It’s been a quiet week in Feathers-town. If I’d written this post on Friday morning, that would have been an accurate opening line. But a few things have changed since then.
Yesterday morning, Arki’s people dropped him off to us for a week-long trial. Arki (short for ‘árktos’ in Greek, meaning ‘bear’) is an 11-month-old, black and white Border/Bearded/Smithfield Collie. He’s boisterous as hell, a fast learner, stubborn and very affectionate.
The jury is out on whether Arki will become a permanent member of our household (we haven’t seen a lot of the cats since he arrived). For now, we’re just enjoying him and teaching him a few commands. Despite his previous owners telling us Arki isn’t really treat-driven (Is he a dog or a cardboard box?), we’ve used a plentiful supply of treats to teach him Sit, Down, No and Stay (almost). We’re still working on Don’t chase the cats, Don‘t bark at small children, and Don’t rip the tennis ball to shreds.
If he does stay, he’ll definitely be a work in progress for a while. Luckily, Barnard enjoys a good project.
Friday brought a different kind of excitement, when I discovered that the August issue of Mindfood magazine with my short story, “The Blackbird”, has hit the shelves. It’s my first piece of short fiction to make it into print and I still can’t quite believe it.
Ironically, after such a long germination period (I’ve been working on the story on and off for the past five years), getting it into print was a very quick process; I received an acceptance email the same day I submitted it. Like the typical pessimist I am, I initially took this as a bad sign. “Did they even read it?” I wondered. “Perhaps they’re short of submissions.” But I got over that. The important thing is, it’s published.
On Friday, we also celebrated Barnard signing the paperwork that will see him return to full-time work next Monday. It’s not his dream job, but it’s good enough. I’ll miss all of the little chats we’ve been able to have during the day as we’ve worked side-by-side in the study.
In my last post I said in my current state of affairs (i.e. sans work), it would be very easy to let the days drift by without doing much at all. I smiled at a recent opinion piece in the local paper. The writer, who is also on a sabbatical from full-time work, said his daily “to do” list sometimes looks like this:
1. Clip toenails
2. Buy milk
And by the end of the day, neither has been done.
Thankfully I can say I haven’t reached that stage and I don’t expect I ever will. There’s plenty of writing to be done, as well as my online coaching job, part-time study and voluntary work for IFLA. And yes, there are times when a lot of knitting, baking and emptying of the dishwasher gets done. But I don’t feel guilty about that. A little bit of time out is good for the soul.
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