Good Dog.

Today was a good day.

This morning began at the conference office, meeting with other West Ohio deacons and talking about community, vision, reaching out to those still in the candidacy and ordination process, and articulating what it means to build community when colleagues are spread out over the conference. Then I popped by to say hello to a couple of friends in their cubicles. Good times.

After our meeting, I headed up to the school. I had about a million things on my mind, and I was not feeling very thankful about the lovely weather or the traffic-free drive up 23 to campus. So I parked and was schlepping (yes, I think that is a word?) the laptop bag, purse, coffee (decaf because I am twitchy) and water bottle (you'd think I was moving in with all of this stuff) up the steps to the front doors of the main building. And what do I see?

A very relaxed, giant golden dog. He was laying on the steps, and his (I was guessing it was a he) leash was loosely tied to the bannister outside of the front doors. I walked slowly towards him - I mean, you're not supposed to interact with strange dogs, right? But this was a dog who was just chillin' and looked as if he belonged there, greeting visitors. I said hi to him, his tail started to wag, and I leaned over to say hello and pet him.

He started licking my hand. He was a good boy who just wanted to say hi. I found out that he belonged to a student; I saw the dog and the student a little while later, strolling up the hill on our campus. It was a restful image.

Sometimes it's the simple things. Sometimes we just need a big ol' dog to greet us and slow us down as we try to rush into our next set of tasks.

Today was a very full day. There was work that needed to be done, and there is homework and other tasks that need to be completed tonight. This fall has been a very full season - travel, meetings, conversations, visioning, tasking, preparing, ending old projects to make way for new ideas. But today I met a good dog who just wanted to say hi.