It's eerily quiet here this morning without Emily around. Samwise is not here either, but he's so still and stealthy that it's hard to tell where he's at when we're all inside. But Emily, although not a barker, lives out loud. She's more verb than noun, more comic than stoic, and my constant shadow. (I just now looked under my desk, half expecting her to be curled near my feet.)
Today is grooming day, and Sam and Emi are getting washed and cut by good Tracy at the Ultimutt Cut in Conway Village. Six mornings a year, we are away from each other when this occurs, which is always a foreign feeling.
It's a tiring day for my friends. They'd rather be with me, mucking it up in the wet woods, than being pampered for four hours. When they get home, they'll sleep most of the day away. And that's a good thing today since our air is heavy and hazy and unsafe to breathe due to the Canadian wildfire smoke.
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