Slot-Car

I painted the front door red this weekend -- A deep colonial red with a high gloss finish. Three years ago when we decided that the trailer would look better with wood screen doors, I took that opportunity to strip all the paint off the front door as well and that’s the way it’s been sitting for the past 1000 days.

Zane, our old blind cat, came out and kept me company for some of it, cautiously moving about the front yard sniffing the flowers and laying in and out of sun spots. It made me sad to think that there likely wont be many more times in her life that she’ll get to do that, so I tried to let her roam as far as I could. I didn’t let her get to far out of my site though, people don’t always pay attention when they’re driving through the park and I don’t think she would want to go out of this world under the front tire of the Dodge pickup Earl drives.

Dewy and Ham have a new dog named Slot-car that they’ve been dragging around for the past month or so. I say dragging because the two of them have become obsessed with training for an upcoming 10K Folksmarch in Leavenworth this August and it seemed like every time I looked up from what I was doing that afternoon, they were setting off down the road for another walk. Of course in the heat, Slot-car wanted nothing to do with this madness and so would lay down and plant herself under every bush they walked by in the hopes that the two of them would finally come to their senses and leave her the hell alone. Of course they never did, so the next half-hour would get spent coaxing and cajoling Slot-car down the road until they'd get to the alley that runs up behind the park, where Slot-car, in a sudden burst of speed, would take a quick left and high-tail it back into their yard; crawling under their singlewide's low back steps to hide and get out of the mid-day sun. You’d think after the third or fourth time they’d give up and leave that puppy be, but you'd be wrong – you see you simply don’t know Dewy and Ham very well. All afternoon in the 90 degree heat every time I looked up there Slot-car would be laying flat on her belly under a Japanese maple, or a rose bush, or a Delphinium, with the two of them clapping and dancing about in front of her like a comically futile drill team’s misguided effort to explain, through cheer and dance, the true joys of Folksmarch training.

It didn’t take long for the doggie treats to loose their motivational appeal.

I thought about fixing the screens in the back, but decided against it. I wouldn’t be able to watch this strange procession from that side of the trailer, and besides, there most likely will be other warm weekend afternoons this summer for me to get those done.

I just took the screen off the front door and painted that as well. Somehow it seemed like the kind of afternoon to hang out in the front yard for a while, watching paint dry and taking sips of iced tea – and, of course, waiting to see if they’d come around just one more time.