View From a Prairie Home

by Hege Hernfindahl, Columnist

The holidays are over. The packages have been opened and the stores have started their post-holiday sales. I am relieved the holidays with their insistence on cheer and family happiness are over. I can just be myself again and not have to force myself to convey a happiness I don’t feel.

Not that our Christmas was bad or even sad. We had a very full house. Ingvild and her kids came. And so did their cat, Calypso. She is a comfort cat. Deeply loved by all and oddly, she doesn’t mind travelling with her family to our house or the cabin. She just goes around and acquaints herself with her unfamiliar surroundings before she finds her favorite spots to nap or just hang around.

Mwende also came. She is a huge Hungarian sheepdog. Erland’s family bought her in Germany when they lived in Brussels thinking she was a Golden Doodle and paying like she was. When their neighbor, a vet, told them that yes, she would continue to grow because she was not a Golden Doodle but a Hungarian sheepdog also called a Komondor. Mwende came to stay with us, because her family was going to Mexico for Christmas.

We have a Lab/Border Collie dog named Per. He is three years old and, like all dogs of his breed, is easy to train because he is so eager to please. His domain is our four-season porch. It has a sofa for him to hang out on and also a crate for him to sleep in. It has a heated floor and we have taken off the door to the rest of the house to create the illusion of an open floorplan. Per knows he can only be on the porch. He doesn’t need reminders, but is content to interact with us when we too hang out there. He doesn’t even lay on our chairs because, well, they are our chairs.

Per goes with us when we visit Ingvild in Kasson. There, he stays in the family room in the basement where he also has a crate. He knows the cat, Calypso. She is the queen and he understands she has the right to hiss at him and eat his food. If she goes into his crate, he just stays outside and lays his head down so she knows she’s the boss.

When we visit Esther and her boys, Per and Mwende play rough. Mwende has the run of the house and Per is not his humble self around her except if she gets possessive, then he lets her have her way.

A Hungarian sheepdog is bred to guard sheep and therefore is not as eager to please people. They are huge so they can intimidate the wolves who want to eat the sheep. Mwende has no remorse when she does something wrong and it scared me a little to have her in the house. We put up a gate in front of the opening to the porch and kept her there. We kept Per in the basement and let Calypso roam. There was a lot of whining from Mwende who was not happy with being stuck on the porch especially when Calypso could go wherever she pleased.

So we went for long walks in the rain and let the dogs be free. It gave us joy to see the two dogs, wild with pleasure, black and white, running side by side as friends through the long prairie grass. We came home, exhausted and wet, to savory meals prepared by Ingvild and her kids. We all ate in the dining room and prayed our special Norwegian prayers while all the pets slept peacefully. We never focused on the two empty chairs, but savored the moment in time when all was quiet, at least for a while.