For forty, of my seventy plus years, I have been walking a dog. It is a routine I usually do happily but not always. Some days it’s a struggle. Especially days like today when sidewalks are half slush, half ice, and short legs and a low underbelly mean daily basin baths.

All of my dogs have been rescued; one from a Post Office, another from the Humane Society and this present one from a forest. Each of them has given me some of the happiest and saddest moments of my life. They have also taken me out of myself and shown, as well as taught me; patience, humility, courage, self-control and most of all what love truly looks and feels like.

That another species could enter one’s life so haphazardly and so fully is a miracle to me. And a gift. Over the years I have come to to the conclusion that my dogs are actually Godde embodied in a form guaranteed to get through to me. A Godde who directs me daily towards what it is I should be paying attention to and all without uttering a word.

I see this as Godde’s tongue-in-cheek approach to my own on again-off again conversation with Her. Sometimes I have shut that conversation down for years but She always manages to start it up again. Nowadays it’s pretty much on-going, thanks to whatever dog is in my life.

As Writer and Spiritual Director Paula D’Arcy observed so profoundly: “ God(de) comes to us disguised as our lives”. In my life that disguise has always had a furry form.

Shantih, a wire-haired terrier and terror, saw me through many exploratory years as a young woman living in the Arctic. Ikwe , a black border collie cross, led me through mid-life in a new city with far more grace than I knew how to manage. Now, in my hopefully wiser crone-years, I have Luca, another terrier, who tugs at me to be wilder than I want to be and more loving than I think possible.

Each dog has had a personality that in many ways reflects my own; the good and the bad.

Shantih was a barker. He had difficulty listening to commands let alone obeying them. He turned his back on me if I left without him but was brave and loyal to the nth degree.

Ikwe was a mother hen; a gatherer of people and a staunch protector of what she considered her brood. She needed to be near me and at the same time preferred her own space. She was terrified of water, but with practice and the possibility of a reward, learned to swim.

Luca is wild at heart but scared of plastic bags and things that go bump in the night. He shakes when there’s thunder but guards me like a mastiff. He believes he’s tough and will actually bare his fangs though rarely bites, except by accident. He is also the most affectionate of any of my other furry teachers.

So I am blessed with Godde’s miraculous presence on a daily basis. But that is only part of the gift. Each and every day something happens. Something not looked for, not expected, and sometimes not even wanted. Those are the stories I’d like to tell but not right now. Godde is calling and it is time for our noon hour walk.