baths and dogs

I went to work today (9-5) and at 4 pm my friends Gosia, Patrycja, Ania Porazka and Kasia came to have dinner and after I finished work we all went to walk around Soho area a little (we found a really cool store with Asian art - many beautiful works of folk art) and then up Broadway. It was a very nice day and nice evening. To finish the day in a relaxing way I prepared a bath with sea salts when I got home. Last week I floaded the neighbors downstairs when I did it - the water pipe under my bathtub broke. It was one of these funny situations when the neighbor rang the bell, I was silent for a moment sending repelent energy to whoever was behind the door to leave me in peace, but the door-bell got so intense that I had to open, dripping wet (like a mermaid or, perhaps, a Venus coming out of the sea-foam...) opened the door and examined the cause of the leak with the neighbor... It was reapired during the weak and I could take a bath again. While lying in the water, aromatic candle flickering, soft music playing in the background, I was thinking about how I enjoy being alone in this apartment... I love the company of people, meeting with them and spending time with them, however, I really enjoy this space of my own where I can separate myself from the rest of the world for some time and be reduced to just... breathing... space... But after that thought another came and it was a thought of my dogs when they were with me here. And I decided that if I miss any being in my apartment it is the dogs. A thought came to my mind how when I was lying in the bathtub when they were here, my elbow (Mr. Olecranon to be precise) protruding from the bathtub, once in a while one of the dogs would come and check on me, lick my elbow and go away, to a different room. Or how when I woke up sick they would not wake me up, the usual ritual of tails wagging and ready to go out, but instead walked on tiptoe and waited until I dragged myself out of the bed to go out for a short pee-walk instead of the regular walk. And then Eureka! I realized why my relationship with the dogs is so special. And why of all the things, activities and whatever you can find in this world my favorite activity always was a walk with the dogs. Here is why. When I take my dogs for a walk in the forest, lets say the forest behind my parent's house in Poland since that was what I did during the summer, the dogs run around on their own, they meet their doggie friends, look for interesting smells. They have their own things to do: looking for trees to pee on, finding new trails, observing insects, squirrels and birds, etc., etc. I have my own things to do: admiring nature, thinking (or not thinking, depending on the mood), talking to people we meet along the way, etc., etc. We do our own things but we never loose sight of each other - if we do, dogs come and check what I do or I call them to see if all is fine. Sometimes we play together, sometimes we are in our own worlds, but in any case we remain close. This I would call the true friendship or a basis of a true relationship. In this friendship there's never the sense of urgency or "neediness" to be with the other being. And also: silly things happen sometimes but grudges are never held for a long time, or jeleousy, or any negative feelings. The relationship I had with all my dogs, and the dogs I met and got friendly with (like the dogs in Goa, for example) were of this type. Dogs are just very smart and they possess what many humans have lost - the playfulness needed in life to make the heart light and free of lingering bed feelings - the true sense of living in the present. And they also have the sense of independence, the good type of independence which is not the selfish type of independence. If dogs are not of this playfull type it's usually because their owners affected them in such way that they lost this primal instinct of living in the present... How do you like this theory? It comes from my observation of people and dogs. And I don't know if I mentioned it before but of all the smells in the world I most like the smell of a dog's paw. It's not something one would use as fragrance for perfumes and such but when I smell my dogs paws they always smell of adventure, of all the places my dogs have been to, the grass they ran on, the moss, the acorns, the moist earth, mushrooms, rain, puddles, sand, etc., etc. If you've never smelled a dog's paw try it one day and see for yourself how amazingly different it is from anything you have ever smelled. Which brings me to the book "Perfume," which I very much liked, even though it is a dark book. Good night.