Two Preparations

The air changes before anything else. The door opens at the same hour as yesterday, and the back of the hand knows first.

The dog knew days ago. Under the blanket at the end of the sofa a little earlier each evening, and at night a shift of place, the body curled tighter.

The Italian Greyhound has no undercoat. Skin sits directly beneath a short single coat, and beneath that, almost no fat. The chest is deep and narrow, the legs long. It is a body with a wide surface for its volume, and a wide surface is a wide door for heat.

So this body cools across the trunk. Shoulder to loin is one continuous plane. Going under the blanket is not a habit. It is a way of making that plane smaller.

A person cools differently. As the temperature drops, peripheral vessels narrow, and the body gives up its ends to protect the core. Fingers, toes, ears. It is why a morning can leave you warm everywhere but the feet.

One cools as a plane, the other from the ends. Two bodies pass through the same season differently.

What each needs is different too. For the dog, one unbroken layer from shoulder to loin — covering that plane without gripping the neck or catching the forelegs. For the person, covering the ends. The feet, and the head.

Before the door opens, there are two preparations. One covers the body, the other the ends.