“Common sense and a sense of humor are the same thing, moving at different speeds.. A sense of humor is just common sense, dancing.”—William James

William James may have been fortunate growing up as he did prior to television and before radio when creativity was a way of life. Back when life was an adventure to be lived, not a problem to be solved. Of course there were some problems I suspect but wouldn’t it be interesting to go back in time.

We’ve been living a new adventure at our place these past days—Mellow Yellow, a young female dog from the Humane Society has moved in with us, and our life has changed as have the Echo’s and Ptolme’s. Fortunately Casey is on a school break and has been mentoring Mellow. The dogs I grew up with mentored me.

Echo, our female cat, has been more involved studying this new female character or possibly making a diagnostic exam, that is until she gets to close to Echo and she responds with a hard right paw pass that backs him off. Ptolme, on the other hand, has made fewer personal visits and he has not been enamored with this young lady.

Then there is the adaptation stage. How often does she eat; how much food do we feed her; how often do we need to walk her?

There were no rules or regulations when I was growing up with Jack, our black cocker spaniel we acquired from Ed Zimmerman. However, before Jack, there were problems with the white circus dog that I believe “Uncle Averill” acquired and passed him on. It seems to me he was a circus dog.

I perceived him one day on the front porch as a horse and attempted one day to ride him one time with my cowboy hat on and homemade chaps. Within seconds of mounting Jerry, he reached back and grabbed me by my right elbow with his teeth and quickly dismounted me. It required my mother’s medical care.  If I remember correctly, he was eventually poisoned but not by us. I think it also ended my rodeo days.

So when Casey goes off to school, our role will increase. Until Casey heads back to school I will maintain my low “dog trainer” profile.

And then there is the phone system…I long for Ma Bell and the days when operators worked in offices connecting one cord to another outlet to make a call go through, collecting “long distance” calls. Phones then weren’t referred to as “land lines” they were just telephones and pay phones and phone booths, but now they too are history.

It’s almost sad to see students and big people walking down the street talking on their cell phones missing nature’s pictures. This comes later, on the other end of life where one becomes “childlike” again.

At least it’s warm enough for people to walk again. Hopefully we may not have to face the cold that limited movement for some of us “elders.”

Last Saturday, a group of us had a dialog at the library. There is a definition for a dialog that I am not quite aware of. I guess it is a discussion and pretty much everybody has the opportunity to say what one might be thinking or what one knows.

A good example of this was an individual who described spending time in Iraq and Iran acquainting both countries with our military might. That brought myself to share that a Minnesota writer and poet has talked about being in Iraq when life was tranquil there.

Abu Dhabi Saleh recently vowed that his security services would hunt down those Al-Qaida members who refused to renounce violence.

But he said “dialogue is the best way,” that Yemen is “ready to reach understanding with anyone who renounces violence and terrorism.” Wouldn’t this be nice?

The Tribune reported the other day that Minnesota’s cold snap appears to be over, that warmer than average temperatures may be in store for the rest of winter.  Usually I resent the “long distant” forecasts but in this case I am willing to accept it.