Murph and Me

And time passed without me hardly noticing……

Several months gone since the cold wet winter, the cheery new-family Christmas and the late winter snow. Several months of my new life: the one where I live happily with Special, probably the happiest I have ever been. The one where Special and I share wonderfully happy times, the one where I swim three times a week, play lots of golf, drive a high performance sports car, and go for long walks across the fields with Murphy the dog.

I have never really been what you would call a dog person, but with Murphy it’s different. We have bonded. Nearly every evening (except on Wednesdays) we go for walks across the stubble fields, through the little wood, over the five bar gates and across the vast green swathes of tall wild grasses that now fill the other fields on our route. Murphy never goes very far away from me, in part because of the pocket full of dog biscuits I always carry with me on our walks, and maybe because he is, at 14 months old, still a puppy at heart and a bit timid of the wild. He does get braver and ventures further when he catches a scent of another beastie; a deer, a rabbit, a fox, but soon bounds back to me. That is if it isn’t another dog. I have seen him completely traverse the biggest of the green fields in seconds to reach a distant dog and owner. He looks fabulous leaping through the long wild grasses, disappearing and reappearing, muscles rippling. Chocolate brown against natural green, grey skies, blues skies, wet grass, dry grass, long grass short grass, hot days, cold days, soft and muddy, hard and dusty, Murph and me have done them all, many times.

In the beginning when we used to climb the first hill up to the small wood, my heart would beat fast and I would get short of breath. But now, thanks to Murphy, I can take that hill in my stride; hardly a pant and with just a few extra beats. As kestrels hover and red kites glide above us, we tread and jump our way across the land looking out over field off white, fields of dry brown, fields of new green, and fields of yellow, as the season changes from winter through spring and towards summer. Murphy offers me unconditional love; mostly in the name of dog-biscuits but there is some doggy-tenderness in there as well. And it is a two way street; me and my man’s best friend, down to earth and back to nature.

We walk, Murphy plays and I sing him the occasional song – his favourite one that I made up to the tune of a Jack Johnson number which goes:

Murphy is a big dog
Always been a good dog
Murphy, Murphy, Murphy the Dog

Murphy always is a good dog…..
Does what he should dog
Murphy, Murphy, Murphy the Dog


Another made up to another Jack Johnson tune goes:

I got dog biscuits in my pocket
I got a canine friend
Murphy is a pretty dog
And we’ll get there in the end

I got wellies on my feet now
It’s tipping down again
Me and Murphy keep on walking
And we’ll get there in the end