Learning to Live
M Alan Roberts

I woke up this morning staring down the throat, of a pit bull. The foul breath, razor-sharp teeth and powerful jaw structure acted in conjunction to alarm my senses. I went immediately into defense mode and was telling myself to protect my neck and move slowly. A split second later, I realized that it was just my puppy, Buckethead. He's cool.

He was yawning. He then proceeded to look at me with enthusiastic admiration - wanting to play or pee or both. So, we did, outside, of course. When we came back inside, I continued to watch him, trying not letting him know. Here's what he did.

He went to his bowl, and stuck his face in for a sloppy morning-time drink of water. It's the only thing that he ever drinks, except for a rare gulp, of my beer. Once satiated, he went to his blanket and struck a perfect Down-dog Yoga pose, letting his energy flow naturally into the complimentary Up-dog. Animals are natural Yoga masters. Watch and see.

His vertebrae in aligned, he apparently was overtaken by an uncontrollable notion of insanity. His body self-propelled, into the air, in a twisting fashion, as he tried to devour his own tail. He seemed to not understand why it was always following him around, wagging, yet. After about 30 or 40 circles, he seemed a bit drunk and settled down on the bare floor to allow his bucket time to stop spinning. Famished, he rose and went in search of his morning meal, which he found waiting for him in his bowl beside his sloppy drinking spot. He ate heartily. As a matter of fact, he really lacks manners of any type. He stopped, leaving some for later.

He noticed me watching, and looked up at me as if to invite me to share. I declined the invite by turning my eyes from him back to my computer screen. He burped and looked a little confused for about ten seconds - food settling into his fattened gut. He grabbed his favorite toy, (the torn off head of a Scooby-Doo doll, and took it over to his blanket where he played with "The Scoob", tossing it up in the air and trying to catch it himself.

He then approached me again. He nudged my leg with his happy bucket and did a little jig with his clumsy, over sized feet. I reached over and gave a few light slaps to his chops - delighting him to no end. That seemed to be all that he needed. He turned from me, went back to Scooby, lay down and lazily stretched his bones out. It seemed only about ten seconds later, the fatty acids, from the food he gorged, hit his hypothalamus. This reduced his pituitary gland activity and, in turn, the amount of adrenaline, in his system. He was off to Neverland.

A few minutes passed, and he started quirking, jerking, and barking with a closed mouth. He was obviously defending the homestead in an early morning puppy dream. I could see that he had entered a state of rapid eye movement (REM) sleep from the how his eyelids moved.

Buckethead is 13 weeks old. He's far more intelligent than most humans that I have ever met.

He drinks only water, and a little beer. He does Yoga every morning and several more times throughout the day. He eats heartily, and stops when he feels full. He is thankful for all that he has, no matter how little or much. He values his family and friends so much that he dreams of how he will come to protect them with his very life someday soon. He loves to play and enjoys every second of his life, asleep or awake.

I am going to try to be more like Buckethead from now on, except I think my table manners might improve.

I know he'll soon wake up, again, and ask me in his own way if it is okay for him to go outside in the sunshine where he will spend hours playing with anything that he can place his dirty little lips on.

That probably accounts for the foul breath.