Dog Days
How do you handle the Dog Days of Summer?
What positive things do you do as a couple?
Our Experience
“Libby, I don’t feel like doing a Good Conversations this week.”
“You’ve got to! Everyone loves them,” she protested.
“We don’t know that. We don’t know if people even read them.”
The Dog Days of Summer was having its way with me. Like most people in the south and perhaps the country we were now
hibernating. I wonder how many times a day I ask Siri for the temperature and humidity. How can we be active in this heat?
(The guilt that comes from whining about it while realizing that too many people are in a war zone, a famine zone, a refugee
camp or are without air condition. How ungrateful I must be!)
Of course, I have an advantage over most people. I’m married to “Little Miss Sunshine.” (I would call her Mary Poppins but she
doesn’t sing.) She never runs out of positive ideas. (And she does not tolerate whining.)
So, we wait until it cools down a bit after supper and go for a walk in the neighborhood. (Me on a knee scooter with my broken
foot.) Tonight some neighbors several houses down were returning home and since we had not seen them in a while they
came out to the street and we had a great time catching up.
“I really like them,” Libby said as we got back to our house. “Aren’t these long days great!”
Even with the heat we try to eat out on the screened porch. We are never in a hurry to leave the table out there. For fun we
listen to novels. If the book is part of a series we get attached to the characters. (If you have a recommendation, pass it along.)
Also, we have friends over for dinner, especially on the weekend. It was too hot last Saturday to eat on the porch, but we had a
nice time.
If we were not intentional about doing positive things we would most likely retreat in our own little escapes, or find things that
irritate us about each other. But paying attention to our experience keeps us light-hearted and playful – most of the time.
What positive things are you doing during these Dog Days?
