tali raze tali is beautiful. her father was a grey shepherd. her mother was a rottweiler. the back of her coat is thick and black, but there's all this light brown in her chest and in her face. the woman who walks her while her human is at work is a real character. her name is kat. she moved here from england when she was young. "i was married for thirty years," she said, "until my husband did me the great favour of dying." she's in her seventies now. she has three sons, all in their fifties. one of them lives with her. all their wives are dead. i asked kat what tali's name was. she told me, and then she said, "i don't know why she picked that." my brain interpreted "she" as tali. i knew that wasn't what kat meant to say, but the idea stuck. i've never been able to stop believing tali chose her own name. she likes to explore. she doesn't try to chase or attack the squirrels. she wants to get close to them so she can see how they work. sometimes she leans on me and lets me pet her, and i feel all the heat her back has borrowed from the sun. last week she was saying hello to me near the entrance of the parking lot in willistead park. there was a car coming. she wouldn't listen to kat's calls, so i led her onto the grass. in the rush to get her out of the car's path, my body jerked a little. she thought i was breaking into a run. she started cutting ragged circles around me. she did that for a while. she stopped, sat down, and looked up at me. then she stood up and ran more circles around me. she made a sound in the back of her throat that wasn't a growl. it was more of a laugh. we were playing. now whenever i see her, she comes running so she can trace her circles around me. i don't think she expects me to run with her. she just wants to show me where our worlds intersect. 210926 ... raze muriel. that's the name of the woman who walks her. not kat. i don't know why i thought it was kat. if i crouch down, sometimes tali will come over and hide her face in the open space between my legs. i like to think it's her version of a hug. today muriel said a friend of hers got a bite in the face from his own dog. "he was invading her space," she said. "but i don't think that's what did it. she's a german shepherd. the dog's a girl, and you know what he named her? briggs. i told him, 'i don't wonder she bit you. i'd have bit you too.'" 211014 ... raze tali jumped up on me and said, "time to play." there's still a bit of dirt on the front of my coat from where she pressed one of her paws against my solar plexus. i don't think i want to wash off the mark she made just yet. it makes me smile when i look at it. 211031 ... raze i wanted to pet her. she wanted to run. so we ran together. i followed her around a circle of hedges. when i was still, she ran around me. each time she sat down to rest, she would let me get almost close enough to touch her. then she'd rise up and run again. when we'd travelled far enough, she let me find her back with my hands. we stood and caught our breath, our eyes held by a bruised sky that stretched out in front of us like an invocation. 211102 ... raze tali made a new friend today. his name is roger. he has long black hair and the cutest little boy face. he's two. he won't tell you that if you ask him, though. he's shy. his mom said, "now, remember what we do. we hold our hand out so a dog can smell us first before we say hello." she made a fist. he made a fist. roger held out his tiny hand for tali while i was petting her back. she didn't sniff it. she jumped up and licked his face. he giggled. 211202 ... raze tali was with muriel's son. they were at least a good thirty feet away. she wasn't leashed. she started running as soon as she saw me. "tali!" i shouted. we ran in circles together. we laughed. "how are you?" i asked muriel's son when he got closer. "not bad," he said. i'd stopped running. tali was still going. "man, she's got a lot of energy," i said. "yeah," muriel's son said. he looked at me like he wanted to spit in my face. he didn't say anything else. he led her away. when he was out of earshot, i said, "i guess some apples fall pretty far from the fucking tree." 211224 ... raze i didn't see her coming. she recognized me from behind and caught up with me just before the parking lot. she was smiling. on a day when the wind chill factor made it feel like it was about zero degrees fahrenheit and even my eyebrows were freezing, we ran together and watched our breath make vapour trails in front of us. then she ate some ice. 220111 ... raze "she won't eat biscuits," muriel said. "her teeth need a cleaning because she won't touch hard food. but give her a stick, and she's happy for hours." it didn't take tali long to find a stick she liked. she kept throwing it over her shoulder so she would have an excuse to discover it again. 220113 ... raze she gets this look whenever she's trying to get close to a squirrel. she lowers her head, her face settles into an intense, meditative scowl, and she starts moving really slow. almost tiptoeing. she becomes detective tali, the world-weary private_eye. it's the cutest, funniest thing. scarface walked right up to her yesterday. tali stopped stalking. they stood and stared at each other with quizzical expressions. then they both exploded into furious motion at the same time. i looked at tali's smiling face, and it hit me. i know what she wants with the squirrels now. she wants to play with them. they all scurried up into their trees. they thought she was a threat. they wouldn't run with her. so i did. 220119 ... raze the snow slowed her down a little. it levelled the playing field. but i think she was a step slower on purpose. she wanted me to be able to keep pace with her. she found a good stick, tossed it up in the air, and almost caught it. she did that three more times. i asked muriel what she likes to eat, since she's indifferent to hard food. "give her a good piece of cheese," she said, "and she's in heaven." an animal after my own heart. 220201 ... raze she snuck up on me again. i heard her before i saw her, laughing the way she does. she had a thick little broken piece of a branch in her mouth. the elbow or wrist of an arm that was once as strong as stone before age and accumulated indignities made it frail enough to fall apart. i ran with her, and she carried in her mouth what had fallen from a place neither one of us would ever touch without becoming birds. with her dark coat and smiling eyes, she would be a raven. i would be a cardinal. and we would fly the way we run, blessing our bodies with the gift of unbridled movement, giving the day something good to remember us by. 220216 ... raze there's a man who brings his sheepdog to the park sometimes. all he does is stand around and whistle while his dog chases squirrels and terrorizes other dogs. there's a bylaw against doing that sort of thing, but the city doesn't give a shit. they can't be bothered to enforce any of the laws they write. his dog likes to run after tali and bite her. he lets it happen. she didn't want to walk through the gate today. that idiot sheepdog was there. as soon as she knew he was gone, she ran inside to see us. she was jumping and sniffing things out in the snow. she found some good sticks to play with. the man and his sheepdog came back. muriel clipped the leash to tali's collar to keep her safe. tali looked up at me. i watched her face fall. it's the first time i've ever seen her look sad about anything. 220219 ... raze "i saw to one of your friends over there," muriel said. she was talking about a dead black squirrel i noticed near the park's back entrance. it wasn't a member of the magnificent_six or any of the other regulars. must have been one of the squirrels i see hanging out around the gatehouse sometimes. they'll linger long enough to grab a bit of food once in a while, but most of the time they keep to themselves. i didn't want to get close enough to see too much. not after seeing little_guy like that. "it didn't look like it was squished or anything from what i could see," i said. "it wasn't," muriel said. "might have just died of natural causes. it was pretty stiff. so it must have been there a good while." tali didn't want to run today. she wanted to headbutt me and lick my face. "you know, for the longest time she never did that," muriel said. tali jumped up on me again. i laughed. "she'll filthy your pants," muriel said. she was right. my jeans are a mess now. but i'd dirty them every day if it meant we could run together another hundred years or so. 220301 ... raze my jeans came out of the dryer with some of the dirt she gave me still visible. what was wet and wild yesterday is now a small stain. a bit of paint from her paws made its mark on twice-patched denim i'm too stubborn to throw away, and no amount of laundry detergent will erase it. so, in a backwards way, i got my wish. 220302 ... raze i was petting her. i was staring at the back of her head after watching her try to dig a stick out of the still-frozen ground. it wouldn't budge. i was thinking there must be some wolf in her. some winter warrior from way back in the bloodline that's been diluted and gentled into this giant puppy i love. "i need to stop feeding her so much," muriel said. "she's getting wider by the day. i mean, she's still got her shape, but she's heavier than she should be." i crouched down beside her and whispered in her ear, "don't listen to her, tali. you're beautiful." 220303 ... raze my dad saw a broken branch. it was almost as long as the path was wide. he picked it up and broke it again over his knee to make it shorter. "a stick for tali," he said. "i don't think she'll take that," muriel said. but she did. she held it between her teeth and ran past a group of high school kids who wanted to pet her, conducting a choir of untrained voices with a jagged baton. she stopped to look at us. to make sure we were watching. then she ran the other way. she was happy. she held onto it longer than i've seen her carry any other stick. after she set it down, i pressed my hand against her back and watched snowflakes melt between her ears. 220309 ... raze she found us in the parking lot. "we were all the way over there," muriel said, pointing to a spot fifty feet away. "as soon as she saw you, she wouldn't do a thing i told her to. she wanted to come see you." tali got me again, dirtying my jeans in the same spot as before, giving me fresh stains to smile about. 220310 ... raze she found this great curved stick that looked almost prehistoric. she ran around with it hanging out of her mouth. i ran after her. she kept stopping and turning to look at me, giving me time to catch up. making sure i was still there. muriel said tali likes to fall asleep on top of people's feet. "you'd be the best foot warmer in the world, tali," i told her. "you know," muriel said, "i don't know if she would. she's not very graceful. she just sort of plops down on you." i've been known to do the same thing. 220316 ... raze tali walked up to a shiba inu to see what they were all about. muriel asked the dog's owner if it was a boy or a girl. she said it was a girl. "tali won't have any interest in her then," muriel said. "the hell i won't," tali said. they sniffed each other. they kissed. then they played. the shiba came over to meet me. she let me pet her. she had the happiest face. tali pried a stick loose from the dirt with her teeth. we ran in circles. she found a smaller second stick and eased that one into her mouth too, carrying both of them at the same time. i stared into her scarlet eyes and asked her what she thought of "tali two sticks" for a nickname. "it's got a ring to it," she said. 220322 ... raze today she broke every stick she bit into. she wasn't trying to. she just couldn't find anything strong enough to withstand the weight of her jaws. she smelled something that came out of another dog and found nothing there to admire. her wet paws left tracks on the path. i followed the trail of black clover until it stopped. one of my footprints would cover ten of hers, but i'll never match her for pace or form. if she wasn't such a considerate running buddy, she'd leave me in the dust every time. 220324 ... raze we ran against the wind hard enough to keep it from blowing us away. i asked muriel if tali had a favourite kind of cheese. "cheddar," she said. "she loves old cheddar. the strong stuff." you and me both, tali. 220331 ... raze today she pressed the side of her face against my leg, hard enough so i would know she was there even if my vision fled, and she stayed like that while i brushed her back with the bristleless wide head brush i call my left hand. when an animal that isn't even yours trusts you that much, it's enough to make you think love doesn't need a word to make itself understood. 220407 ... raze muriel's son roger brought tali to the park today. he didn't walk her. he stood on the grass and threw a frisbee for her to chase. when she caught it, he yelled at her to bring it back so he could throw it again. when she wasn't quick enough to catch it, he groaned. she didn't listen to anything he said. most of the time she didn't even look at him. when we were on the opposite side of the park, she came over to see us. she had two crisscrossing discs of spit-covered polyethylene in her mouth. one was blue. the other was red. 220414 ... raze his name isn't roger. it's paul. figures. paul doesn't talk to tali the way muriel does. she sees tali as an equal. he yells at her. she started heading our way as soon as the two of them walked through the front gate. "hey!" paul shouted. "tali! get back here!" then he saw who we were. "oh," he said. "well, go on. play." so we did. when we were finished running, tali found two sticks she liked. she threw them both up in the air. she didn't try to catch them. she wanted to see them fly before they fell. paul shook our hands and told us his name. he told us to have a good day. he seemed to mean it. so. miracles do happen. 220422 ... raze this time paul pointed us out to tali before she knew we were there. "look!" he said. "it's the johns! go play! run!" she traced a constant circle around me while i ran toward her. i felt like an actor trapped in a trick shot, only the movie was my life, and i was in no rush to move on to the filming of the next scene. after the circle was broken, paul walked on ahead. tali followed. she kept doubling back to make sure we were right behind her. he sat down on a bench. she met him there. he gave her head a good pat. "hey," he said in the softest notes his gruff voice could sound. "i've been waiting for you. what's going on, huh?" and it struck me for the first time: he loves her. he just isn't always great at showing it. "thanks for letting her play with us," i said when they were leaving. "any time," paul said. 220428 ... raze "it's your buddies!" paul said. we ran rings around a scion before she let the stick she was carrying fall. "not worthy?" paul said. he found a long, knotted bar of deadwood. he picked it up. "no," he said. "but this one is. ready?" he pitched it into the air. tali made herself a brown and black torpedo and fought to catch what was spinning away from her. i do the same thing every day. i just don't have her wheels. 220506 ... raze "she came up lame the other day," muriel said. "i think she must have pulled something in her shoulder when she was chasing after a stick. we couldn't find anything, but she's been favouring it ever since." "it doesn't seem to have dampened her spirit," i said, scratching tali's head while she grinned at me. "oh, heavens no," muriel said. a corgi named bryce stared at tali. she stared back. he started barking. "that's not going to endear her to you," muriel said. when she was resting after we ran, i sank into a squat so i could get closer to her. tali stood up and shot through my legs. i held her just past the place where her forearms meet her ribcage, and we hugged. 220510 ... raze "her shoulder's still healing," muriel said. "poor tali," i said. "i'm sorry she isn't feeling better." "oh, she is. that's the problem. she wants to run, but she can't for another week. i have to keep her on the leash. she's been good about it, though. she isn't food-oriented." "not like certain people we know." tali made a move toward me. she didn't make it very far. the thin strip of fabric in muriel's hand kept her from doing what she wanted to. i walked to her and drummed on her back while dandelion seeds blew into her coat. she yawned. a few birds took a shit at the same time. i didn't see them, but i saw what came out of them. three splotches of white paint hit the path, one after another. plop. plop. plop. they just missed us. 220519 ... raze a little girl was petting tali. she looked about two. her hair was a wild cavalcade of strawberry blonde curls. tali saw us. muriel unhooked the leash from her collar. "you're free!" i said. she ran around me, fencing me in with a continuous circle so tight, all i could do was stand in place and spin. the little girl clapped her hands. she jumped up and down and howled. tali smiled. then she sneezed. she was happy. me too. 220524 ... raze tali ran around a tree while chatterbox hung off the side. he stared at her like she'd lost her mind. "when she was a puppy," muriel said, "a baby squirrel fell out of a tree right in front of her. now she expects them all to do that." 220528 ... raze i was stroking tali's back and scratching the top of her head. "you've got a full-time job doing that if you want it," muriel said. "she'll be glad to let you have it, too." "i'll take that job," i said. "just seeing her happy is payment enough." 220607 ... raze achievement unlocked: tali flopped down on top of my foot to let me know she was happy hanging out with me for as long as muriel was willing to let her stay in the park. i kneaded the fur that blankets her skull and her ears curled backward to hug my hand. 220611 ... raze i got her to hold off on chasing squirrels for once. she saw a few wandering around in front of her. i kept petting her and whispering her name. she left them alone. she sat down and eased her lower back into my quadriceps. "good girl," i said. muriel told me i wasn't special. tali was only leaning on me because i happened to be there. "you do realize you're a convenience," she said. "don't you?" "i'm just happy to be of service," i said. 220906 ... raze "have you met boomer?" muriel asked. "he's a black lab. built like a brick shithouse. he's always trying to mount her. she'll tolerate it up to a point. then she says, 'no more.' she let him know she wasn't having it this morning." "atta girl," my dad said, scratching behind her ears. "joanne thinks she's getting a bit heavy," muriel said. "but if you shaved her, i don't think she'd be any thicker than anyone else." tali shot me a look that said, "please tell me that's a joke." 230304 what's it to you? who go blather from