It has come to my attention that our dogs pity us. Well, dog, really. It’s Nova, our little rescue Diva who we now know is a 16-pound-mix of chihuahua and pit bull terrier with some shih tzu sprinkled in due to the dog DNA test I ordered because I’m ridiculous.
She is indoorsy. I have never seen an animal resist being outdoors as much as Nova Grace Seabolt does. You’d have better luck trying to take a goldfish on a hike than walking Nova. From what little we know of her time before she came to us, she spent the first year of her life as a stray on the streets of St. Thomas. Accordingly, she’s had enough outdoors to last her. She’s a homebody now. She loves a king-size bed, sofas and down-filled pillows.
Jackson, my darling 10-pound handsome little man is a Shih Tzu Lhasa Apso mix — all big brown eyes and blonde curls. He resembles a teddy bear and is roughly the size of a loaf of bread. I’m a nervous wreck the entire time he is outside. I keep my eyes on him — and the skies — so worried am I about hawks, other birds of prey, feisty squirrels and so on.
Naturally, since he is small and vulnerable, Jackson loves to be outside. His hobbies include laying on the concrete in the hot sun until he’s baked himself to a panting puddle. Then I intervene because whether I am acting as a human mom or dog mom, it is my sworn duty to be an absolute buzzkill. He moves to the shade of the porch — under protest — and stares out at his acreage from there. He would spend hours outdoors if he could. In his heart, he is a wilderness dog.
As the weather finally turned warm and springlike, Jack and I headed out to the porch. I love our porch. It’s one of the primary reasons I fell in love with our home. A big wraparound porch is just as lovely as you can imagine. It’s shaded and I have lots of comfortable furniture complete with piles of pillows and cozy throws, should you need one. It’s a long way from “roughing it” when you sit on our porch.
Nova hated every minute of it. A bright spring day. A relaxing breeze. Even a clean bowl of cold water for her to sip could not persuade her.
First, she paced. Then, she barked at me. Then she stood stoically near the door in hopes of willing it to let her back in.
I should have known better. We took her camping with us — in a 30-foot recreational vehicle mind you — and she was appalled. The a/c, queen bed and sofa were no match for our actual house, where she very much wanted to be.
Granted, she is entitled to have trust issues. When she was still fairly new to the family and we didn’t know her like we do now, we took her out on the boat. We had snacks and shade and canine life vests. She was so miserable she could have starred in an ASPCA commercial. Jackson liked it well enough. It offered him the ample opportunity for heat stroke that he so enjoys. He swam with me. He ate cheese. He adapted. Nova said absolutely not.
Kai, our cat, moved outdoors last year, and he is living his best life. Granted he has a heated cat dorm, as well as two barn spaces to enjoy. Breakfast and dinner are served promptly on the porch, and we look the other way when he sublets to possums, racoons and neighborhood barn cats. He may be running some sort of weird little wildlife gang. We don’t ask too many questions.
If he’s anywhere near a door to the house when it’s opened, Kai reacts as if the house itself is attempting to catnap him. He hisses and runs away. The house will never take him alive, he seems to say.
He’s now set up a secondary spot on the porch. A chair with a quilt draped over the back has become his blanket fort. From here he can lay in wait for unsuspecting Amazon delivery drivers who drop packages on the porch. Comfort, fresh air and unsuspecting victims? Sign him up! He has adapted to porch life beautifully.
Nova, meanwhile, doesn’t even want to visit the outdoors in 15-minute increments. She has no desire to relax outdoors. I keep telling her this is good for her. It’s fresh air and sunshine. This is how I know she feels sorry for us. Or, perhaps, she thinks we’re stupid. She’s wickedly intelligent, and I can just imagine her thinking “We have a perfectly good home and they’re outside like hobos.”
