MEET MYLO!
Mylo is a 4 year old shih tzu and one of the most laid back dogs I’ve ever met… I suppose ‘laid back’ is a fancy word for lazy sometimes but that’s part of his charm. He enjoys sox, pizza crusts and his stuffed tiger Chester.
Little Mylo has a very strict routine in the morning. We both get out of bed around 9 and head out to the living room. I usually turn on the computer and Mylo heads straight for his ‘living room bed’ to sleep.
About an hour later he’ll get up, stretch, eat a little and take his place on the window sill. We are over 30 stories above the ground so he just looks at the water most of the time.
After our morning walk and some food, I get started on whatever project I want to tackle that day. Sometimes it’s a new blog post or a Photoshop project. But something funny happens to Mylo when I sit down to write screenplays.
This is the exact look I get when I’m about to start writing. He stares. He sniffs and he moves around my chair until I pick him up. He doesn’t stop.
“Ahem… We both know I’m not going anywhere so pick me up and let’s get going.”
Once he’s on my lap he immediately lays down. To be honest, I think he just likes laying there because he knows I’ll be sitting still for a while. It’s been like this for years. Just about every page I’ve written has been with Mylo resting on my lap looking up at me every once in a while.
Most recently, I’ve been working on a fairly emotional and personal screenplay. I tend to get upset while I’m writing it and constantly speak dialogue out loud. We all know dogs are perceptive and when I’m genuinely angry about a scene, (or the inspiration behind it) Mylo does everything he can to try and cheer me up. He sits up and climbs as high as he can. He looks me right in the eyes wiggling his tail back and forth.
“You’re upset. What can I do? How’s the scene shaping up?”
In this way, he’s become my emotional barometer. If he sits up, I know what I’m writing is truly honest. Little Mylo sitting on my lap when I write is part of my comfort zone now. I find it amazing that he only wants to sit on my lap when I write screenplays. How does he know?!
I love that dog.
