Quarantine Update: Dog-Ter Appreciation

Quarantine is HARD.  I know what you’re thinking – tell me something I don’t know.  But everyone has their own hardship they’re going through right now.  I’m tip-toeing around my apartment while my husband works from home, trying to be productive without interrupting his almost-constant work calls.

While this may be “hard,” I’ve taken a lot of time to reflect on all the things I’m thankful for during this time.  I’m thankful to have a job (even though I’m not currently working and might not be getting paid soon), a roof over my head, food in my fridge, and a family that loves me.  So many people during this time are focused on the negatives – I’m tired of cooking, I’m tired of doing dishes, blah blah blah - such privileged problems. 

So yes, quarantine is hard, but I’m trying to take the time to focus on all the things I say I never have the time for.  I’m spending more time with my dog (aka my dog-ter) than ever, I’m cleaning the sh*t out of my apartment, working out daily, and noticing the beauty in a lot of the little things.

Here’s my dog-ter Bella.  I’m not sure how I’d make it through this difficult time without her – she’s my world.  Every morning when I wake up, I have coffee and breakfast, all the while she’s eyeing me to see when we’ll go to the park (aka the P-A-R-K).  She knows that once I put my shoes or my jacket on, it’s game-time.

Bella has been keeping me fit and getting me outdoors.  Every morning after breakfast, we walk a mile down the street to the park to play fetch.  Like most German Shepherds, she’s OBSESSED with fetch/tennis balls.  Sometimes other dogs will come up and start sniffing her butt and she won’t even notice because she’s so focused on her tennis balls.  Such a weirdo!

A couple things that make Bella *cough cough* unique:

·         We always have to play fetch with two tennis balls because she won’t let you have “her” tennis ball. When I say “her” tennis ball, she thinks she owns all the tennis balls at the park.  When we used to take her to a dog park that had tons of tennis balls, she would collect them all in one area and think they were all hers, even though they belonged to the park.  Now, I’m always telling her to drop tennis balls before we go home so she can leave them for other dogs.  If she had things her way, our apartment would be filled with tennis balls (think little-kid ball pit).

·         If you don’t pick up the second tennis ball while she’s fetching the first one, good luck grabbing it from her when she comes back (see video below – she’s so fast at picking them up!)

·         Sometimes Bella refuses to leave the park and will literally make you chase her all around the park.  The other day I spent 30 minutes chasing her and was about to lose my mind when I finally caught her.  Below is also a picture of Bella looking at me from afar from behind the cage of a baseball field.  This was when I was pretending to leave the park to see if she would follow me, which she did, but only to the point where she was protected by the fence and then she just stood there with a ball in her mouth and stared at me until I turned around.  We’re trying a new game called “catch = treat” to get her out of this habit, so stay tuned to see how that’s going. 

Despite her quirks, I love this dog.  She’s got such a strong personality and she is so full of love for her friends and her family.  Getting to spend more time with my dog-ter is by far the best thing that’s come out of this quarantine and I don’t take a second of it for granted.  I know that there’s no end in sight yet, but someday this will all end and I’ll have to go back to work and I don’t want to look back on this time and wish I spent more time with Bella.  So here are a bunch of pictures of her just to show you how much I truly love and appreciate my dog-ter Bella.