I see dog stories as an antidote to the dire news that nothing is ever going to get better. – W. Bruce Cameron
https://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/w_bruce_cameron_734990?src=t_dog
It is a form of punishment I occasionally indulge in. Noticing and sometimes chiming in my two cents, on topical social media posts, news stories, or a provoking radio broadcast. When I am captive in a vehicle for an hour or more twice a day, I am already hypersensitive to mankind’s nonsense. The workday is relief from current world events, but my tasks and reporting requirements often use some skill in politics.
I used to find it embarrassing that I graduated from the university with a degree in Political Science. Not only is this degree all but useless to enter the workforce, I found myself often making excuses for choosing that education path. But I balanced that educational experience with twenty-five years of military service (enlisted), And another ten of varied technical and trades occupations. My almost-twenty-year marriage has been a healthy union of dissimilar origins but a model of compromise. Not just domestically, but in work roles – my spouse has been a corporate manager almost as long as I have been reporting to managers. Even raising three adolescents into grown men with dissimilar careers and political/social/cultural views is other evidence that politics does not always have to be the dirty business that we hear about.
However, the most refreshing thing about my dogs, is that they are neither interested in, nor are materially affected by the politics in San Diego, Sacramento, Washington, D.C. or the latest social media outrage. Neither one has any other interest than going out for a walk, negotiating another biscuit, or who gets the closest dog pillow to my writing desk.
With the weekend finally here, the only politics I need to engage in, is negotiation and compromise with Dexter to let me onto the couch, and with Comet, to not dig into the kitchen trash that I will otherwise have to run outside to put in the bins. Every time I open the back door, the fellas engage in a little diplomacy of their own: “Walkie time?”
It's a Dog's Life 