The Ones That Keep Us Going

If you ever wonder how two hermit creative folks who work from home manage to stay on any kind of schedule, the answer isn't discipline. It's not a planner or an alarm clock although we use those too. It's three animals who have absolutely no respect for creative flow and every right to interrupt it.

Their names are Marvelous, Amara, and Zeus and they run our house.

Marvelous is my ragdoll cat and my emotional support animal. If you've never met a ragdoll, imagine a cat who was designed by someone who wanted a dog but got outvoted. She's SUPER soft, she's dramatic and adorable, and she has a gift for choosing the most important moment of your creative process to flop across your workspace and demand attention. My laptop is her favorite nap spot.

She's also the one who reminds me to stop. When I've been writing too long, painting too long, staring at a screen too long, Marvelous shows up and puts herself between me and the work. She doesn't ask. She just arrives, and suddenly I'm petting a cat instead of grinding through another hour. She's not interrupting — she's intervening. She knows before I do when I need to come back to my body and just breathe for a minute.

As you can tell by the picture for the post of her in my camping chair she knows how to get your attentiona and make you smile and that's her teaching me something. That's her saying "this is how you rest. Watch me and learn."

Amara is Joe's ESA — a chihuahua, pomeranian, bichon frise mix who is small in size and enormous in personality. She is Joe's shadow, his constant companion, and the tiny heartbeat that keeps him grounded when his world gets heavy. Where Joe goes, Amara goes. If he's at his desk building a game, she's in his lap or curled at his feet. If he moves to the couch, she's already there before he sits down, like she teleported.

Amara is also our unofficial alarm clock. She doesn't care what you're working on. She doesn't care if you're in the middle of a breakthrough. If it's time to eat, it's time to eat, and she will let you know with the kind of quiet persistence that only a tiny dog can pull off. She won't bark — she'll just stare at you and nibble at your feet until the guilt becomes unbearable and you get up and feed her. And then, because you're already up, you realize you haven't eaten either. And that's how a 13-pound dog keeps two grown adults from forgetting to take care of themselves.

She keeps Joe on a rhythm when his brain wants to work through everything without stopping. She's the pause button he didn't know he needed.

Zeus is our big boy — and he is supposed to be a service dog. I want to be clear about that. He was supposed to be a service dog. He had one job. But Zeus looked at the job description and decided he'd rather be a pet, and honestly, we can't even be mad about it because he's so good at being a pet that it feels like that was the plan all along.

Zeus is the one who makes sure we go outside. Not because he's trained to — because he has to pee and he's big enough that ignoring him isn't an option. So three, four, five times a day, no matter what's happening creatively, someone has to get up, walk to the door, and stand outside for a few minutes while Zeus takes his time investigating every blade of grass like it contains classified information. And those few minutes outside — the fresh air, the sky, the pause in whatever we were doing — are some of the most important minutes of the day. We'd never take them on our own. Zeus makes us.

He's also the warmth in the room. He'll lay next to you on the couch or wherever we are. He'll be there. Not asking for anything, not performing, just existing nearby in a way that makes everything feel safer. When the world gets loud or the work gets heavy or the day just isn't cooperating, Zeus is the steady, warm presence that reminds you everything is okay right now, in this moment, on this couch, with this dog.

Together, the three of them are our schedule.

Marvelous tells us when to stop. Amara tells us when to eat. Zeus tells us when to go outside. We didn't plan it that way — they just divided the responsibilities among themselves like a tiny, furry management team that we never hired and can't fire.

Joe and I could easily disappear into our work. We're both that kind of person — the kind who starts something at noon and looks up and it's 2 a.m. and we forgot to eat dinner. The kind who would sit in. the same chair for eight hours if nobody interrupted. The kind who needs someone to say "hey, you're a human, act like one for a minute."

That's what the animals do. They keep us human. They pull us out of our heads and back into our bodies. They remind us that the work will be there in an hour, but right now there's a dog who needs to go outside, a cat who needs to be held, and a tiny chihuahua mix who is staring at you because the food bowl has been empty for eleven minutes and that is unacceptable.

We build things — books, letters, music, games, whole imaginary futures. But the animals don't care about any of that. They care about now. They care about the attention, the meal, the nap, the warm spot on the bed. And in a house full of dreamers and creators, that grounding is the most important thing anyone contributes.

Marvelous, Amara, and Zeus don't know they're part of a creative process. They just know they're loved, and they love us back. Now the animals would like their breakfast so until next time we are sending good vibes to your family and especially to the 4 legged members because they really do keep us going.

— Alisha, Joe, Marvelous, Amara, & Zeus The Lewis Family