Kind of like an audience with the queen

This past weekend Enrico went backpacking with a friend who lives out on the Kitsap Peninsula, while I joined his wife - my childhood friend - along with their kids and our dogs, at their lovely, wooded, secluded waterfront property.

The dogs were pretty much in heaven out there. Julie & Dan's dog went backpacking with the boys, which is what made it all workable because whenever the three dogs are together, Nelly is stubbornly fixated on beating Pinion up while Pinion is understandably fixated on avoiding Nelly. Which requires a lot of vigilance on everyone's part. Nelly is smart. When she sees that she isn't getting her way, she'll lie down and act all "oh well, I give up on trying to eat the small dog, I'm sure he's not that tasty anyway" - and then when we've all let our guard down, she'll lunge, and pandemonium ensues.

So, for them to have full run of Pinion's house and woods, to drink from his water bowl and pee on his scent, was pure joy.

Both my dogs do fine with little kids, though I'm more wary about Nelly now that she's getting old and has arthritis. If a toddler where to hurl herself onto Nelly's back end, for example, I am quite confident that the resulting pain would be sharp enough to earn a snap from her, though probably not a bite. Which is of course completely logical from the dog's perspective - a snap being their way of saying, dude, that REALLY hurts so please don't do it again - and completely unacceptable from the parent's perspective. So we encourage kids to focus their love on Toby instead, who will tolerate absolutely any manhandling and abuse. You can hug him, flip him, haul him around like a sack of potatoes, squeeze him and call him George.

Little three-year-old Sophie learned the drill very quickly, diligently reminding us over and over that we "have to be gentle with Nelly!" And yet, kids can't resist Nelly, with her floppy ears and silly curled tail and that impossibly soft, lush coat of fur. I was very proud of my black dog. She put up with a hug, and a bucket dropped on her head, and pudgy little fingers in her face. Most impressively, she presented Sophie with her belly for a rub, an honor that she confers so selectively and rarely that it took my breath away to see it. Sophie is probably one of a half-dozen people on earth who have been offered Nelly's belly, though she's too young to appreciate the honor. She just ran her little fingers through the super-soft fur in the crook of Nelly's hind legs, repeating oh so softly "Gentle! Gentle with Nelly."