Sometimes in my quest for the Simple Life I feel I am making leaps and bounds....not so today. It feels more like two steps forward and three steps back. If you recall, a few days ago I was excited about my new found realization about breakfast with Nina, the puppy. I made the adjustments needed to accomodate her need to see me as she eats and made it work for me in a positive way. That was a good thing.
Then last night I had to go out and by pet food. We have four indoor dogs and nine outside feral cats (three adults and six food-eating sized kittens, none of which we can touch)...that's a lot of pet food! I called my Honey while I was at the store to see if we needed more doggy treats. We have them trained to go to bed (their kennels) at 8pm and we give each a treat when they happily rush to the bed. Here's the thing....the four dogs each get a different treat based on their size, age and preference. Chelsie gets the large, hard doggie cookies. She loves them, the little ones struggle with those. Pan Dulce gets the meat flavored little bone-shaped biscuits. Nikos prefers the marrow-filled treats and the baby, Nina gets the softer chicken flavored strips we use in training. Four different treat varieties. Then there is the actual dog food. Until we weighted Nikos last week, all of the older dogs ate the same food. Nikos is a little too heavy, so we have now put him on a diet, he gets the Healthy Weight version. The puppy Nina is still on the super-duper nutritional puppy food. The cats all get the same food we now have to buy in the extra large bag. They do not get treats. As I loaded all this into my cart, the big picture started to emerge.
Then came this mornings feeding time. Pre-kennel release, I prepared Nina's puppy food dish in her room and set Nikos' new weight control food in a dish in his new eating area apart form the others. This required the arrangement of baby gates for separation and blocking in. EGAD! For all my cleverness in the new arrangements, I totally freaked the dogs out because they usually rush from their indoor kennels out to potty. I had blocked them in with the gates! So much for planning ahead. They were confused and bounced all over the place. If it were not so annoying, it might have been amusing but dogs and Mommy alike were starting to feel a little stressed.
Finally got everyone where they were supposed to be and sat down to have my breakfast with Nina again. She did not want to eat. Fine! I finished my food and headed back to the kitchen where Nikos was sequestered with his new food. He did not want to eat either, this was just too new and unnerving for him. FINE!! To no surprise, Chelsie and Pan Dulce were on a food strike as well. FINE!! Mommy does not seem to be handling this as well as she perhaps could.
On to feed the cats. I take a large container of food out for the crowd and the kittens dash about as if I was Jack the Kitty Ripper...this is an everyday - twice a day - event, you might think they would get used to the person that supplies their every need, but NOOOO, they run like their tails were on fire. Run, you little ingrates, run!! I didn't want to pet you anyway! Who needs your love? Not me!.....That's a total lie, I want to love on them so badly my finger ache!
Nothing 'simple' about any of this. I realize we are to blame for this situation and it will be up to us...and when I say 'us' I know it means 'me'...to straighten it out. Pets are supposed to enhance and enrich our lives, not make them crazy. Our pets are animals tho we treat them as if they were four-legged kids. All we require from them is unconditional love and simple obedience. The love they freely give, the obedience we had to work on.
I will give some thought to finding a better, more streamline system to give each one that which bests suits their needs but not right now. For now, I am focusing on regaining a sense of calm, order and clear-mindedness. All the baby gates are down but the one that keeps Nina in the house while allowing the others access to the doggy door. The buzzer just went off reminding me it is time to hang a load of clothes out on the line. That's good for soothing the savage beast within. It also helps remind me that I am, indeed, making a little progress in living the simple life on Hacienda Hill. Today, I need every bit of encouragement I can scrape up.**sigh**
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