Chasing Larry Bird (the dog)

Of the several things I did today two were most frustrating and in a similar way.

First, a friend of mine, who I need a vacation from, has a puppy named after basketball great Larry Bird. Larry, the dog, not the bird, was picked out of a box at a grocery store in the Northeast. Well, Larry was cut at first like all puppies are. But now Larry is growing up, spends too many hours inside and has a ton of energy. I went over to see my friend and I let Larry slip out the front door. Well, it became my responsiblity to catch Larry before he ran across the street and got hit by a car. Cornered, the little fucker in my friend's backyard, but still he wouldn't let me catch him. I'd ask him, Please? I'd sit on the ground. I'd pretend that I wasn't paying attention. And I chased. I chased Larry the dog around bushes, through the garden around jungles of trees--this backyard is too big.

"Try giving him some food," my friend suggested through the window.
"OK, yeah, hand me some." Through the window he passed me a handful of dog food pellets.
"Remember, he may be faster than you, but you're smarter."

I tried this. And Larry seemed interested. When my cell phone rang, however, I dropped the pellets. Lost in conversation, Larry ate the pellets and I couldn't catch him.

"Oh, he's trying to pay tag or something," a man working next door said over the fence.

For thirty minutes it was my mission to catch this dog. I would be a terrible cowboy. How do dog catchers do this? When finally I sacrificed my knee tackled the pup and grabbling him by his loose fitting scruff. Fuck, I hate that dog.

I'm not a very good phone friend, but I began talking to a Denver friend on the way home from the bus stop.

"How ya doing?"
"Fine."
"What you been up to?"
"I'm not good, but not bad. I'm fine, too."

Things like this. We chase around the many points. She's looking for love. I'm looking for myself. She doesn't want to be alone. I think I need to be alone. She wants to know what love is. I think I know what it's not. She mentions a name I don't want to hear. Wants to know what I hear from her. Says we were good together and I say, yeah but it's over; we don't talk anymore. Questions arise as to what happened, and I want to know to; it's complicated, I say.

This friend of mine figures she needs someone. That she doesn't like to be by herself. But she needs to be by herself; help herself before anyone else can help her. And I learn a little from this as it comes out of my mouth. And when she says, but I'm not happy unless I'm with someone, I'm back in the backyard of my friend's house watching Larry the dog run circles around me. And I can't get 'em.