Walks in the Land of Medicine Buddha
Emma Sutra: Do not lick the monks
We arrive at dawn, when it is still dark under the redwoods. The air smells like cedar, wet earth and fog. The only sound is the creek rushing over boulders and across fallen logs. We have driven slowly on the narrow one-lane road carved into the mountain, headlights on, praying for no oncoming traffic.
Homemade signs are nailed to fence posts saying, “this place is magic,” “fairies live here” and “slow down.” Emma has her head up, whining. She knows where we are and she is impatient that I have to park the car: “This is taking too long. It’s time to hike!” She leaps out of the car when I lift the hatchback. I catch her mid-flight, like a fuzzy football, and get the leash snapped on.
We pass through the tall wooden gates, strings of prayer flags fluttering in the early morning air. It is so exciting that Emma has a quick poop right at the trailhead and waits impatiently for me to clean it up. “Hold on, Princess Puffypaws,” I tell her, as she tries to run off, “someone has to clean up after you.”
Once we are a safe distance from the road, I commit my first illegal act of the day and unleash Emma. She shoots forward, sprinting down the steep bank to splash and snort in the creek far below, then races back up the vertical incline. She trots across a fallen redwood suspended fifty feet over the ravine. She looks like a tight rope walker between two skyscrapers, delicately crisscrossing her paws along the mossy trunk. She stops halfway across and executes a neat pirouette, bounding back to me. I let out my breath when she vaults safely off the end and thunders ahead.
From here it is a ten-mile rambling, running, sniffing, jumping, splashing, galloping “walk” that takes us through the 108-acre redwood refuge. I hobble determinedly on one leg and Emma zooms on four, a billion times faster than I am. I let my guard down a teensy bit. Emma is not going to knock over a toddler, eat a dead seal or lick a nude sunbather here, probably. From one of the trailside memorial shrines Emma delicately plucks a photo of a deceased Australian Shepherd and trots past me. “Drop it,” I command, and she does so, happily trading up for a banana bacon biscuit. I retrieve the picture from the ground, unharmed, and take a moment to admire the big handsome boy grinning next to his owners, their arms draped across his neck. The universe is whacking me over the head with this one. “OK,” I mutter, “I hear you.”
At the very end of our walk, we come to the Eight-Verses Pilgrimage Trail, a meandering path designed to promote meditation and contemplation. The smell of incense lingers in the air. People sit on teak benches in front of each verse, deep in thought. It is not a good trail for a dog like Emma, who is wont to lick meditators. I charge past the signs and shrines, herding my overtired, manic dog back to the parking lot. At the car, I get Emma some water and pick the ticks out of her eyebrows. I also untangle the small redwood branches and needles from her butt fur. Our record is eleven ticks, four branches and a pinecone. Emma is like a Swiffer going down the trail. I drink what is left of the dog water and take a moment to catch my breath before driving us home. “Someday,” I say, “I’ll actually read all those verses. I could use some tranquility.”
Since Emma crashed into our lives two years ago, serenity and peace have been in short supply. I had a vague notion that getting a dog would be good for my mental health and my blood pressure. Many Veterans I worked with at the VA arrived at appointments with their emotional support dogs. With the exception of the Great Dane who took a gigantic dump outside the director’s office, these dogs were polite canine companions. They made the world a little easier for their humans.
In contrast, Emma has made life so very hard. I have never been so depressed and anxious. I have pressure ulcers from all the hiking. I’ve broken two knees (hydraulic). At my last primary care appointment, my PCP warned me that I was burning through my pancreas. “These numbers are concerning. Have you been eating a lot of carbohydrates or desserts?” Since getting Emma, I have been self medicating with ice cream every night and a bagel with extra cream cheese every morning. Also, hot, cheesy pasta. Slabs of banana bread. And chocolate chunk scones. “Define a lot,” I said.
The dog annoys the hell out of me, but she is also spectacular. Joy radiates from her as she moves through the world, curious and up in everyone’s business. Her sheer ebullience sets her apart from other dogs. I used to think it was because she was a puppy, but now I know it was one part puppy, two parts Emma.