MOUNTAIN COMPANIONS
“How do dogs help us connect with mountains? Are they guides, rescuers, climbing partners or avatars for our disconnected selves?”
I HAVE BEEN RUNNING for a long time. Unravelling a spool of breath. I’ve not lived here long enough to know the landscape by name, but I’ve found a tarn, a frozen rut of track, the place where a stream used to be.
All the time, the lean dog runs ahead of me. I can’t call her mine, not yet. She is the colour of musical notation. Something about her body makes me think of a harp. Perhaps it’s the broad curve of her chest, its half-wing shape. Or the way her legs grasp up the path like quick fingers, fingers plucking at strings.
Sometimes I whistle out her name and she comes back to me for a moment. Bell. It is a high, thin sound. A clear thought. We reach the plateau and the way curves back down into Grasmere. Everything is visible for a moment. Everything is open, white and pale grey. And then she is gone.
‘I like to run’
A whippet is built to run. Not far, but fast. Its heart is large and slow-beating,
