The post below was sent as an issue of my newsletter, Ready for Rain.
There is an unwritten rule about home building projects on Orcas Island: well-behaved dogs are welcome. On any given day there is at least one dog on-site and we’ve grown to love them all.
The true house dog is Koda and we see her almost every day. She greets us in the driveway and when we reach down, she submissively puts her ears back and she curls into crescent with a wagging tail and whines as if to say “oooooh, you’re here please touch me, ooohhhh.” Her fur is as soft as she is sweet. Koda has the unique luxury of an on-site bed, but sometimes prefers a nice pile of sawdust in the sunshine. Koda belongs to the site foreman, Casey.
A dog we don’t see as often but consider a house dog is Beaudry, who belongs to Jorgen, the blacksmith. Beaudry is a cuddler if you give him the chance, and very dedicated to fetching. There is an orange rubber toy in the shape of a pig at the house that has to be hidden from him because once he has it, it constantly ends up on your feet.
Beauregard arrives with Kevin, the electrician. Beau sees so many job sites and people that he moves around the house like an inspector, unconcerned with the humans. Once you get his attention, though, he’s sweet and friendly. One weekend we were staining cedar and had placed boards on the floor to dry. Kevin arrived to check-in and before we knew it, Beauregard added a few nice paw prints to the newly stained cedar. We fixed them with ease.
Coco was one of the first dogs on site because she belongs to Tyler, the excavator. She’s also a dedicated fetcher and will drop any stick she can find at your feet for as long as you want to keep throwing it, and then some. Coco now has a little sister named Clover.
Some dogs arrive at the site and wait patiently in their vehicle. One of those is this handsome puppy, Douglas, who is owned by Niles, one of the plumbers. Douglas is exactly what you’d expect: amazingly sweet and soft to the touch.
I’ll throw a deer in for good measure. When we started cutting down risky trees to make room for the house, the deer had a buffet for a while.
Also, not a real dog, and not on Orcas Island, but check out this driftwood Boxer in Anacortes, Washington.
With so many friendly dogs around, I think about them being a physical part of the project. No doubt, their hair is now under the floor and in the walls. I wouldn’t want it any other way.
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