A Crock Full

     In the living room, on the floor, sits a large crock-like bowl. I have no idea where it came from but I'm sure it is quite old.  It has probably seen days of warm weather picnics with its interior filled to the brim with potato salad or fried chicken.  It could tell many a tale of years gone by.  Days before cell phones and the internet, perhaps even before telephones were a household staple.

     The only time I can recall using the bowl was to hold some lovely colorful cloth napkins that I thought were a good, "green", idea.  I rolled them into neat little bundles and placed them into the bowl and then it sat in the middle of the table.  Since everyone preferred paper napkins the cloth ones went untouched.  When they began to gather dust, I put them in a drawer and placed the large crock-like bowl back in the cabinet.

     The bowl now has a new function.  It has become a toy chest of sorts.  Not the kind that holds children's toys, there is a large wooden chest on the other side of the room for that purpose, but the kind that holds dog toys.

     I was going to use a pretty wicker basket for this purpose but it did not take long for me to remember that a wicker basket would not survive the jaws of the chew monster that now lives in this house.  Runtly, our new Jack Russell Terrier, could easily chew up a steel anvil.

     Every evening, I pick up all the doggy toys and place them in the bowl.  My goal is to teach Runtly this trick.  Every morning, Runtly slowly and methodically takes each one out and packs it to the office to place them in front of the heat register.  Just like a child, he plays only a short time with whatever item he has selected before going to retrieve the next.  

     When the bowl is empty, except for the small slick plastic ball, which is much more fun to chase around in the nearly empty bowl, Runtly takes a nap, toys strewn hither and yon.

     Teaching Runtly to pick up his toys should be interesting.  I wonder if he will get "rubber legs" like the kids would do when they were 'forced' to pick up.

     Most parents would probably agree that when our children were young, we wondered if we would ever get to use the bathroom by ourselves again.  I'm wondering that again too.