THE LOST DOGS OF LANGSTON.

Entry 22.

So.

I am tired. All this has been like Julia Cameron's morning pages. That's what it was for I suppose. Because now I've posted them all except for Angelo and I have to get new homes for them all, except for Angelo. I will take Angelo and everyone else will have to go.

Angelo has stepped up to the plate. He has made his wishes known. He wants to be MY DOG.

The others...well they just need to be someone else's dogs.

I'm tired of taking up the slack for other people's animals. I'm just flat tired. I'm tired of carrying other people's responsibilities.

But isn't this what Christians do?

Yes, sometimes. But someone else already hung on that old rugged cross so that I don't have to. And I am tired of trying to do all this. Round and round the rugged cross the ragged rascal ran. I'm running myself ragged. I've been injured several times and I can take it no more. I will do the bare minimum from here on out.

And Roscoe. I'm really pissed at him for bringing me a whole new family when I just took care of the last one. Really pissed. In fact maybe it's not such a good idea to feed them when they come around because they'll just hang around and get in fights with my neighbor's dog and maybe get hit by cars if I'm feeding them out there. I"m tired of tracking up and down with food when my dogs don't get enough attention as it is and tired of trying to figure out how to haul water pans with a busted wrist and just oh so tired.

All this has been going on for three years. And I suppose it was worthwhile; but it was supposed to be my RETIREMENT. And I have been BUSIER THAN I EVER WAS during these last three years. So much so that I have to sit and grab onto something sometimes due to the overwhelm.

You see, I'm not a great multitasker. I tend to leave the eggs boiling down to a nub when I am out in the back yard weeding the blueberries.

It's kind of dangerous for me to be a multitasker.

So.

I'm taking off that Easter Bunny suit and I'm comin' down off that cross and I'm putting that pan and that spoon away. (See one of the previous posts for the antecedent to that sentence, I forgot which post it was...oh, yes, the one about Virtue Signaling, I think.) Little by little I am getting unattached to all these dogs and what to do with them. If I have leftovers, Roscoe might get fed that day. If I don't, I don't want to haul dog food that's supposed to be going to my dog/s

my DOG, that is, in an ideal world...just ONE is enough...one is PLENTY, as I have found out...but I'll have to wait to get homes for these last three...it was two but now it's three because Patterson...

...cats are a little easier, and plus I need them for the rodents here, when they mow across the street little mice come out and they tend to wander over...not many but still...

...but if you need a cat you can have one of these, also. Except Tuley and Widgie really don't need to be separated, if possible.

So I'll wait until the requirements are met and meanwhile I'll just keep being in tired old solidarity with everyone in the pandemic who is ALSO tired

and I know that means pretty much EVERYBODY

but really I'm trying to do too much and I just can't anymore. I have to minimize it and get ahold of the situation.

I'm getting my second shot tomorrow. Things may improve after that. I sure hope so. I will still be masking like hell (a KN-95, another cloth mask over that and my safety yellow baseball cap with the plastic visor that a lovely friend made for me) but at least I'll feel a little more confident.

Or at least, I think I will. Why that is, I don't exactly know. I'm still gonna be my old paranoid self that I always was.

Well now that I've written/journaled/Julia-Cameron-morning-paged my way to being able to face all this big bulbous reality that's been right in front of my face but I didn't wanna look at it, I just wanted to say One more day, I can do this ONE MORE DAY...I can, I can, I know I can...well I guess there's not much time to sit around feeling like a failure or anything like that. A big bunch of feral dogs running all over a community is a job for a community to handle, not for just one person to try and handle by herself.

Maybe I should be thankful it's only feral DOGS. And from what I have read lately, I kind of am. I'm not gonna mention that though, as I don't wanna call anything up.

And really. Roscoe would be so mad at me if I got someone to shoot him with a tranquilizer dart and then hauled him in and got the vet to remove his manhood. He might even die from the weight of the indignity. I don't know what would happen to him but he has been so used to the way he's living for so long that I can't really imagine Roscoe being someone's pet, I can't really imagine him living any other life. Maybe he's supposed to live on the fringes until his last day. I just don't know. I just can't really tell you. We city slickers love to spay and neuter our dogs and get them good homes where they'll have adequate food and clean water and health care and someone to love them. And toys. And fences. And beds to sleep in, either their own little doggie beds or human beds.

And whatever else it is city slickers love for their dogs to have.

But you know? It's just these voices talking inside my head and they are loud and clear. I'm TIRED of taking up the slack for OTHER PEOPLE on this issue. I'm really just physically TIRED. I'm too TIRED to do it anymore.

I have to stop. From now on Roscoe will only get the leftovers if I feel guilty about putting them into the landfill where they'll cause more methane and I don't want people living next to the landfill to be affected by my crappy leftover food scraps.

And if that ain't a Christian attitude, then I dunno what is. But I'm really tired of trying to prove anything like that, either to myself or to anybody else, including imaginary other folks.

So I might stop all that sort of stuff too. I might just clear my mind and be on my merry way.

Doesn't that sound good? It kinda does!

It actually does...it sounds GREAT!!!!

Maybe I'll get to retire after all.

(weeping a little)

(yawning)

(turning out the light)

Come on, Angelo. Sleepy time.