Patriot Realm

My rescue dog came to me in a moment of intense loneliness and I had been wondering what the hell I was doing with my life.

It was suggested, here on this blog, that I get a dog. I had a few beers that particular night and had decided to go to the local animal shelter and find myself a little bloke to provide a distraction.

I came home the next day with a drooling farting lump of beast and have been in blokey love ever since.

Not Digger. 

You see we get on well because we are the same. We are like twins. Mirror images of each other.

We both like to scratch. I try not to do it in public but Digger has no such problems with the good manners bit of life. If he has an itch he scratches it.

No matter where it is. 

At least I try to pretend that I am looking for something in my pocket and manage the odd moment of relief pretending to find a coin. I now carry a $2 coin in my pocket just in case I feel the urge.

That way I can itch, scratch and get the coin out and say to Digger “ I knew it was in there somewhere. “

He looks at me with his big eyes and I can tell he is saying “ you may have fooled them but I know you didn’t fool me and you know you didn’t fool me. “

I have learned a lot from Digger.

For example, I have learned that farting is something that doesn’t happen if you don’t eat crap food.

When he first joined me he farted all the time. I took him off dog food and gave him meat and pretty much started cooking two meals instead of one just for me and he now is a very socially accepted fellow in the farting department.

Because I started cleaning up his diet, I cleaned up my own and now can proudly boast that I am a cleaner whistler than I once was.

We both still drool when we sleep though. It took me a while to get used to him sleeping on the bed with me and it was OK because he lay at my feet. Over a period of months, he crept up the bed and now sleeps beside me. His head is on the pillow and I wake up in the middle of the night to see his big head across from me and he is snoring and drooling and wheezing and dreaming about the bacon, eggs and sausages that his Dadda will cook for his breakfast. I have put his pillow in a plastic bag and then have the pillowcase on top of that.

It makes for a better laundry day.

I walk a lot more these days. Every morning we go into town and I buy a coffee for me and “ a bowl of your finest flat white cool no coffee “ for Digger. That is a bowl of milk for you uneducated non Digger people out there.

I read the free paper and we walk back home, have breakfast and  check out what has happened on Patriotrealm since I woke up and first had a look earlier in the morning.

I go and have a morning contemplation in the dunny and Digger joins me. He sits beside me. He says it is to make sure I don’t fall off the seat but I reckon it’s because he just doesn’t like being left alone.

I don’t think he will ever get over feeling abandoned and it is OK by me. After all, I was abandoned before he rescued me so fair’s fair.

By lunchtime, we both sit on the porch and have a kip.

Life with Digger is good. Two mates looking after each other. Both a bit screwed up but better for having met each other.

He is my best mate.  I love him and I forgive him for being a bit socially untrained because I am not exactly the kind of bloke you’d invite home to meet your parents.

And neither is Digger. So we muck on quite well together.

What is the best thing about life with Digger?

A sense of purpose. A need to get up every morning and have a walk. A need to cook 3 squares a day. Someone to talk with and someone to look across the bed at night when the black dog used to visit and know that Digger is there to ward off the black dog who stole so much from my nights and daytimes too.

My life with Digger is full of matesmanship. Comraderie and quiet moments in the dawn hours when I lie sleeping and he watches over me and I in turn watch over him. Or when we both sleep and wake and fart and scratch our crotches and look forward to another day together.

When we no longer have to take on the world because the world no longer poses a threat because we have each other.

Thanks for reading my life with Digger.