This Dog Won't Hunt

When I take my dogs for a walk I like to let them loose in the empty field of our neighborhood. There they sniff out the resident bunnies and transient mice, catching a whiff of a few wandering deer.  Our dogs are Labrador Retrievers, a breed known for its hunting skills.  My husband takes them hunting for pheasant, ducks and geese, so these two are trained to pick up scents, flush prey, and then, well, retrieve.  As I watch them do their bird dog-thing, I think about how happy this makes them.  This is literally what they were born to do.  They lift their noses to the wind, interpreting smells (and sometimes rolling in them) and then twitch their ears around to detect the sound of scurrying feet or flapping wings.  At that moment their lives are complete.

Wouldn't it be great, I think, if  humans could have the same experience?  If you knew instinctively, through hundreds years of evolution, what you were born to do?  And then were able to do it?

I am not a hunting dog (and I would hope that is obvious to all of you). If my ancestors were selectively mating to ensure a certain skill or trait that would lead to a perfect career, they didn't mention it in any will or Ouija board seance.  What was I born to do?

Hunting is definitely out--you have to get up way too early, it's usually dark and cold, and I don't care for wild game.  I like my food full of steroids and wrapped in cellophane, thank you very much, just as God intended.

I love words and books and thesauruses
(or is it thesauri?) .  Of course, I also love chocolate.  And shoes; I always feel one with the universe when I get a new pair of cute shoes.

I know I was meant to be a mother.  (Whether or not I was meant to be a good mother is still up for discussion.  My kids remain skeptical.)  But I always knew, without being able to give a concrete reason, that I wanted to have kids.  They'll wreck my body and spend all my hard earned money? Sign me up!

I was not bred to have any sort of athletic talent.  Or to even particularly enjoy watching any sort of sporting event, unless it involves one of my offspring (see previous entry). This is another reason my siblings are convinced I was adopted.

I seem to have a sixth sense for sarcasm.  It comes very naturally for me and required no special training. How this translates into a life's purpose I have yet to discover, but I remain hopeful.

Some days I think I was born to write and read and to share the funny and wonderful things I come across in my life. Other days, not so much.  But I come from a family of artists and teachers, musicians and poets.  I have apparently been bred to be a thinker of thoughts who dabbles in words.

But I will not hunt.