he knew mine. We took turns manipulating each other in the fashion of a puppet show…his most impish act was to make me scratch my head with my foot while I sat. The action was to me utterly, unbearably funny…I laughed until it was impossible to breathe.” Years ago, I experienced something remarkably similar with my dogs, and I wasn’t under the influence of peyote. I was wrestling with my three big dogs in the yard, becoming one of them, and laughing so hard that it bordered on convulsing. Not too long ago, I digested magic mushrooms for the first time, on a hike through a forest to the ocean, and the waves became iridescent, a sea lion appeared in a tiny cove and sort of barked in my direction. All the depression in my life vanished into thin salty air and I was possessed with an instant clarity of consciousness of the kind that heretofore was unknown to me. It occurred to me in that moment that I really wanted to go on a beach run with dogs after digesting magic mushrooms. It occurs to me now that I probably should have done so before writing the dog book. Oh well.

I pulled into the parking lot of the grocery store. It was late morning and threatening to rain. I saw a young and thin man with long black hair hanging out with his tan dog who looked like a little lion. They were kitted out for the road, the road of the New American Diaspora that is all around us.

I parked near the man and popped the trunk. I dug out two cans of dog food from the emergency stash I always carry to help out the transients’ dogs when the opportunity arises, which is almost daily. I asked the man if he could use some food for the dog. His face exploded into smile and he said, “Sure, thanks brother!”

He jogged over to me to get the cans. He thanked me again and said he loved this town. I started walking to the store when I heard him playing with the dog and asking it what can he wanted to eat! (There were two brands.) He set the cans on the asphalt and let the dog choose, talking up one brand, then another, really egging on the dog. The dog made a show of the choosing and was barking and running around the cans.

It made me deliriously happy to observe this in the midst of the increasing delirium engulfing much of the United States.

When I returned from shopping, the dog was grubbing out and the man was sitting on the asphalt and playing on his phone. I asked the dog’s name.

Bozo. Of course!

He called me brother again and we told each other to take care.

I pulled into my favorite filling station on a bright Saturday morning. And when I mean filling station, I mean it: no nachos, chicken strips, energy drinks. Paper maps and windshield wiper blades only.

My filling station’s attendants always clean my windshield. Every time. That’s why this is the only place I buy gas.

A kid was on his first day on the job. All they would let him do (he told me) was clean windows. And he was pumped up beyond belief to being so! He smiled as he worked and we chatted about the people he’d met earlier that morning. He’d met five new folks! He was pumped about that too! He was generally pumped about everything in his life from what I could tell.

The kid had pumped me up with his eagerness! I was feeling it in the car. He finished the window. A little streaky. Okay, he needed practice but he’d be an exert with the squeegee at the end of his shift.

I called him over to the window and handed him a dollar. His first tip! He smiled even wider and thanked me with gusto. I cranked on the classic rock and drove away, well, pumped.