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Lessons from the Company Dog

General

Life has gotten to be all kinds of crazy lately. We are gearing up for our big work event in May which means that work is hectic, and Nathalie and I are plugging away on our business plan for our online boutique. And in between there’s the usual fun life stuff that comes up, like taxes.

When stuff gets crazy, somehow my shoulders, with a mind of their own, lift to an uncomfortable position near my ears and stay that way as I sit at my computer for hours on end, working on spreadsheets and word docs. On Friday, I had been sitting at my desk like this, hunched over and glaring at my screen, for a good few hours when, in the quiet office morning, I heard a strange sound. A sound not commonly heard in quiet offices. It was not an incoming fax nor a print hot off the press. It sounded like one of those farting gag toys, but more real, more… wet and… the smell! Oh, the smell of it.

Curious, I got up from my desk, walked around my cubicle walls and saw that it was not a sales person playing with a whoopee cushion, but in fact it was America, our company’s office dog (a really charming, super friendly pup), who had left in his wake a trail of brown watery poop across the carpet by my desk. He had had an accident (apparently from some medication he had taken earlier), but did he care? Was he beating himself up over it or sitting around scowling? No, when he saw me, he looked up, started wagging his tail and then began racing away, free as the wind. It was as if he had a message for me, his point being: Sometimes you just gotta let shit go.

I watched him run, searching for the next best treat, and I thought about what he had just brought to light for me. And then I closed up my laptop and went out for lunch.

Last modified: January 10, 2019