The morning is pleasant, cool and sunny. It is 66°. Outside is calling. I’m thinking it is time to clean the deck furniture, to start the day outside with my morning coffee, the paper and my dogs. I love the look of the backyard this time of year, early summer. The trees are laden with bright green leaves. They dance in the breeze.

My deck is high off the ground like a treehouse. I sit at the table under the umbrella and watch the dogs romp in the backyard. Nala is prone to a zoomie or two before she collapses on the grass. Henry mostly walks the yard. After a bit, both of them usually join me on the deck. They lie down. I just sit.

By the time this time of year came round, I was done with school. The days were too pretty to sit inside all day penned at a desk. I longed to be free. We got out fairly early in June. The last big hurtle was end of year tests. I always did well. The last day of school was a half day, a wasted day. We sat around until we got our report cards. The grades were hand written on the cards. On the back my mother had signed each term that she had seen the grades. On the bottom was promoted to grade and then a line for the number. I don’t know anyone who was not promoted, but who knows.

When I was five, my aunt gave us Duke, our first dog, our boxer, as a present. He was the runt of his litter who came from a breeder in our town. He had been bought then returned because the first owner did not know what to expect. Boxers are unique dogs. They stay puppies until they are about three. They love to play. Nala still carries her stuffed elf around the house. They are smart dogs. They are also stubborn and sassy. Boxers are wonderfully protective. When Shauna, my first boxer, was at my mother’s house, the man from a siding company came to show her house siding colors. Shauna immediately got up and stood beside my mother. The man wanted to know if he was safe. The only problem with boxers is they don’t have long lives. Gracie lived to be twelve, the oldest so far of any of my dogs. Duke died when I was a sophomore in college. My mother was with him. It was, up to then, the worst day of my life.

This entry was posted on June 8, 2026 at 1:28 pm and is filed under Musings. You can subscribe via RSS 2.0 feed to this post's comments. You can comment below, or link to this permanent URL from your own site.