I’ve been living with hippies for several days now. More correctly, hippies have been living with me. When they arrived I thought that they were gypsies, however, that’s not the case. They may be hippy gypsies, but I’m very sure that they’re hippies.
Don’t get me wrong. I love them and enjoy their company, but they live a more casual, transient lifestyle than I’m familiar with. The thing that I find most interesting is that their dog is not a hippy. He has become a transient like his owners, but I believe that deep in his core he remains a regular dog.
Ruth and I have had dogs over the years, however, none in the past twenty-five. When we learned that Elizabeth, Sutton, and Jonesy would be living with us for a week here and there over the summer of 2018, we took steps to dog proof our house. We didn’t believe that Jonesy would deliberately destroy things but he’s got a tail that just doesn’t stop waggin and we were concerned that his tail may knock over some low hanging family heirlooms. So far the only damage that has been inflicted is upon my leg. I’ve been to the walk-in clinic a couple of times to have my tail swiped contusions attended to, but there’s nothing serious to report.
We live at the lake so Jonesy spends much of his time acting as a sentinel to our compound. He travels from window to window constantly on the lookout for rabbits, squirrels, raccoons, ducks, geese, swans, blue herons, deer and any other animals that may attempt to invade our space. He’s only swiped one breakfast sausage from the counter but part of that is our fault. We shouldn’t have tempted him with unattended sausage.
The primary reason that I believe that Sutton and Elizabeth are hippies is the food that they eat. I believe that Sutton will eat anything. He’s a great cook but we have things in our house that have never been here before … green chilies, jalapenos, organic pasta, organic cheese, green peppers (Ruth and I are not fans of green peppers), coffee imported from the hills of Oregon, and organic, non-GMO, vegan crackers.
A couple of days ago they bought pasties from the local market. Sutton has eaten a few. He also told me that he had several “pot pies” during his college days but as everyone knows, pasties and nineteen cent pot pies are two different beasts. I told him that there are two acceptable ways to eat such a delicacy.
“You should bake them, and when they are done, wrap them in a cloth to protect your hands from the heat, and bite off chunks like the miners of the Upper Peninsula did. If you want to experience the full effect of eating in a mine, you should go to our small lower level bathroom, start the water dripping in the shower, close the door, and turn off the lights.”
I also told him that my preferred method was to eat them covered in brown gravy.
They didn’t buy gravy at the market, so Elizabeth began exploring our pantry. She found a can of “beef mushroom” soup to use as an alternative to gravy. I thought it would be a great idea. When she read the bottom of the can and discovered a “best if used by date” of 2011, she opted out. Only a green chili, organic, non-GMO, vegan cracker eating hippy would read the bottom of the can.
I explained that the reference to “best if used by date” was only a suggestion but she didn’t buy my explanation. Upon further inspection of the pantry, she located a package of dry “only add water” gravy mix. If she read the label she chose to ignore it because I know for a fact that the package of dry gravy mix moved with us from Kalamazoo in 1977. That must have been pre “best if used by” packaging.