Red Girls, Snow, and The Golden K

February 10, 2019

Snow has been falling off and on at The Golden K for a week now. I’m amazed at how alive dogs become in the snow. Impervious to the cold – seemingly energized by it – with the speed of a gazelle and endurance of a marathoner they run, roll, jump and chase only stopping occasionally to catch their breath. And I believe, as they stop and look around, that they realize their world is different for the moment and they appreciates the beautiful playground that Mother Nature has created for them. Then all at once they are off again…

Kloe and Koda – The red girls as I call them – have had a lot fun with snow play this past week. Although The Golden K is located in the Sierra Nevada Foothills we’re just about at the snow line at 3100 feet elevation and don’t receive a lot of snow each year. As inconvenient as it has been this past week in some ways it has also been special. The red girls have taken advantage of the velvety layer of cold white powder sitting on top of what is usually a hard and muddy landscape this time of year.

For the past week the red girls have alternated between this:

Kloe and Koda stopping to catch their breath and appreciate their velvety playground

And this…

Koda” “Dad you’re embarrassing me. I’m not cold and I already shook off the snow.” Kloe: “It makes him feel better. If it was mud we’d both be up in the bath right now.”

Our Traditional First Snow Walk

Earlier in the week we took our traditional first snow walk with the girls to the top of The Golden K. It was a little melancholy for me because as we headed out of the immediate area of the house and headed up the hill Kali was struggling. Kali, now almost ten with bad hips struggled in the deep snow making it too difficult for her to follow along. She tried but as she labored to make gains up the hill to follow me I could see in her eyes that it was too much for her. As much as I wanted her with us and as much as I know she wanted to be by my side I took her back to the house while Holly and the red girls waited at the trail head.

Holly” “If only the red girls were attached to a sled they could power me up the hill… Mush!”

Kali last year on our traditional snow walk to the top of The Golden K

Kali: “My hips are frozen – this feels great!”

And so it goes during winter at The Golden K. Rain follows this snow storm and then more snow, and then more rain. Hopefully we’ll have a few days to dry out in between all of that. I’m convinced the earth is spinning faster with the way time flies by. Before the girls know it they’ll be running on the hard clay ground in sunshine, sitting patiently by the BBQ for a little “sumpin’-sumpin'” and looking for shade to cool down in. But for now we take what Mother Nature has to give and enjoy the beauty of the Golden K all dressed in white.

The red girls running, rolling, jumping and chasing. How great is it to be them!

Swim Time At The Lake

September 18, 2017

It was almost as though the water took the weight of the world off my eight year old Kali. Well, I guess in some ways it did because when you’re paddling and floating the water is absorbing much of your weight instead of your joints and bones.

And so it was for Kali this afternoon at the lake.

With summer winding down we wanted to get the girls back up to the lake for another romp in the water while the weather was still reasonably warm. I’m sure they wouldn’t mind the cold freezing snow melt later this year but Holly and I would! Kloe loves the water and we knew that she would have no problem getting in the deep stuff so we were prepared this time with the long 30 foot leash. We’re not yet comfortable letting either of the dogs, especially our little dare devil Kloe, into the Lake without a “safety net”.

Kloe had a blast, as expected, swimming out to retrieve the sticks we threw in the water. This was the first time she really had an opportunity to outright swim without her legs touching the bottom of the lake and it was fun to see her eyes when she realized she was floating and then started paddling. She did get a little more reserved the deeper out she got. This actually made me feel relieved because one, she knows her limits to a degree, and two, I wouldn’t have to reel her in like a Marlin. On the other hand if squirrels could swim and happened to be in the lake all bets would be off and I’m pretty sure Kloe would hyperplane towards the dastardly swimming vermin.

But Kali was really the surprise star of the afternoon.

Kali had been hanging around in the shallow water as Kloe swam out to retrieve sticks. We gave Kloe a break and put the long leash on Kali just for grins. Before we knew it she was romping and stomping in the water. I threw a stick as a joke but the joke was on me. Kali dove into the water, swam out to the stick, grabbed it, and brought it back and dropped it. I threw it again and she repeated the exercise.

So shame on me for underestimating my (aging) Golden Kali who seemed years younger as soon as her fur hit the water and her feet began to paddle. Most days with Kali are a joy but today will stand out for many months to come.

She won’t get a lot of points for style or grace but I give her a 10.0 for effort and heart. Good girl old lady!

The Golden K Dressed In White

January 15, 2017

I imagine that snow and ice is especially unwelcome when one has to dig out, drive to work, and cover every inch of their body including their face as a regular part of their daily routine. I can only imagine because I have never lived in such a place. Growing up in the San Francisco Bay Area, and having lived their all my life until earlier this year, I didn’t experience any extreme weather elements. The temperature was rarely below freezing, there was no real humidity to speak of, and never snow.

I realize that much of this country and others in the Northern Hemisphere get plenty to a lot of snow and that it’s not always a welcome element. I’ve seen pictures of Syracuse, NY in the winter. I’ve heard about Duluth MN in January. Mother Nature is probably not any kinder in Grand Rapids MI and Quebec City in Canada during the winter months. I would probably perish after a winter week in any of these cities.

So when the Golden K gets an inch or two of snow and it all melts by mid-afternoon can I really say, with a straight face, to anyone who lives or has lived where snowfall is 60 or 70 inches per year, that it “snowed”?

We’ve had three days of snow this year which I understand is about average for our area up to this point in the season. I feel very blessed to be living at the Golden K in the middle of a forest covered by pines, oaks, and cedar trees. With each change of season so far (Summer, Fall, and now Winter) I appreciate a different type of beauty on display that I once only dreamed of waking up to each day. This morning after several days of rain and one day of snow the sky is blue, the air is crisp, and leaves and pine needles are shimmering.

The snow day we had this past Thursday was magical to wake up to. I didn’t have to dig out. I didn’t have to bundle up. And I didn’t have to drive anywhere because I work mostly from home. I know I am blessed because instead of digging out I was free to take a walk (OK I did bundle up a bit…) about the Golden K and explore the beauty with a romantic perspective of life at 3100 feet.

Mother Nature was very kind to us on this morning!

Winter Dance

January 14, 2017

I thought we were getting a Golden Retriever but we got a bucking bronco, a race horse, and at times a bull in a china shop. At least that’s how it’s seemed the past several days. Kloe is the bull and the rest of us and the house is the china shop….

A recent series of much needed storms has grounded “Air Kloe”. If we could somehow harness and store (externally) her unused energy it could potentially serve two good purposes. First, we could sell the stored energy to power companies and make a few bucks while the energy was put to good use running power tools in a factory or local lumber mill. It would probably last them weeks. And two, and even more important, the energy would not be in her body (hence the reference to external storage) and our world would a much safer and saner place to ride out these storms.

Golden Kali’s last post was called Rain Delay. And the rains have continued to delay and preclude Kloe from spending any significant time outside. The Golden K has a lot of places for Kali and Kloe to roam and explore. There are a series of gates, chain fences, and farm fences that connect our wrap around deck to several large areas that the girls can roam and run in. Well Kloe can roam and run, Kali mostly just roams for a few minutes and then quickly lies down and enjoys the scenery. The rain makes these areas, except for the deck that just gets icy, mud bowls. We’ve learned a lot of things this first year at the Golden K and one of them is that we need better drainage throughout the areas the girls have access to. There is definitely a Spring project or two having to do with grates, drains, and pipes in there somewhere…

Although Kloe is impervious to rain the house is not impervious to mud.

~~A decision to allow~~ Succumbing to Kloe’s pretty brown eyes and relentless pleas to allow her outside in the wet and mud is usually followed by 30 or 45 minutes of getting her cleaned up and house worthy. We’ll try to work in walks when it’s not raining too hard but this past series of storms has been very wet and walks have been few during the past week or so.

The girls have always had unlimmited in and out privileges so Kloe is very used to going out for a spell, coming in to see what’s up inside, and then asking to go back outside again. She’ll do this several times throughout the day but when it’s wet and muddy, depending on what we’re doing at the time, it may not be practical for Holly or I to sign up for the clean up rotations. We were talking about this the other day and were saying to each other that other dogs spend the day outside rain or shine and the owners are ok with. Why aren’t we ok with it? This in itself doesn’t make us good dog owners or make them bad dog owners. Like us they love their pups. In fact those dogs may be happier than Kloe (or our perception of her happiness?)…

But that’s not how we roll at the Golden K and that’s not the type of relationship we want to have with our pups. They sleep next to us at night, lie under the table when we eat dinner, wrestle at our feet when we watch TV, and are lavished with treats (healthy treats of course!) throughout the day.

It finally stopped raining and things are drying out. Kloe was able to spend significant time outside yesterday and will again today and tomorrow. Clean up rotations will be much shorter and “the bull” will be happier outside the china shop where she can burn off some energy, chase a ball, do a little “Tazing”, and be able to take some long power naps when the energy is finally spent.

But alas, the rains will back again by Thursday and apparently in full force. China will need to be protected in the shop and clean up rotations will be longer. Our 70 pound puppy bull will stare out the window, look at us with pleading eyes, and of course we’ll relent and let her out for a short while.

Rain, pleading stares, relent, clean up, and repeat. This is the Winter dance we do at The Golden K. We’re’OK with it.

Holly, the puppy bull, and the stare

OK with it.

Rain Delay

January 8, 2017

A series of storms over the next several days should deliver 7 to 10 inches of rain to the Sierra Nevada Foothills. Great for combating the last several years of drought but not so great for one “little” 70 pound puppy named Kloe.

If Kali and Kloe were human children Kali would be the child who was content to stay indoors and read on her bed all day. Kloe would be the hyper-active kid who had to be outside riding bikes, playing sports, or climbing trees. The extra wet weather has made outdoors off limits except for taking care of “business” a few times a day. This has been just fine for Kali. For Kloe, not so much.

First thing in the morning after breakfast Kloe looks at the door and then looks back at me as if to say, “Go ahead. Open it – I don’t mind the rain. In fact I love the rain because it makes the dirt turn into mud and you know how much I love the mud!” She eventually gives up and just lies in front of the windows facing the back yard and sulks. Today, to add insult to injury, I spent much of the morning shoring up drains and doing various chores outside in the rain. I see Kloe through window looking me and I’m sure she is thinking, “What’s up with that? Dad gets to play in the rain and mud and I don’t? Not fair!”

This afternoon Holly and I drove into town to run a few errands and spent about 50 dollars on new dog toys. Yes they are spoiled but this is another form of “rainy day recess” to keep Kloe occupied and so that she can chew off a little energy. Kali is content to ~~read~~ sleep but Kloe does a pretty good job of getting Kali to engage in tug-o-war and wrestling when new toys are brought out. This is good for Kali otherwise she’d read the entire collection of Harry Potter in a day or two before coming up for air.

As the afternoon turns to evening Kali sleeps out of ~~harms~~ Kloe’s way and Kloe for the moment is content being inside. But this rain delay may be more than Kloe can tolerate and at some point I suspect we will let her out to belly flop in the rain and mud.

Thank goodness we have an outdoor tub.

The Outdoor Tub (earlier this year)

The Year Of The K

December 30, 2016

I don’t typically partake in reflection of the past year as the new year approaches but this year has been like no other. It has been the year of the K.

Packing up 34 years of suburbia and moving to a rural area was a truly life changing event for Holly and I. This journey started in September of 2015 when “just for fun” I began looking on the internet at homes for sale in the foothills. One of the first I saw was a five acre property in Tuolumne CA. It seemed to call to me and Holly agreed that it looked wonderful but she was not keen on moving; at least not for several years.

A few weeks later we drove up to see the property “just for fun”. Over the following weeks and countless discussions about the possibility and rationale for moving the “just for fun” became serious and we decided to look at more properties. We saw several that we liked but none met the beauty, charm, and rustic elegance of what was to become The Golden K. We made an offer in November and closed escrow in December, just over a year ago.

Wow! What in September were only musings about one day moving to a simpler life in the mountains became reality just four months later in. It’s one example of many over the past 34 years of Holly and I aligning on a goal and making it a reality.

The sellers rented back from us through April which gave us time to sell our home in Livermore and for Holly to finish her school year as a teacher. In early May while still living in Livermore we brought a nine week old Golden Retriever home that we named Kloe, with a K or course like her big step sister Kali with a K.

That was all the inspiration I needed. I then knew we were moving “home” to The Golden K. We moved in full time over Memorial weekend and we never looked back.

So here we the four of us: a guy and a gal still desperately in love after 34 years of marriage, two beautiful and loving Golden Retrievers, and one shared romantic perspective of life at 3100 feet.

They're Cutting Down Trees

December 18, 2016

It’s coming on Christmas
They’re cutting down trees
They’re putting up reindeer
And singing songs of joy and peace
I wish I had a river I could skate away on

Last weekend Holly and I went to a local nursery looking for a live Christmas tree. What was available was scrawny and very expensive. Then Holly and I came to our senses and remembered that we live on five acres full of trees. We laughed just a little at ourselves.

By the time we arrived back home at the Golden K it was pouring down rain but we were determined to establish a new tradition of cutting down a Christmas tree from our own property. So we put on the best rainproof-cutting-down-Chistmas Tree-gear that we had and headed up the hill to the back side of the Golden K. Back in the days before we went artificial and when we still put up “real” trees we always had pines. It wasn’t likely that we would find a pine small enough so we were hunting for a Cedar.

It didn’t take us too long to find a tree that was suitable. It was a very nicely shaped Cedar about 12 feet high. We carried it to the shop, cut it down to about seven feet and carried it back to the house.

It felt a little bit like when your kids are little and they cook a meal for themselves. They eat the meal as if it was the best food they ever tasted because of the gratification of having cooked it themselves. As we looked at our tree we both felt as though it was the most beautiful tree we have ever had in our 34 years of marriage. I guess because we “cooked it” ourselves…

So like Joni sang, “they’re cutting down trees” at the Golden K and they are in love and they are grateful. And if that’s not a romantic perspective of life at 3100 feet I don’t know what is.

First Christmas at the Golden K

Snow Bunnies

November 30, 2016

The “girls” got their first taste of snow on Sunday.

I actually had a preview at about 3:30 am when I got up for a drink of water and looked out the window to see snow flurries floating down. There is a small irony in the fact that something freezing can warm your heart… I went back to bed anticipating an early morning blanket of ice and snow on the ground.When I got up with the girls about 6:30 I wasn’t disappointed.

The sun was rising and our five acres of heaven never looked more beautiful. The patchwork of snow on the ground was only slightly over shadowed in beauty by the pine and cedar branches delicately balancing glistening snow and ice in the morning sun.

Holly and I sat and drank coffee looking out the windows at the christening of snow on our new treasure we call the Golden K. For most of the morning Kali and Kloe – mostly Kloe – were restless and wondered why we didn’t let them outside to explore the “Winter-land”. So at noon we went for a walk around our neighborhood to give the girls a little exercise and to savor this dusting of snow before it all melted. It was great fun to watch the girls as they experienced snow for the first time. The personalities of Kali and Kloe were in full display as we walked along the snow spotted roads near the Golden K.

Kali who prances under normal circumstances seemed even more animated as she navigated the slippery ground and got used to ice under her feet. She methodically followed her nose along the snow and ice on the roadside probably wondering why the normal smells were not as vibrant being covered by a layer of snow. Kloe tugged a little more than usual and was very excited to finally be outside. She stopped every few feet to gobble down a bite of snow.

We walked, talked, and and gave thanks as we took in the beautiful sights of snow covered pastures, creeks running crisply with the melted snow, but mostly watching Kloe as she realized she could use her body as a snowboard. She would throw her body down on the ground and slide for as long as the leash would allow her and then get up with wild eyes and do it again. Holly and I were in hysterics and I think even Kali got a laugh or two out of her sisters antics.

It was a great day and a wonderful way to wrap our holiday weekend walking with our two “snow bunnies” who we are so thankful for.

Never too cold for a little training and TREATS!

Trying to look stoic after a belly flop and slide

Golden Blessings

November 13, 2016

The Golden K has been truly golden this past week. The change in seasons is increasingly evident in the cool mornings and evenings, the early setting sun, and strikingly in the color of the leaves. Especially those leaves from the Black Oaks that periodically rain yellow and orange leaves from the sky and onto, well, onto everything.

Each season this first year at the GK is new for us. Summer was wonderful, and now Autumn is simply beautiful. The warm temps in the mid seventies this past week is to some degree guilt free since we’ve had a considerable amount of rain – much higher than normal – at this point in the season. We continue to pray for a very wet winter but meanwhile are truly loving the goldeness of the Golden K.

During an early afternoon walk around the property I was taken back by the beauty of this day and season and stopped to take a few photos while feeling truly grateful for the golden blessings we have up here on the hill.

Kali NOT at the wedding and pondering wagons.

Right Of Passage

September 12, 2016

So Kloe is scheduled to get spayed this week. Of course it’s the right thing to do. And of course it will all be fine. But I have to admit I hate the idea of her going under anesthesia and getting “cut”. It’s my nature to worry. It’s my nature to want to protect those I love from any pain, risk, and discomfort.

And of course she’ll have to wear the “Cone Of Shame” for several days.

Kloe, as most puppies, is very active, loves to run, and loves to thrash around as I like to call it when she throws her body around aimlessly out of sheer joy and jubilation of being a six month old Golden Retriever. This will be the hard part. How in the world will we keep her relatively calm and inactive for the first few days so that she doesn’t bust a stitch?

Like other rights of passage this for Kloe will be a milestone event in her young life as one of the sweetest beings – human or canine – that I have ever met. And the best part is that she is in our life.

I love you Klo’!

Nine weeks old – the day we brought our “baby” home

Kali was the best big sister from the day we brought Kloe home!

Pillow Talk? Nope – more like pillow snores…

Bow Wow! What a beauty!