Morning Walk

Alice and Twinkles. Photos/Alice Corkill.

By Alice Corkill

It’s cold and dark when we step outside, Twinkles and I. Six months ago it was light and hot at 5:30 in the morning. We prefer the cold, the dark. It will be light by the time we return home. The others will walk then. We’re lit up like the Christmas tree we took down not long ago. Three LED slap bracelets are affixed to Twinkles’ harness and leash (white, pink, red), and three are attached to me (blue, yellow, green). It will be dark for a while, so the lights are a necessary precaution. We head off on our not quite five mile route. The air is fresh and clean, and I breathe in deeply. The cold, crisp air helps sweep away the spidery cobwebs in my mind.

Before long, we both smell the bacon cooking at the coffee shop we pass every morning. We will eat breakfast after all of the morning walks. The traffic on the busier streets frightens Twinkles some, but when we turn off the main road, she settles and goes full-on sled-dog. I guess I’m her sled. I wonder what she thinks as she tests the limits of her stretchy leash. She seems to take her responsibility seriously, and she pulls almost, but not quite, as hard as she can. Twinkles is a shepherd mix that my husband, Mark Gay, and I adopted from the animal shelter in Flagstaff, Arizona almost nine years ago. She was eight weeks old. She had only been with us for six days when she was diagnosed with the parvovirus. She was immediately quarantined and with intravenous fluids and antibiotics, our veterinarian brought her through.

Twinkles knows our route. We go the same way every day. If it weren’t for tripping hazards I could close my eyes and let my mind wander. As it is, I let my mind wander with my eyes open. It’s really dark on this first stretch. Soon we hear Yippy and Yapper, who I think are Chihuahuas, start up with their racket. Twinkles pulls harder. She is not a fan of the Chihuahuas. Today we have music. I have a compact speaker clipped to my coat with the volume just loud enough for me to hear. I expect Twinkles can hear it, too. Right now one of my favorite tap dance pieces is playing, and I can feel my toes twitching as my mind follows along, “Boom-boom-bah-dah-di-dah-bah-dah-di-dah-bop-bah.” Soon there will be a different song. Music that reminds me of other times, other places, other people.

We turn into our favorite neighborhood. It’s a great neighborhood for walking – self-contained and walled, but not gated, with only three entrances. There’s little traffic this early in the morning. It wouldn’t really matter if we walked later. There is seldom much traffic in this neighborhood. All of the houses sit on a third of an acre, and the streets are broad. I can log two-and-a-half miles by weaving my way up and down the streets in this enclosed neighborhood.

About halfway through we notice the sky is giving way from deep violet to pale pink, pearly grey, and soft blue. We see few others. Just Mr. and Mrs. Hound walking with Lady Basset. It’s cold enough today that Lady Basset is wearing a stylish tweed coat on her long, low body. The Hounds are followed by a neighborhood cat whom they call “Dougie.” Dougie seems to favor Lady Basset. He is interested in Twinkles but not quite brave enough to become her friend. Mr. Hound befriended Dougie by sitting quietly on a low wall until the cat felt comfortable enough to approach. Now Dougie follows the Hound family for a few blocks perhaps pretending he’s part of their pack. We won’t see the long-legged boxer mix who runs with her man or Schnauzer City the barking machine. The goofy Golden Retriever hasn’t been out in a while either. Neither has Caroline, the Great Dane, who is really more dog than her elderly owner can handle. I guess it’s too cold this early in the morning. Perhaps they come out later. Perhaps we’ll see them again come spring and summer.

The neighborhood looks bare now. In September we anxiously awaited the blossoming of the Night Blooming Cereus. What a lovely sight! Ghosts and spiders, with and without webs, and scary clowns and witches and black cats and skeletons and grim reapers and jack o’lanterns and so on adorned many houses from mid-September through the end of October. Soon after the end of October, Christmas decorations appeared and more than half of the houses on our route hosted a holiday display. A few remain yet as we near the end of January almost like there is a private contest to see who can refrain from taking them down the longest. Soon, though, we’ll be seeing signs of spring.

By the time we near the final portion of our walk, the mountains to the west are pink. Twinkles automatically stops at the “lovin’spot” ready for the praise, kisses, and gentle touches that let her know she’s a good walker-dog. We round the final corner, and I let Twinkles off her leash. She runs ahead to the front door and finishes any food left over from the outdoor cat’s morning meal.

Alice with Data (on her right) and Bear Bear (on her left).

Bear Bear barks with impatience as we step inside. He is ready for his turn and wants to make sure I know. Bear Bear is a Newfoundland retriever that we adopted about four years ago from an animal shelter in Auburn, Nebraska. He was roughly six years old then, and he had a tough life until the kind souls at Hearts United for Animals came to his rescue. They treated his heartworm and showered him with loving kindness. Bear Bear’s official name at the time we adopted him was Big Boy Bear. We call him Bear Bear, Mr. Bear, or Sugar Bear. Despite the sadness of his early life, Bear Bear is the sweetest, most loving dog. He has good reason to despise humans, but he doesn’t. He and Data, our 10-year-old Newfie-mix, take a much shorter morning walk. If you can call it a walk. Bear Bear and Data feel the need to smell every leaf, twig, rock, pine needle, blade of grass, and speck of dirt we pass. It’s more like a morning drag than a morning walk.

Mr. Palms is out this morning. I call him that because he wears a ball cap that says “Palms” on it. He’s an older gentleman who no longer has a dog, so he is happy to see Bear Bear and Data, and they are thrilled to see him. Much leash pulling and tail wagging ensues as Mr. Palms talks to the dogs and pets them. I wonder if Mr. Palms makes Data think of Joe. Data is a certified therapy dog and for more than three years she faithfully visited Joe every week at the group home where he spent his final years. Joe passed away at the ripe old age of 97 right at the beginning of the pandemic-imposed, stay-at-home order. I miss Joe, so I imagine Data misses him, too.

These morning walks are new since May. When it became clear that I would be working from home for the foreseeable future, I knew I had to do something. My best chance to get out of the house was early in the morning with Twinkles, but it didn’t seem fair to walk only with Twinkles, so the other two get a chance as well. We used to go to a nearby dog park on a haphazard schedule, but there were just too many people at the dog park in March and April, which made me reluctant to go. The daily walks have been a nice alternative. I walk and think. I walk and plan. I walk and dream.

Twinkles and I have walked more than 1,300 miles since the beginning of May. I faithfully start the Charity Miles app every morning on our way out the door. Charity Miles will donate 25 cents for every mile we walk to the charity we select from their list of options. Twinkles and I selected the American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals, of course, so these walks have translated into more than $325.00 in donations.

As I finish writing this reflection, I note with great sadness that more than 400,000 Americans have died from the coronavirus. Four hundred thousand people in less than one year. I mourn the hundreds of thousands of lives lost across the globe and the unspeakable grief left behind. So, some days, I walk and weep. But I look toward the future with hope. I feel incredible gratitude not only for health care and front line workers, but for the scientists who developed the vaccines and the thousands of people who volunteered to participate in clinical trials. And I keep in mind this quote from a country music song written by Gary Allen and Hillary Lindsey, “Every storm runs out of rain.” May it soon be so.

Alice Corkill was born and raised in Lincoln, Nebraska. She attended the University of Nebraska, Lincoln, where she earned a BS in Geography and an MS and PhD in Educational Psychology. After short residences in Honolulu, Hawaii and London, Ontario, Canada, she landed in Las Vegas in 1992. Alice is a professor at the University of Las Vegas, Nevada, and is currently the Chair of the Department of Educational Psychology and Higher Education in the College of Education. Alice loves dogs, and she and her husband, Mark Gay, hope to always have dogs in their lives. Alice has been singing in church choirs since she was five years old and is currently a member of the Chancel Choir at University United Methodist Church in Las Vegas. Alice is also an avid tap dancer having taken it up as an adult. She claims to have more enthusiasm than skill; nevertheless she takes two to three adult tap classes at The Rock Center for Dance every week. When she’s not singing, tap dancing, or walking with her dogs, Alice likes to read mysteries and detective novels.

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Kathleen KuoFebruary 16, 2021FComment