Tuesday, March 30, 2010
Thank You
I am so thankful for all of my good friends and family. You guys are the best! Thank you for not making me talk about this. Thank you for sending me funny videos to watch, silly jokes to read, and games to play. I appreciate the mental distractions. Even if you didn't know what was going on, or why I needed the smiles, thanks for sending them my way. You are truly an answer to my prayers. Love you!!
Sunday, March 28, 2010
Some Days Just Suck
There are days when what I think is not something I want to share. I've been told that my blog is only the "nice" side of me, not the real picture. I guess that's true. My momma taught me that if I can't say something nice, I shouldn't say anything at all. I suppose my blog is a good example of that. So, when I'm silent you can assume that I am either too busy, or I have nothing nice to say. Most of the time I'm just busy. I have ideas of things I want to write, but not the time to post them. The last few days, well, it's been the latter. This is not a nice story. Frankly, it sucks.
Writing is good therapy for me. It helps me sort out my thoughts. I type a line, then delete. Try it again another way, with slightly different words, backspace again, until the words match my thoughts. Sometimes once I get the words out I decide I don't feel that way anymore and I delete them for good. Sometimes the point I get too seems so pathetic, even to me, that I don't want to save it and ever remember feeling that way. More often, my writing and self editing bring me focus. (See, just there I started to write "more concise ...." which wasn't exactly it, so I backspaced to the point that it was right, and tried again. Now, maybe I should just go delete it all.) So, for today, for this post, I'm going to let down the guard, and let you in. I'm not feeling very nice things right now, and I need to write. I'm going to ramble on the way I normally would in private and post it here. Not to worry, it's just an experiment, next post I promise I will be back to my nice self. It might be a few days, or even longer, before I am up to writing something good for public consumption again. Maybe I will just post pretty pictures to quickly move this thing off the top of the page. I'm sure no one will want to read my rambling crap more than once, if that. Just for the sake of this experiment, please ignore any grammar errors. I'm going for honest tonight, not the "A+" with a gold star.
So, you all know that in the last year and a few months we went from no dogs to three dogs. Carl and I had a dog 18 years ago, but none since. So, we weren't 1st time dog owners, but pretty dang close to it. We were certainly out of practice at it all. It started in January with Chester, who was a puppy we got from friends who discovered they weren't 'dog people'. In March, after a string of robberiess in our carport and yard, we got Charlie to guard our house. He was offered on Craiglist inexpensively, and seemed the perfect fit. I really don't want to write about this - I feel sick to my stomach right now just thinking about it. Somehow I have to let it go, and I can't bare the thought of telling this story again, live and in person to another soul, so I supposed getting it all out here and now is a good idea, as much as I'd rather just go play scrabble and pretend everything is fine. It's not fine. My heart is broken and I feel terrible.
Yesterday I had to take him to the Humane Society and they put him to sleep. There, I said it. It's ugly isn't it? It just isn't right. It's one of those things that should never, ever, ever have to happen, but it did and it sucks and I feel like crap about it. When we adopted him, his previous owner said that he was getting rid of him because he had moved to a tiny studio in town and just couldn't keep him there. Charlie is a lab/pit bull mix and wasn't a huge dog, but certainly not a dog that could be happy living in a tiny condo. Anyway, he promised vet records, but never delivered. He had hives and other skin junk going on. We took him to the vet, got him well, and started living with our 2 dogs. (Shuggie, otherwise known as Little, showed up a few months later, starving and neglected.) He was so anxious. That's an understatement. He was riddled with anxiety and fear is probably more accurate. One neighbor made him especially crazy. Eventually he and the neighbor had an altercation, and the man was bit. It could have been a lot worse, but it was not good. There were other incidents, and the aggression was unpredictable. I read all of Cesar's books, and employed his methods. They seemed to help, but even then, there was no real rhyme or reason to the outbursts. I really hate admitting this. I don't like to fail. It feels like we failed Charlie. I would much rather tell a success story, or just keep my mouth shut. Anyway, we tried and tried, and I think Carl said it best, "That dog is just slightly unhinged." Last week we had house guests and he was not well behaved. Some of the things he did had me worried and he spent some serious time in the garage away from the guests because of it. The other night, Quincie and her friend were just heading out to walk all the dogs when Charlie saw our neighbor (not the same neighbor that he bit, this was someone else. The neighbor that made him go nuts was at our old house.)and his boxer puppy walking down the block. The other dog was with his owner, on a leash. Charlie went crazy, pulled away from Quincie and went on the attack. The man was understandably angry, yelled at her, and took his dog home. Later that night I went over and spoke with him. He is a nice guy. We are very lucky.
I guess you could say that was the last straw. We had to do something. Everyday we were taking a chance that he would hurt someone seriously, and that would be terrible, so irresponsible, especially when we knew, we knew he was unhinged and very strong and just not predictable. While evaluating him, worker at the humane society discovered that he had a micro chip. That micro chip had his original owners name and phone number on it. At that point, that person was considered his legal owner, and would have final say on his fate. They spoke to her, and the end was determined. Apparently we were not his 2nd owners, but at least the 3rd. He had a history of similar problems in his short 2 and half years of life. I can't go through all the details of the story from here. My mind just won't let me. The conversations that led to the ultimate decision, the prayers, the pleas, the ideas that were considered and rejected, all of that, is just too agonizing to hash over. I have to let it go or it will consume me. I can say this, and hopefully sum it all up, and you can get a glimpse of the pain from a far enough distance that it doesn't rub off on you: Sometimes, doing the right thing feels so terribly, horribly wrong, that you second guess your decision every fragment of each moment all along the way. Sometimes what you have to do goes against every natural fiber of who you are. Sometimes your heart breaks and sometimes you need something, or someone, outside of yourself to hold you up, and help you go on. Some days just suck. I'm so grateful that Ryker was there with me. As much as I wish I could have spared him that pain, rather than shared it with him, I am grateful that I was not alone. He is a very special person, and I am so privileged to be his mother. As a mother, as a friend, as just me, I would like to shield everyone from the ugliness of the world, and take it all on myself if it would keep it off those I love.
I suppose that's why my blog is usually just "nice". The world is full of days like yesterday for all of us. I don't even want to HAVE days like yesterday, and I certainly don't want to SHARE them with others and spread the unhappiness. I'm not even sure I'm going to share what I have written tonight. If you see it now, and it is gone later, you will know I took it down. It doesn't seem fair to pass on all this sadness. Some may say, "Come on Wendy, he was just a dog." But to me, a life is a life and love is love, and damn it, I love Charlie and his life was sacred. I feel terrible that he trusted me and I led him to his death. I do take comfort knowing that we gave him a happy home for a year, and that we really did love him and tried our best to help him. The employees working there yesterday are special people. They were kind, supportive, helpful and went beyond professional courtesy. I am grateful for their goodness and that Charlie's last moments were not in a scary negative place.
It's been a sad couple of days in our house. If we are not ourselves, now you know why. We are sad. We had to do a hard, hard, hard thing. We miss our dog.
Writing is good therapy for me. It helps me sort out my thoughts. I type a line, then delete. Try it again another way, with slightly different words, backspace again, until the words match my thoughts. Sometimes once I get the words out I decide I don't feel that way anymore and I delete them for good. Sometimes the point I get too seems so pathetic, even to me, that I don't want to save it and ever remember feeling that way. More often, my writing and self editing bring me focus. (See, just there I started to write "more concise ...." which wasn't exactly it, so I backspaced to the point that it was right, and tried again. Now, maybe I should just go delete it all.) So, for today, for this post, I'm going to let down the guard, and let you in. I'm not feeling very nice things right now, and I need to write. I'm going to ramble on the way I normally would in private and post it here. Not to worry, it's just an experiment, next post I promise I will be back to my nice self. It might be a few days, or even longer, before I am up to writing something good for public consumption again. Maybe I will just post pretty pictures to quickly move this thing off the top of the page. I'm sure no one will want to read my rambling crap more than once, if that. Just for the sake of this experiment, please ignore any grammar errors. I'm going for honest tonight, not the "A+" with a gold star.
So, you all know that in the last year and a few months we went from no dogs to three dogs. Carl and I had a dog 18 years ago, but none since. So, we weren't 1st time dog owners, but pretty dang close to it. We were certainly out of practice at it all. It started in January with Chester, who was a puppy we got from friends who discovered they weren't 'dog people'. In March, after a string of robberiess in our carport and yard, we got Charlie to guard our house. He was offered on Craiglist inexpensively, and seemed the perfect fit. I really don't want to write about this - I feel sick to my stomach right now just thinking about it. Somehow I have to let it go, and I can't bare the thought of telling this story again, live and in person to another soul, so I supposed getting it all out here and now is a good idea, as much as I'd rather just go play scrabble and pretend everything is fine. It's not fine. My heart is broken and I feel terrible.
Yesterday I had to take him to the Humane Society and they put him to sleep. There, I said it. It's ugly isn't it? It just isn't right. It's one of those things that should never, ever, ever have to happen, but it did and it sucks and I feel like crap about it. When we adopted him, his previous owner said that he was getting rid of him because he had moved to a tiny studio in town and just couldn't keep him there. Charlie is a lab/pit bull mix and wasn't a huge dog, but certainly not a dog that could be happy living in a tiny condo. Anyway, he promised vet records, but never delivered. He had hives and other skin junk going on. We took him to the vet, got him well, and started living with our 2 dogs. (Shuggie, otherwise known as Little, showed up a few months later, starving and neglected.) He was so anxious. That's an understatement. He was riddled with anxiety and fear is probably more accurate. One neighbor made him especially crazy. Eventually he and the neighbor had an altercation, and the man was bit. It could have been a lot worse, but it was not good. There were other incidents, and the aggression was unpredictable. I read all of Cesar's books, and employed his methods. They seemed to help, but even then, there was no real rhyme or reason to the outbursts. I really hate admitting this. I don't like to fail. It feels like we failed Charlie. I would much rather tell a success story, or just keep my mouth shut. Anyway, we tried and tried, and I think Carl said it best, "That dog is just slightly unhinged." Last week we had house guests and he was not well behaved. Some of the things he did had me worried and he spent some serious time in the garage away from the guests because of it. The other night, Quincie and her friend were just heading out to walk all the dogs when Charlie saw our neighbor (not the same neighbor that he bit, this was someone else. The neighbor that made him go nuts was at our old house.)and his boxer puppy walking down the block. The other dog was with his owner, on a leash. Charlie went crazy, pulled away from Quincie and went on the attack. The man was understandably angry, yelled at her, and took his dog home. Later that night I went over and spoke with him. He is a nice guy. We are very lucky.
I guess you could say that was the last straw. We had to do something. Everyday we were taking a chance that he would hurt someone seriously, and that would be terrible, so irresponsible, especially when we knew, we knew he was unhinged and very strong and just not predictable. While evaluating him, worker at the humane society discovered that he had a micro chip. That micro chip had his original owners name and phone number on it. At that point, that person was considered his legal owner, and would have final say on his fate. They spoke to her, and the end was determined. Apparently we were not his 2nd owners, but at least the 3rd. He had a history of similar problems in his short 2 and half years of life. I can't go through all the details of the story from here. My mind just won't let me. The conversations that led to the ultimate decision, the prayers, the pleas, the ideas that were considered and rejected, all of that, is just too agonizing to hash over. I have to let it go or it will consume me. I can say this, and hopefully sum it all up, and you can get a glimpse of the pain from a far enough distance that it doesn't rub off on you: Sometimes, doing the right thing feels so terribly, horribly wrong, that you second guess your decision every fragment of each moment all along the way. Sometimes what you have to do goes against every natural fiber of who you are. Sometimes your heart breaks and sometimes you need something, or someone, outside of yourself to hold you up, and help you go on. Some days just suck. I'm so grateful that Ryker was there with me. As much as I wish I could have spared him that pain, rather than shared it with him, I am grateful that I was not alone. He is a very special person, and I am so privileged to be his mother. As a mother, as a friend, as just me, I would like to shield everyone from the ugliness of the world, and take it all on myself if it would keep it off those I love.
I suppose that's why my blog is usually just "nice". The world is full of days like yesterday for all of us. I don't even want to HAVE days like yesterday, and I certainly don't want to SHARE them with others and spread the unhappiness. I'm not even sure I'm going to share what I have written tonight. If you see it now, and it is gone later, you will know I took it down. It doesn't seem fair to pass on all this sadness. Some may say, "Come on Wendy, he was just a dog." But to me, a life is a life and love is love, and damn it, I love Charlie and his life was sacred. I feel terrible that he trusted me and I led him to his death. I do take comfort knowing that we gave him a happy home for a year, and that we really did love him and tried our best to help him. The employees working there yesterday are special people. They were kind, supportive, helpful and went beyond professional courtesy. I am grateful for their goodness and that Charlie's last moments were not in a scary negative place.
It's been a sad couple of days in our house. If we are not ourselves, now you know why. We are sad. We had to do a hard, hard, hard thing. We miss our dog.
Thursday, March 25, 2010
Trees
After days of fun and sun I woke up to pouring rain this morning. The usual walk was postponed until this afternoon. Rain or shine, the beasts and I needed exercise. The beauty of the park and the endorphins from running never fail to lift my mood. I can't share the good brain chemicals, but I can share these photos.
(This is the entrance to the park from the road.)
Today it rained a little and I saw an awesome rainbow. I left my phone in my pocket during the rain, so sorry, no photo of that, but trust me, it was great! The dogs didn't notice the rainbow, but they paid particular attention to the fisherman, a dead lizard, 2 teenagers making out, a few wild cats, a kid on his bike and about 20 mongoose.
Wednesday, March 24, 2010
Waimea Falls
Here it is with and without our smiling faces. We walked up the path to the waterfall and swam. The water is deep and COLD! What a fun day!
Sunday, March 14, 2010
Picture of the Future
The other day I was looking through my Google Docs for an image I thought I saved a long time ago. In the process I stopped to read things I wrote years ago, mostly notes I took while reading various books, like The Secret, and Psycho-psybernetics, etc. It's kind of amazing to look back and see the progression of life. Many of the things I wrote out as "wish lists" are now reality. Some goals have been achieved and some have changed. One of the documents I found was entitled, "picture of the future". I was all ready to see the evidence of the power of intention, but when I opened it, it was entirely blank - just the title. That blank page made me laugh.
And then it made me think. Our future is not predetermined. It is not written on a page somewhere, waiting for time to pass as each thing on that page is fulfilled. Our futures are blank, until we live them. It is up to us each day to create our future, shape our lives, and bring our dreams into being. The picture of my future is blank, until I choose to write upon it and call my dreams into reality by my thoughts and my actions.
The future is ours to create each day. The page is blank. How will you fill your page today?
And then it made me think. Our future is not predetermined. It is not written on a page somewhere, waiting for time to pass as each thing on that page is fulfilled. Our futures are blank, until we live them. It is up to us each day to create our future, shape our lives, and bring our dreams into being. The picture of my future is blank, until I choose to write upon it and call my dreams into reality by my thoughts and my actions.
The future is ours to create each day. The page is blank. How will you fill your page today?
Friday, March 5, 2010
It's a Whole New World
I love my new house! It has a dishwasher!! Woo Hoo!! I know Quincie shares my enthusiasm for this magical device. Doing dishes by hand in a shallow, single sink with a crappy plastic tub for the last few years taught me a great lesson - dishwashers rock!! There is nothing like a load of steaming hot dishes that you KNOW are actually CLEAN! The rest of the new kitchen is awesome as well - tons of cabinets and counter space and a nice new fridge!
I took a bath for the first time in years the other day. I can't decide which is more exciting, the bathtubs or the dishwasher. That's right, I said bathtubS, with an S. There are 2 bathrooms in this house, which is pretty dang wonderful. The four of us have been sharing one closet sized bathroom with a shower stall the size of a coffin. Someone was always in that shower when you had to pee. Conversely, taking a complete shower without a desperate knock on the door was rare. I would post a photo of it here, but I didn't take any. It wasn't a pretty picture.
There are many more great and wonderful things about this new house, but those are the highlights.
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