My dog Spike and I are “working” in my office on a rainy Wednesday night in December, but my mind has been frazzled by the recent drama of the car theft which has affected my concentration, sleep patterns that are suspect anyhow on good nights, and winter/holiday doldrums that were here before any of that madness. Bah humbug.
This monkey’s expression while reading the Wall Street Journal reminds me of how Spike and I feel during the storm tonight. Basically, WTF.
Then I have to laugh because I gave this monkey to my dad for a Christmas gift to put in his office when he was a public school teacher turned administrator in the late 1960s. He loved it – said it made him smile whenever he noticed it during a stressful day at work. I saved it when I cleaned out his personal items from the school office in 1976 two months before his death. The monkey is a symbol of a powerful bond that shaped my life forever, a reminder of a good father who gave me the ability to find the “funny” in the journey, the vicissitudes of life as he would say.
I think he would approve of my working with a dog like Spike at my side. Daddy always loved his hunting dogs who never could hunt because they lived a life of luxury sprawled on a sofa next to him in an air conditioned home.
I understand now that not everyone had the loving, yet dysfunctional, family I had growing up; but I’ve had a monkey in my office for nearly fifty years that makes me smile on a rainy night in South Carolina when I remember the man and that Christmas.
Spike and I feel better.
I'll Call It Like I See It 
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