A Most Perfect Creature of Heaven

I want a dog.  Not just any dog.  I want a Scottish Deerhound.  The idea came to me one night last week.  I've been wanting a pet for longer than I can remember.  The thing that was stopping me was that I already had a pet, a fish.  But come on, a fish is hardly a pet.  You can't even pet it!  But it was always a 'valid' point in arguments with my mom.  


scene 1


Me: Mom can I get a pet?
Mom: You have a fish.
end of scene


But a few weeks ago, after much forethought and guilt for my fish's horrible standard of living, and after my realization that I could not leave the poor fish's demise up to fate or starvation, I, quite simply, threw my fish into a pond, with the knowledge and hope that he would die soon.  Which brings me to my reason for telling you this story.  I just realized this.  The event of 'releasing my fish into the wild' removed the long standing barrier keeping me from getting a real pet.  So, ever since, I have been overreacting to this newfound freedom, and I have been chasing fleeting urges for outrageous pets.  Like, "I should get a cow" or "I want a cat (outrageous because everyone in my family is allergic but me)" or "OMG! I should get two horses and a sleigh, and then in the winter I could drive it around!"

It was during this last whim that I realized, "hey, I really want a pet, and until I get one, I will continue to run after these half-brained ideas, so I should pick a sensible pet that I really want before I go and buy a herd of sheep."  At least, I realized it on an unspoken level.  It all happened in a matter of seconds.  My brain was all, "Horse" then "No I couldn't" then "Scottish Deerhound!"  

 This is a Scottish Deerhound.

Let me explain my love for this dog.  I first met this breed last year, when I watched "Angel" by Francois Ozon.  It's a movie about a poor English girl who makes good when her romantic novels are published and are well-received by public.  She starts going to parties and wearing beautiful dresses and buys the house of her childhood dreams.  Then she falls for a handsome, struggling painter.  She hates his paintings, and so does almost everyone.  They get married, even though the painter has no feelings for her, and the painter takes advantage of her wealth.  They fight a lot, he goes to war and cheats on her, and then becomes a grumpy bitter invalid, and their marriage goes down the drain.  He leaves her, or dies, I can't remember, and she can't write anymore, and she wastes away and dies.  Kind of a horrible ending, but what do you expect.  But, she has a Scottish Deerhound named Sultan, and he's really only acknowledged in two scenes.  Nevertheless, I instantly was drawn to this dog.  I didn't know what kind he was. I fell in love with his shaggy, roughed-up coat,

 and his easy, loping gait,

 and quiet demeanor,

 and practically everything about him.  I tucked him in the back of my mind and kept him there, until a few months ago, when I was taking a dog compatibility test.  I filled out the questions and headed to the results page.  There was a list of dogs, and I started google-ing each one to see what they looked like.  I typed "Scottish Deerhound" into the text box, and lo and behold, it was Sultan!  That's how I found out the name of the breed.  

Which brings me to the present.  When I subconsciously identified my aforementioned problem, I thought what's an animal that I love.  And ol' Sultan popped into my head.  It was perfect.  I instantly started researching the breed, and looking up breeders.  The researching part went great, I found out that these dogs are absolutely perfect, loyal, calm, content to lay around, but also willing to play and run when asked.  It's a perfect idea.

I also found out that Scottish Deerhounds also competitively run, which is called lure coursing.  Another thing, only royalty were allowed to own them.

But alas, things worth having are worth fighting for, and the universe is certainly sending plenty of battles to me.  Battles like no one is selling their deerhound on Craigslist.  Battles like there aren't any accidental litters that owners are willing to get rid of for a low price.  Battles like not ONE breeder has a page with pictures and prices of a recent litter.  COME ON.  Basic stuff here.  So I amassed a few breeder pages and e-mailed them.  So far, one breeder isn't breeding now, another e-mailed me a whole bunch of nonsense without even answering any of my questions, and another is selling her puppies for $2000.  Yeah right.  I knew that the price was impossibly high for me, but I had a nugget of hope that maybe I could do it.  Then my father told me he wasn't buying me a car, even though he had hinted at it earlier in the summer.  Car tease.  Now I need most of my funds to purchase the car of my dreams, a Jaguar E-Type.  More on that later.  The rest of the breeders haven't responded.  I'm counting on a specific breeder, and if they don't come through, well, there goes my dream, bye bye Sultan, maybe I'll try again in a few years.  Whoa, I just made myself really sad.

Well, fingers crossed, I've still got hope for now.

Loose, Linen Dresses

About twenty to forty minutes ago, I became mildly obsessed with this dress.

Not this dress in particular, but this type of dress.  I don't know what the style is called.  

I'm going to imagine wearing it.  For the white color, I'm on a sail boat for two, skimming over the calm sea waves.  I've just come up from below deck and have been greeted by a healthy sea spray from the wave that just slapped up the side of the boat.  For the teal color, or a darker color, it is a cloudy day, has been all day, and it's slightly cold, but the dress keeps me warm enough, especially if I'm wearing the dress in the forthcoming photo.  The dress lifts away from me in another gust of wind, and I feel the slightly stiff, starchy feeling of the fabric.

This next one I can picture myself tucked up in a lovely sunny corner of a fairly large, get-lost-in-the-stacks-amid-heavy-bound-volumes-with-gilded-titles library, tracing with my eyes the swirls of the grain of the mahogany chess table, which seems to be lit from within where the sunlight hits, contrasting deeply with the dark spots in the shade.  The warm air smells like binding glue, book pages, and leather; and the hot scent of the tea in the hand of the cute, freckled and bespectacled boy follows him and settles around my table as he sits and asks for a game of chess.

And with this one:

We're in an apple orchard, at that magic hour where the sunlight is tinted to an orange-red color.  We've been picking apples since early morning, and are thoroughly sleepy from all the work, and also from the little apple fight we had earlier.  Almost everyone in our small group has retired to the grassy ground and is in various stages of napping.  The only sounds are the soft, deep sounds of contented breathing, faint strains of music coming from the wedding in the house down the road, and the click and whir of crepuscular bugs, whose wings glow with sunlight.  One of our party has leaned against one of the trees, and he reaches up and pulls an apple from a low-hanging branch.  The branch swings back up into the treetop, swishing its leaves and dropping dirt and bits of vegetation onto our sleepy faces.  The snap of the apple stem breaking momentarily cuts through the lethargy, and we realize how late it's gotten, and pack our baskets of apples into the back of the rusty old pick-up and climb in.  The old car starts with a lurch and soon we are headed down the road, sending clouds of dust up behind us.  Later in the week, we will head back to the same orchard to have a picnic; our dessert will be apple pie, made from the ones we picked.

See, I could go anywhere with these dresses!  I need at least one.  They're fantastic.  

Most of these dresses are from this website: http://www.artfire.com/ext/shop/studio/StylishLife#/ext/shop/studio/StylishLife/9/7/0//ajax