Jen Jeffrey: Saturdaze

  • Wednesday, July 30, 2014
  • Jen Jeffrey
Jen Jeffrey
Jen Jeffrey

Saturdays are becoming one of my favorite days of the week, although – I really do appreciate each day of the week for different reasons. Monday is a favorite, because I like structure as well as starting new things. I like Tuesdays because I can really get started on what I might have procrastinated with on Monday.

Wednesdays good, but are only a reminder to me that I need to hurry up and finish things before Friday gets here and, Thursday … well, who doesn’t love ‘Throwback Thursday’ on Facebook where you bring out old photos and post them? Thursdays are also the ‘pat on the back’ that it has been a good week and Friday will be deserving.

When Friday gets here, I have finally joined those of my friends who shout “TGIF!”

Friday used to be another day of work for me as I have worked on weekends for years because I dreaded them. Weekends for single people isn’t always the greatest and I would fill my weekends with work. When I worked at the gym, I was depended on to work weekends because most other staff members were married and ‘had a life.’

That is not to say singles don’t have a life, but if any singles are like I was… I floundered a bit until God showed me to embrace being single and make the most of that time because there was purpose in it.

My schedule and my circumstances are different now and I have slowly been obtaining a comfortable routine in my weeks.

Friday is a day I look forward to because I know it is my husband’s last day of work for the week and I enjoy his ‘tired-in-need-of-relaxation’ yet ‘feeling-satisfied-of-productivity’ attitude.

Even though I enjoy making my husband breakfast each day, I also enjoy getting the morning off from fixing breakfast because Jason eats at the office that day. And, I get the evening off from cooking dinner because it is “Mugsy’s Hideout’s Pizza night.” We have made it a tradition and, where most couples may make Friday night a date-night, Jason and I are mostly homebodies. Knowing how tired he is at the end of the week, I like that we both just want to eat pizza and watch a movie in the comfort of our home.

We get out enough during the week with certain events or luncheons or errands, so staying at home on the farm is a sheer pleasure to both of us.

Skipping Saturday for a moment to say, I love Sunday because it is the first of the week where we get ‘surefooted’ again. After a week of …whatever, it is always good to begin the first day of the week worshiping at church with Jason’s mom and gathering our thoughts in how God has blessed us, what He expects from us and to be aware of our focus on whom He is in our daily lives.

Right now, Hardin Baptist is still going strong with the “Route 66” theme where we are studying one book of the 66 books of the bible each week. Brother Ricky and his son Kory have made it fun as we have assignments to read passages before Sunday’s sermon and they are listed on their Facebook page so it helps us to remember to do it.

After church we go out to eat, usually a Jasmine’s Thai Cuisine – his mom’s favorite. Sometimes I get sushi, but lately, I have been getting the Red Curry dish.

So what is it about Saturday that I love so much? I think it is because it is my ‘everything’ day.

Unless Jason and I have plans to be somewhere, it is an ‘anything goes day’ with no structure, but also it seems to be a day in which I get in whatever I need. If I am busy during the week with work, housework, events or plans that keep me from really being focused on time for just Jen, Saturday is a day I can do that.

I do like to be with others, but I think it is healthy to have alone time as well. On Saturdays, Jason has a need to sleep in and that helps me with my need for alone time that is just me. Okay… it isn’t ‘just me’ because the Greys need walking, but they have become an important part of my Saturday morning alone time.

Whenever I walk them during the week to help Jason out if he can’t walk them, I may have other things I need to be doing and it seems like something I ‘have’ to do - a responsibility. But, on Saturday …it is a joy. It is a time when I am giving to my husband by letting him sleep in, but it is also my time to go off and explore nature and greet a beautiful morning.

After having let the cats out of the outside ‘cat room’ to explore the farm and the woods, the day has just emerged and the cool morning breeze greets me. I prepare all the ‘kids’ food dishes unless the Greys are whimpering to go out NOW, then I leave that job for Jason if he gets up before I get back.

I found that the Greys also like to explore. Greyhounds definitely show their hound characteristic when they sniff the whole world (I don’t just mean crotches) I mean everything in front of them.

Sweetie is three years old and still has pup-like qualities and Spec is the older and wiser and… sometimes scaredy-cat. I get tickled as we walk passed the cornfields surrounding the farm and Spec gets his nose into the ground sniffing the heck out of something and all of a sudden, if that ‘something’ moved, his whole body springs up while all four paws come off the ground and his skinny-butt-and-big-chested torso curls. If a gunshot sounds in the distance, Spec will stop in his tracks before proceeding (I did this when I lived in the city). Whenever I laugh at him, he seems to shake it off taking the lead to show that he is still the big dog.

Like a child, Sweetie will sometimes test me and become obstinate with my lead of her leash. She will become busy sniffing or trying to get a little protein by eating at some insect in the grass. When I get her attention and her nose comes up from the ground, she will still stand her ground and not budge while she looks at me with those playful eyes curious to see what I will do about her noncompliance.

When the Greys aren’t showing their different personalities and we are in unison walking a path to see-what-we-can-see, I have found that I have become a pretty good leash-wrangler.

Though I still haven’t figured out if the Greys just don’t understand how the two leashes get tangled or if they do it on purpose, I have had to learn to quickly change up my hold on the leashes to avoid entanglement.

Trying not to break a good stride, as Spec crosses over to see what Sweetie is doing, I loosen my grip for a very quick second to un-lap the leashes, switch and keep us straight.

At times Spec (and I am still not sure if he does it on purpose or not) will head off in the cornfield and our stride is broken while I have to back up and wait for him to come out the way he went in. When he doesn’t seem to know how, I then have to reach in and grab the leash near his collar from where he is trying to get out and pull the rest of the leash so that he can come out of the path where he wants to.

I admit that I test their wits as much as they do mine. Sometimes, I will not re-grab the leash and I outwit Spec until he finds his way out the same way he went in.

One Saturday as the greys and I took off for our walk, I wanted to go where the cows were lowing. It was farther than where we normally walk and it was much farther than it looked. From the house I could see the long stretch of gravel road trailing off the road in front of us and it disappeared into the far woods and sky.

After passing the huge cornfield next to us, a neighboring house host a few barking dogs in the distance that I wanted to avoid as we made the turn onto the gravel road. I could tell that ol’ Spec wanted to avoid the barking dogs too. For being a fairly large canine, Spec can be somewhat of a big baby.

We headed down the gravel road with vast empty pasture on each side and a backdrop of wooded area in which I have heard coyotes howl. Spec and Sweetie picked up new scents that I think made them both a little nervous.

I always feel as though I have won the lottery when I can get both of the Greys to ‘poo’ before our walk is over. If they aren’t in the mood – they just don’t poo and it seems our walk was for naught.

As Sweetie dug her nose to the ground and came upon a few small nuggets of hairy poo, I remembered hiking in Chattanooga with a group Jeff Hunter lead and he taught us about hairy poo being that of a coyote.

Dogs are smart and funny at the same time. Sweetie is usually the one who is up for anything and does not scare easily, but after sniffing the hairy poo, she either developed a nervous stomach or she was instinctively making her own presence be known because she was pooing not just once, but several times all along the path.

Spec followed his canine pal with the same nervous behavior and I was smiling so big, you’d think I just heard from Publisher’s Clearing House! Both Greys poo’d for mommy so much, that they were certain to not mark up the garage for days!

When the far off pasture met us with the cows grazing, Spec and Sweetie weren’t sure what to make of these beings who were bigger than them. The leash wrangling began and Spec was telling me, “No… THIS way, Mommy!” I told him, “Cows are our friend.” And he complied to follow, though with caution. Sweetie made sure to mark every spot she could with one or the other voiding.

As I got close to the fence where the cows were, the morning haze across the pasture brought stillness as the cattle’s breath could be heard. Just as the buffalo I had seen in the spring, the cows’ breath was magnificent. Each cow breathed out into the foggy grass as they vacuumed the pasture with their constant pull.

One cow that I think was a steer had horns, but also what my youngest son used to call ‘milk-jugs’. She was beautiful with fabulous markings that mimicked a Paint horse.

The sun lifted into the sky and the haze began to disappear. The pooing pooches and I headed back down the gravel road with a spring in our step! I had seen God’s beauty and felt one with nature – an automatic high for me, and the Greys were just glad to be heading back to the garage for breakfast.

‘Daddy’ had already gotten their food prepared and I was ready to make his sausage and cheese bagel. I hadn’t realized our excursion took more time than normal and the Rifleman was already on.

It is a Saturday tradition for Jason to watch the Rifleman, which he teases is ‘good wholesome killing.’ We both laugh at the backwardness of the times in that show, but I also like to watch to see the horses and just being with my husband whose mind is not at all preoccupied on a Saturday.

I washed my hands and pattied out the sausage and I made a hole in the cheese to fit on the bagel before broiling. As breakfast-smell fills the room and the sound of ‘good wholesome killing blares from the television, I am faced with a full day of anything goes and… that is why I love Saturdaze.

jen@jenjeffrey.com

 

 


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