Katy-the-Wonder-Dog’s bladder still hasn’t learned to wake up an hour later on Saturday morning to let me sleep in one day a week, but today that was okay. I was trying to sneak out for an early morning writing session at my favorite cafe and was running around the house like a silent thief as I popped my iPad into my purse full of glasses (a pair for reading, a pair for driving, a pair for drawing). And there, as I as ready to sneak out, was Katy, wagging her tail, letting me know she was crossing her legs and that there were deer in the meadow across the way that needed barking at.
I set down my bag and got a good hold on her collar before opening the door and trotting out to her line. Katy wagged her tail when she heard the clicking sound of the clip and looked up at me for a quick neck rub. I petted and rubbed while she wagged and slobbered for a minute, and then I remembered I needed a sketch pad.
“I’ll be back in a few minutes,” I told her and went back into the house, wiping doggie slobber off of what I just realized was my bare leg.
I wish I could say this was my first streaking adventure, but when we first moved to Vermont (a full decade before Google Earth came along), we quickly learned to appreciate certain aspects of country life. The solitude. The privacy. The freedom to make a mad dash to the laundry line for the work shirt you forgot to bring in the night before and only remembered after you were “ready” to step in the shower. We’ve even taken advantage of a good rainstorm to get a ‘natural’ shower or two.
The proliferation of the knowledge that “we are being watched” by the tech gods in the sky – all the time – has tempered my high-velocity nudism, but sometimes it’s too easy to bask in convenience and imagined privacy. Sometimes I just want to enjoy the privileges that come with being surrounded by acres of forest. Even if it means risking a broken lense on a satellite camera.
Now,two feet from the door, in the almost-altogether (I’d remembered to pull on my sweats earlier apparently), I raised my eyes to the heavens, silently imploring Google Satellite to stick to its policy of blurring details on the ground in order to spare America the image of an inadvertent exercise privacy run amok.
