Courage

Watching Lizzy run the length of our backyard at full speed is hilarious, a hilarity that gets brought up a notch when, at the end of the yard, on the other side of the fence, there are three deer who remain basically undisturbed by Lizzy's dramatic approach.

Lizzy barks, play bows and manically wags her tail, and scratches the ground with her hind legs in her "I'm an Alpha!" pose, all to no avail. The deer don't budge. In fact, the biggest deer, the one who seems to be the doe that leads the two young fawns, paws at the ground herself with her right foot, as if saying: "Bring it on, little shit of a dog! Come out here and I'll smash your brains with my hooves just for fun!"

I have to admire Lizzy's courage, her unflappable ability to face any of life's challenges (the possible invasion by Amish horses; the three-times-her-weight almost daily rough and tumble with Pepper, her best friend; the little terrier on the TV show that lead her to run around the house several times, barking, baffled that she couldn't find that other barking dog).

That's courage I admire. The ability to roll with the punches, so to speak, to not make a tragedy out of every setback but to turn lemons into lemonade or, alternatively, to suck those lemons with defiance.

"I want to be the angel with the flaming sword," I told a student once during a conversation about ethics and the choices we make in our lives. These days, that's one of my goals. I want to continue to cultivate courage and strength and the determination to change this world, purposefully, for the better.

Once someone compared me to a chihuahua because of how anxious I get. Perhaps. But I'd like to I think that if I'm a chihuahua it's because they're fearless little dogs (and Latin@, to boot!). I aim to be like Lizzy, fearless.