Afternoon Recess

I do enjoy the quiet of Fort Williams in the morning. The faithful every day walkers with dogs may be there (though they weren't yesterday-- Athena and I were all alone in our frost covered solitude), but it is quiet enough to gather your thoughts in the morning, or to just soak in the sounds of the birds and the waves and hopefully soon, the leaves on the trees. Sunday afternoon, it was a lovely day, much more spring-like than typical for early March in Maine, so we headed back to Fort Williams in the afternoon for a bonus walk.

The afternoon is a completely different place. It was a really lovely day, but instead of one or two cars parked, as in the morning, I started to worry that I wouldn't find a place to park my car! And when we entered the off-leash area, it looked like some sort of a dog convention! There were dogs everywhere, joyfully chasing balls and each other. Some we knew, like Rambo (pictured at right below), the giant labradoodle, and we met quite a few new dogs and their owners. New to to us, but not to each other, as many of them are afternoon regulars, another distinct community, this one a bit more energetic and busy than the morning dog community.

Afternoon recess is perfect for dogs, perfect for people-- why the work day doesn't somehow adopt it in its purest form, I don't know. A coffee break just does not do for you what the things we did at recess as children. would--a quick game of dodge ball or jump rope. You'd know you were alive again. Someone wrote a book about all the important life lessons learned in kindergarten. Maybe dogs are in our lives to remind us of these.