I have lots of voice memos that I plan to do something with, and then I do nothing with them. But this is one I am actually using. I am recording it on my morning walk with Maui. It follows my first night sleeping in my new house here in Nardò.

Right now, it’s just my dog and me on our morning walk.

He is my companion. There are lots of things I could say about him, mostly that he’s a big lump. It’s silly, really. He knocks things over because he doesn’t seem to have any awareness of his own size. He sheds far too much hair. I spend minutes every day—actual minutes of my life—just vacuuming up after him.

It pisses me off. And yet, withal, here we are. Never mind the shedding. We are Walking.

And what does he do? He just lives. Give me a car, give me a tree, give me somewhere to pee, and I’m happy. That’s his philosophy. He loves the walk. He gets out of the house, and he just finds every smell compelling. He keeps walking and walking. And now we’re here, basically, in a field between a vineyard and an olive grove. And he’s eating grass. I read somewhere that dogs eat grass, and they can’t really do anything with it. They don’t digest it well. But apparently—I don’t know—it seems to help them. Maybe we could research that later. Is there a thing about dogs and grass? Who knows.

Anyway, the point is: here is the dog. The dog’s life is just getting up in the morning and getting some water. Suffering the heat or the cold—and it feels cold now that we have acclimatised to those hot summer temperatures. Going for a walk. He is never trying to control a damn thing. No strategising. He just takes it moment by moment. Day by day. His happiness is all included in those moments. He’s not lying around worrying about what tomorrow brings or what he did a minute ago.