By Deb Montgomery
My dog likes to eat dead birds. This is a problem. See me running on the beach like a screaming crazy lady, “Drop it!” When I do, my dog just looks at me as though I am stupid and should just be proud of her. My dog trainer says she is addicted now. Dead birds, chipmunks, squirrels and rabbits. But it’s the dead birds she won’t let go. My sweet dog has a powerful prey instinct and I need to learn how to make myself more interesting to her than all that! So I’m working on that … and it’s working which is great. Well, mostly.
On my way to meet the dog trainer recently, I was thinking about how I should probably think about what I want my dog to do and whether I, her human best friend, am willing to do the same? I like Mexican food, potato chips, margaritas, and anything that crunches. Most of the time, I am measured and very adult in the way that I eat and drink. But sometimes, under pressure, or dealing with not yet metabolized emotions, I find myself wanting to indulge more than not. When this happens, I ask myself what is kicking up in me that needs my attention?
Anne Lamott wrote, “We are every age we’ve ever been.” Sometimes parts of us we’ve left behind need attention. Maybe your inner Artist? Your story? Something unresolved in a relationship with yourself or someone else? A needed change in your life? A fear of being more yourself and losing someone dear to you?
Maybe your dead birds have nothing to do with food and beverages. But most of us humans have an inclination to self soothe somehow, which makes sense because life can be painful. Some stretches are really painful. Often the behavior that we want to change is less about making a rigid change. More often, it’s about turning to care for a part of you that needs you, or maybe it’s about getting on with the next thing calling you out of the safe but frustrated place that you are afraid to leave.
Whatever your dead birds, chipmunks or squirrels are, may you find the space to listen more deeply to what wants your attention and meet that place with grace.
Dig for Diamonds in the mud and the sand/take the kid you left by the hand/ he’s got stories that you won’t understand/ until you go. (Dig for Diamonds / EP All the Water)
