Every Night I Go To Bed Laughing!

"There seems no doubt that hearty laughter stimulates practically all the larger organs, and by making them do their work better through the increase of circulations that follow the vibratory massage that accompanies it, heightens resistive vitality against disease."

~ James L. Walsh, Laughter and Health ~





Sam is giving you the raspberries!




I was thinking after reading that quote above that I must be the healthiest woman in the universe. I mean with 6 parrots, one dog, and 3 pugs (they're not the same, as I've said before) plus the 2 beta fish, who, if truth be told, are absolutely hysterical, I spend a great deal of the time here laughing at somebody or other! But it's when I go to bed at night that I always really laugh, and it's all due to Sampson.

I have mentioned previously that Sam is my velcro-pug, and anything more than a quarter of an inch from my body is too far. As I have taken to sleeping downstairs on the couch (it's a nice, overstuffed, 7 foot long couch given to me along with the oversized chair and ottoman, barely used, by dear friends when I moved in here 6 years ago with not much of anything. They are very comfy!) since hurting my ankle so badly (the bedroom is upstairs) Sam and I sleep on the couch. Here's the routine.

First of all, if I stay at my desk too late working, like, say, 2.a.m., he will come out from under my desk where he has been lying on my feet and sit and stare at me, right next to me, sobbing pug-like, the most pitiful sound you've ever heard. He looks up at me with those gigantic soulful eyes, and if I'm not finished working (I often write very late at night.) I will say to him, "Not yet Sammy. Mama is not finished working." He knows exactly what I mean but he's not happy about it. He shrugs, goes back under my desk, and lies on my feet.






Sam, lying on my feet under my desk, thinking, "Why can't I get
her to go to bed at some decent time. She knows I can't go to bed
without her... Sigh..."




When I am finally ready to go to bed, I needn't say a thing. I turn the computer off, turn the light out, take off my glasses, and he runs around looking at me, all jostling about with joy because he knows we are going to bed. He follows me to the bathroom where I brush my teeth and take care of other -- ahem -- business, and then follows me back to the couch. He hops up on the couch, and, while it doesn't seem to bother him that he needs to snorfle about and go round and round and go belly up and nose down and round and round and round before he can get settled, it irks him no end that he gets jostled about by me getting situated!

This is something you have to see to understand how cute it is because it's the oddest thing I've ever seen, I've had dogs of all breeds all of my life because they've pretty well all been rescues, and I have never seen any dog do what pugs do. They straddle the arm of a chair or couch, if it's wide and comfy, and go to sleep. I don't have a picture of Sampson on the couch because I'm already "in bed" when he hops up there, but he will hop up and stretch out until I am still. Here's a picture of him on the arm of the chair...






I think this "pug pose" is about the cutest thing I've ever seen!





Sometimes I try to get him to help me with my fiber work, but last
time we tried we both fell asleep in piles of shredded sari silk for
the yarn I was handspinning...




Anyway, he straddles the arm of the couch and looks at me in dismay. And don't think I don't know what he's thinking either. He's thinking, "Man, it takes her forever to snorfle about and flip flop and go round and round and round..." We know each other well. Once, I am settled in, however, he hops down in his special spot, the crook of my knees, and starts his round of snorfling, circling, digging, grunting, and I start laughing as quietly as I can because I don't want to get him worked up, and we're in the living room where the other dogs and birds are all longsince asleep, but by the time he kind of collapses in sheer exhaustion, we both begin to go to sleep, his little head on my ankles most likely, and it's only when I wake up that I realize he has moved up on my hip and thigh, balancing, I suppose, against the back of the couch.

When Pug Rescue told me that this little dog would stick to me like glue, I didn't know they meant literally, but he is one of the greatest joys of my life as are all of my other feathered, furred and finned family. As a woman who has been in therapy most of her life and suffered severe depression all her life, and while I know the meds I'm on do help, I credit my animals for keeping me happy and sane and joyful most of all. If you ask me, when a therapist takes on a new client who is depressed the first thing they should ask them is, "Forget your past, do you have any animal companions?" If the patient says no, he or she should be hustled off to the nearest Humane Society or rescue and get a dog or cat whom they will surely fall in love with on sight. These animals, especially the dogs, are the only unconditional love we will most likely every know (I speak for dogs because I am allergic to cats, but they are wonderful too!).



In closing, I'd like to leave you with another quote that I really love...


"Laughter is cosmic joy juice ... we pretend we are separate from one another. But the contagion of laughter reminds us we are one.

~ Annette, Goodheart, New Realities ~





My little pack of joy juice munchkins without whom I would laugh
a whole lot less...


Maitri