The End of a Chapter

Spice and Easy

No melodrama.

No comments of what a great thing I did - no. It was my privilege.

I guess ten years ago, Carolyn and Greg asked me to be named in their will with two of their other friends to be responsible for placing their dogs should something happen to both of them. Sure I would and I was honored. I barely knew the other two friends at that point.

We never dreamed... Greg and Carolyn were my age. We were young.

A month before she died, Carolyn said she was just worried about her eldest two, Easy and Spice. They were old and had been together since birth. Easy had thyroid cancer and wasn't expected to live much longer. Could they stay with me when she - Carolyn - was gone? She just needed to know where they'd be.

Of course.

Easy wasn't expected to live beyond January of 2009. Spice on the other hand would be typical of Wistwind dogs and live well into her teens - fifteen, sixteen, even seventeen. But Spice got her own brain cancer, just like Carolyn, and suddenly she was gone.

That was purely awful. I mourned the loss of Carolyn and Greg afresh. And Spice, oh God had not made a sweeter being.

Easy kept right on. He slept on our bed. He played with squeak toys like a rowdy puppy. He rolled and rolled and rolled in the grass. He never felt bad, though his tumor kept growing.

I am saving up for a small used motor home. I want to take all the dogs when we go to dog shows. It is physically painful to leave the old dogs at home, but around here it's too hot for them even with the van tarped, and it's no fun for old dogs in a hotel room.

Last weekend I went on a long awaited trip to Minnesota. I picked up Crystal who had gone to Sweden with me and we talked and talked. I got to see my dear, wonderful friend Laurie (who takes these magical photos) in person - we talk on the phone every day. And I got to see Sam I Am's brother Rivet, and Lindy Loo's sister Simmer who live with Laurie. I got to see Laurie's 89 year old dad, with whom I am a little bit in love.

And we showed in a big giant Whippet show. Swede William was a star and a half and finished his Championship with a huge win: a five point major, which is as big as they come. But that was Saturday.

On Friday, Swede William was Reserve. It's an honor to be Reserve at a Specialty (it means next best, almost, dang close but no cigar), and I was thrilled. See, Swede William's color is very common in Europe, but not in this country. It's all due to silly fashion and prejudice. (The written whippet standard says famously, "Color is immaterial".)

Out of sixty-six whippets, Swede William was the ONLY blue fawn. So he has to be extra good and he was oh boy was he!

When I got done showing on Friday, I saw there was a message on my phone from Bill. Bill does not call me during the day at a dog show and my heart stiffened. I thought oh no Mama Pajama or Fat Charlie. I wished my heart would beat again because I didn't have any air.

I called Bill.

Easy? No! Easy? How? He had taken his walk in the morning, barked at a Stupid City Squirrel, wolfed down his breakfast of Cheerios, Grapenuts and yogurt and rolled in the yard. And he had had a grand mal seizure.

I bawled then when Bill told me. Bill had never had to take a dog in for that; he's a gentle soul and that is my responsibility. Easy was still groggy from the seizure and in fact was starting to seize again. So he was not a bit worried which was a blessing. There was no decision to make. But still. I wasn't there. I was at a dog show in Minnesota in my van with my very good friends and all those losses: Greg, Carolyn, Giacomino, Spice, then Martha, and now Easy. Woo-wee it was loud for a little bit, I sort of keened. I sort of forgot where I was; and luckily I was not ringside, but down by a kind soul's motorhome.

Arms were hugging me. They had all been there. They understood. But I got a grip.

Then Saturday morning Swede William won and that was all he needed to finish his championship. I have fun showing dogs, and I think it's important to be an ethical breeder. How horrid would it be to not have any whippets, or wire fox terriers, or collies, or papillons? But I don't live and breathe for championships. It's fun and a thrill and a challenge.

Well, when I was standing with Swede William, waiting for his Winners Dog ribbon, the dam broke. Maybe it was my imagination - of course it was - but I had this overwhelming sense of Carolyn's presence. Like she was right in front of me smiling, and Greg was sitting in his fold up chair, smiling too.

Here came the tears! Big snotty ones that aren't a bit pretty. What did everyone think? People didn't know about Easy, except for Laurie and Crystal and the motorhome friend. There I am standing with my dog who just had a big giant win for which I can take no credit (Lisa in Sweden, his breeder, gets all of that) and I'm just a-bawling snot bubbles. And there was Carolyn with a big grin. Just all around me.

Every time I looked at Easy I saw Carolyn. I often saw Greg and Spice, too, but every time I saw Carolyn. I think after you're dead that there are more important things than dog shows. Maybe Carolyn's presence had nothing at all to do with Swede William's win. Maybe I was finally saying goodbye.

Like I've closed the cover of a good book, hating to leave the characters. Knowing they'll stay with me, but not be a part of my every day anymore.

Carolyn and Greg

It was a great long friendship, and I've been much luckier than I deserved.

hug your hounds and your friends

Easy and Spice

Easy

Spice

It give me the greatest pleasure, Dear Readers, to introduce you to Easy and Spice. Easy is officially Wistwind's Easy Livin CD, ARX, CR, LCM, CanFCh, TRP, CGC, AV. (When a dog has that many titles, we call it alphabet soup!) Spice is Wistwind's Spice Twice, FCh, TRP. I think that she has her Canadian Field Championship, too. And she might have her Lure Courser of Merit (LCM), but I'm not sure.

They were born on October 29, 1997. And, as you know, they were bred and loved and treasured by my friends Greg and Carolyn Mountan, both of whom recently passed away.

So Spice and Easy now live at our house.

The blending of the canine family has been as smooth as the skin on a baby whippet belly. (That's smooth!) I can't imagine - still - what the last year was like for these two eleven and a half year old siblings. Though their tails wagged and they sat on laps and begged at the dinner table during their first week here, they also had moments of looking lost. They stayed right next to me. Spice tried to bury some of her food instead of eating. If I moved while they were napping, they jumped right up. Wagging, but a little worried.

I must brag a bit on the Warburton Waggle. They have been so generous and gracious! No arguments over toys, treats, beds, couches, anything. Easy and Spice were very close to Greg as well as Carolyn, and they want to snuggle with Bill, especially Spice. Delia has shared her personal manservant. And even her chair! Amazing.

Spice in Delia's chair!

Now, after onlytwelve days, Spice is eating all her food. Easy has a favorite stuffie squirrel. Yesterday he was bouncing around the yard with it, Tigger style. Shaking it dead, tossing it in the air and pouncing on it, bucking up and down. Wagging and rahring. My heart was beaming so hard, I think the rays must have shot out of my butt and toes and nose and hairs. And oh how those two enjoy their city walks! They come and tell me if I'm tardy.

They're no longer glued to me. The curl up with their new housemates on couches and beds. If I'm doing something boring downstairs they'll go on upstairs and claim the prime spots. They are settling in.

Easy and Sam I Am

But I can't call them my dogs. Even though I love them as such, when people say, "Are these your new dogs?" I say, "They are my friends' dogs. They've come to stay with us."

And that's just it: Easy and Spice will forever be Greg and Carolyn's dogs. I simply have the lovely privilege of taking care of them for a while.

hug your hounds

We're Home/Thank You/Figuring Things Out - part 3

I woke up Sunday morning knowing what I had to do, but not accepting it. It wasn't light out, and one southern mocking bird was singing away in the dark at the top of his lungs, as if life were something to sing about. Giacomino was curled up against me and Bill was awake. Both of us were crying.

I got to talk to my sister. They extubated her in the afternoon. I talked to the ICU nurse. Martha's pain was well controlled by the morphine drip. I'm coming, I said. I don't know when yet, but I'm coming. "Okie dokie," Martha said in a hoarse whisper. That morphine is good stuff.
My friend, Swede William's dear breeder Lisa in Sweden called. She listened to me ramble. And then she echoed Bill's exact words: "A week, a month, a day means nothing to a dog. It means everything to us, but nothing to a dog. Do not wait too late. That is where we can be cruel; that is where we can be selfish." Words I myself had spoken in the past to another dear friend.

We had a lovely walk around the block in the warm sun. He started to fall several times but I caught him. It didn't dampen his enthusiasm. I spent the day scanning photos. Oh and Lisa in Sweden had reminded me that I needed to trim William's neck fuzz for the National. This is not an activity to attempt through swollen tears, I later realized. I thought I had done a fine job. William's neck looked like he had encountered a maniacal, fuzz buzzing, fur-craving beaver badly in need of orthodontia.


I can't go into the next hours, except to say that I am blessed with the most wonderful, compassionate vets in the world. When I left them, something snapped in me on the forty minute drive to the crematorium. On the way there, I started to keen. Sounds just came from me. And on the way home the keening became screaming. Can you imagine? There I was driving on Lone Oak Road, in my big old Warburton Whippet van, with my unshowered bed hair, just screaming. I've never screamed as loud and it kept coming. I couldn't make it stop. I got frightened and I called Bill. "Talk to me," I screamed. "I need to hear your voice. I can't stop screaming." I scared him and he wanted to come get me. "No," I screamed. "I'm almost home."

Somewhere a plan had taken shape. I would drive to Atlanta the next morning. Carolyn had been on the Board of the American Whippet Club. Another board member was having health issues and would not be able to make it. If I didn't go, I didn't think there would even be a quorum, and nothing would be voted on, new officers wouldn't be elected and it would be a mess. I would show Swede William, go to the meetings, deliver the Willow Award, and then head up to Toledo, meeting Friend One with Spice and Easy on the way. That night the bed was so damn empty.

Tuesday morning I checked my email one last time before packing and heading to Atlanta. (Remember the Comcast outage? This LINK will take you to Comcast's official explanation.) Some of the lost emails had dribbled in during the night. And then my breath caught. There was an email from Carolyn. The subject line said "Re: Easy." I thought perhaps her brother or sister-in-law had emailed me some info from her computer. But it was an actual email from Carolyn, which I had gotten back in December. It must have been stuck on some server somewhere, and when Comcast's glitch got fixed... I had been trying to figure out when Easy's cancer surgery had been. I couldn't remember if it had been in January of '08 or November of '07. The email said,

I thought it was his lymph nodes but Greg took Easy to see ROn today
and we are pretty sure that his thyroid tumor is back - it has been
almost a year. Right NOW , he is eating, drinking, playing, barking, and
basically acting , eating normally but I am not sure how long it will
last. Ron X rayed his chest today and said it is perfectly clear so at
least that is good for now............. The surgeon thought it would
coms back in his chest first ....... I do not plan to put him through
surgery again....

And with that miracle electronic glitch, Carolyn was able to answer so many questions for me. The surgery had been in January. No more surgery for Easy. I had done right by my own Very Old Dog. I got out my suitcase, relieved that this would no longer cause worry for a Dear Old Soul, and I stopped screaming, and began a good old-fashioned cry. I miss Carolyn. I miss my Giacomino. Oh my poor sister.

Hug your hounds

For Me

Thanks, Laurie Erickson for this wonderful photo of Carolyn and Jack, who gave her so much love and laughter.

Just about one year ago, Carolyn called me up and said she didn't feel right. "Something just isn't right," she said.

Carolyn was the perennial picture of health. Always fit, trim, though she'd tell me she'd been 'eating like a hog' and had gained five pounds. I knew better. She loved DQ.

She was so well versed in things medical, but this had her puzzled and she went to the doctor. They didn't find anything, but tried some meds. They didn't help. Maybe they did, she said. Maybe a little.

I saw her at the American Whippet Club National in April. She looked great! She traveled from western Pennsylvania, and I travelled from western Kentucky and we gave each other an excited hug in Oregon. To my relief, Carolyn looked fine.

"You look great," I said.

"I'm feeling better," she said. But...

Days after we got home she called again. "Something is really wrong. I've been tripping. I fell down this morning. And have you seen how many typos are in my emails?" [We phoned and emailed every day. She was better at phoning than me.] "My hand doesn't do what I tell it."

I felt a chill. One of those deep, soul-stopping bad feelings. You need to go back to the doctor. Today. Tomorrow.

It was Carolyn, so she already had an appointment for the next morning.

And then there was the emergency CT scan and Greg was calling me from the hospital and she was having brain surgery to have the damned damned damned glioblastoma removed and I felt so useless and how on earth could this be?

Carolyn did everything in her power to recover.

Greg died in December. Carolyn was talking to me on the phone that morning. We talked about how Bea did at the show. When she went upstairs to wake him he was gone.

They were friends in kindergarten. Prom dates. Married after college. Greg was fifty-six.

I have worried every day about Carolyn for a year. I have felt so sad that she has had to face this. She loved this life. She loved all the birds at her feeders. The best fed birds in the world. She loved "Chipper" with his full cheeks. She loved Greg so deeply. She loved her dogs, God knows she loved those dogs. The first time I heard of the miracle of puppy breath was from Carolyn. She loved her little 94 year old mom, who stayed by her side. She loved Greg's dear sisters.

And she loved her fortunate friends. She loved her brother who fixed her computer. She loved her flowers and her vegetable garden. She loved to cook. She made the best salsa from her garden in the world. And Christmas cookies! She loved to laugh. How much we laughed! We would talk, sewing machines whirring in the background, one in Pennsylvania, one in Kentucky, and laugh until we had to put the phones down, get up from our sewing machines and go pee.

She loved to go and do. To watch dogs running in the yard. To watch Spice stalk a squirrel, so quiet and patient like a cat.

And this morning, she peacefully passed from this life into the next.

It occurred to me, when I hung up the phone from the 5:30 am phone call, that I am relieved of the sadness I have felt for Carolyn.

Now, I am left with my own.

The most generous friend

[If I've mastered the technology correctly, this will be posted while I am on a plane somewhere above Ohio.]

I'm going to visit my friend. It's her birthday and we're having a party. But Carolyn sent me a present.

It's her birthday.

She's in hospice care.

She sent me a present.

That's what kind of friend Carolyn is.

And what a present. I squealed like a ten year old. Just take a look at this.

Oh my ten year old STARS!!! Candy from my childhood! Long lost treasures. Mint juleps! Charleston Chew! I scared the living snot out of Bill when I screamed TEABERRY GUM!!! Candy cigarrettes, candy necklaces (yes, Laurie there it is, circled in green just for you), CHUCKLES!!!Jujyfruits, Chicklets, Necco wafers, Fire balls, Jaw Breakers, Wax bottles, Wax lips, Chunky, Buble Gum Cigars, and so very very very much more!

I'm putting the whole box in my suitcase and sharing it with Carolyn and our friends. Well, almost the whole box. The sugar daddy is gone. The Sky Bar mysteriously disappeared. Hey, where did those mint juleps go? And there was a box of Good 'N Plenty, I know there was. I don't need to take the Junior Mints - you can still get them anywhere. So I'm taking the rest of the box with me in my suitcase.

I can't wait to see Carolyn. I can't wait to see Easy and Spice, and Early, Beauty, and Jack. There is a lot I'm not saying out loud in this post. I'll leave that to you, dear readers.

Thanks, Carolyn! You're the BEST!!! (That is not a Sugar Daddy in my cheek! It just looks like one.)


hug your hounds and think some thoughts of comfort for Carolyn and hers, if you would be so kind

beginnings

(Giacomino - Very Old Dog - on the porch, yesterday at noon.)

in Just-
spring when the yard is brown-

green-scented the fragile Very Old Dog

piddles far and wee

and LindyandWilliam come
running from tugs and
dinosaur rahrs and it's
spring

when the yard is wormsquish-wonderful
the dear old

Very Old Dog snuffles

far and wee

and CharlieandMama come alloverwagging

from perfect sunny spots and

it's
spring
and
the

golden-aura'd
Very Old Dog gambols

far

and

wee

(humble apologies to e. e. cummings)

(Sammy and Very Old Dog - just 4 weeks from their 7th and 15th birthdays, in the yard yesterday)

I write of personal feelings.

Today we saw straightline winds driving rain perfectly perpendicular and heard loose things crashing and our windows rattled. The emergency alert (this is not a test) interrupted Prairie Home Companion; the nerve. And then we walked the dogs, not a half hour later, in clear blue skies, so warm that in short sleeves we glowed.

The malignant Bermuda grass is still brown, but the fescue, what's left of it, is Kelly green. Grass green. Daffodils opened up for the sun, and the not-really-tulips on the tulip trees. The new little birthday lilac bush sports a riot of brazen buds. It survived.

Beginnings.

From the ice storm, the wounded grand trees in their prime will die. Like a best friend whose very name has always made me smile. Who has malignant tumors in her brain, but still possesses her special grace, and dignity, courage and humor; I hear the oxygen whoosh on the phone. I have your smiling name in my heart when I go to sleep. When I wake.

Beginnings.

A tiny soul has arrived. In the usual way, thank you paul simon, but not. I didn't know he was en route until he was nearly here and now he is and I want to hold him and smell of him and fill his eyes with my face so he will know that I will love him like a gramma. And cry over him and fuss and fill my heart with his. His name is Brody.

Beginnings.

And Bill is away, so I float just out of reach, a deflating balloon's silly careening. Untethered. He'll come home to my telling him how much I love him. But the dogs and I did just fine.

Delia keeps a constant eye out for her Bill. One ear tuned to the street for the right car door to slam.

But she's an unconscionable liar who tells me she always was my dog.

Until she hears that car door slam.

most all of the time I write for you, dear readers. tonight I wrote for me, but you can still

hug your hounds

Going to a Dog Show

Normally I would be saying, "the van is packed and ready." But these are not normal times.

Gas.

I love my van. I adore my van. I bought my van back in the day when I was a full time R.N. and getting paid! I actually put a monthly "car payment" in a savings account, (earning interest instead of paying it) and when it was time to buy the van, I bought it. The van before this one had been bought used, but this was shiny new and spacious.

It is a fifteen passenger van. A church bus. A big airport shuttle. We took the bench seats out and filled in the cavern with dog crates and bins of my collars to sell and even a full sized x-pen up on a platform. All nine of the dogs ride comfortably, with room for a friend of the canine or human persuasion.

But I have not loaded the van for this trip.

I have taken crates out of the van and put them in... I still hate to say it out loud... the Buick. Rendezvous.

Our other car was always a Subaru wagon, since 1983. Except for a three year hiatus when we thought Japan wasn't trading fairly so we bought a Saturn. Other than that since 1983, we had a Subaru. Lulu the Subaru was the dog car before there was a van, back when there was a truck and horse trailer. She was a good luck, happy times dog car. She continued to be a happy car for our daughter an her husband after she left us. That was a great car.

But the whippets outgrew Subarus, and graduated to vans, and the Subaru became our get around car. And that's how we got the Rendezvous. I was getting around to picking up my new glasses and two desperately needed new bras. (I do not enjoy shopping, and I never budget time on purpose for it. I detest malls. I think that's what's wrong with this country: Walmart and malls. Have you ever seen a happy person at a Walmart or a mall?) But since I had to pick up my glasses, I figured I could drive on out and get something significantly less tired than my current undergarments were.

I found two bargain bras out at the "mall area" (not at the mall and not at Walmart) and I was sitting in the latest Lulu the Subaru at the stop light in front of Chuckie Cheese's thinking about my soon to be perkier figure and my authorly new glasses, when the loudest noise exploded me and next thing I knew a nice man was asking me if I was all right. I thought it odd that I should be lying flat on my back when I should have been sitting at a stop light. And my neck hurt and both of my hands were pins and needles.

Turns out the lady going forty mph in her nice big Mercedes didn't notice the red light, neither did she spot the Subaru stopped at it, nor the car stopped in front of the Subaru, or the two cars stopped in the other lane, and she didn't bother even stepping on her brake the tiniest bit, but instead let the back of my Subaru and the car in front of the Subaru do the stopping of her nice big Mercedes for her.

We think she had a habit of doing stuff like that, because she wasn't insured.

Those two bargain bras cost our insurance company somewhere in the neighborhood of $8,000.00 each.

Bill met me at the hospital. He had found my new glasses which had been on my face, back by the tail light in the way back of poor Lulu. She was totaled.

She had done her job of protecting me, and by some real honest miracle, I had not taken Mama Pajama with me. It was when she was too sick to go on even a short walk, and to make up for it, I'd take her in the car for little errands. Now, I'd written articles on the importance of having dogs secured in vehicles, since in even a minor fender bender a dog becomes a flying object and when it's dog versus windshield, the dog doesn't usually fare so very well. But to give Mama Pajama something to be happy about I had been ignoring my own advice and had been letting her ride shotgun.

I had, thank goodness, left her home that day, and I cannot think about what would have happened had I not. Sweet Mama Pajama is well enough to go on her walks now, and when she rides in a car or the van she is in a secured crate.

So my neck hurt a bit, but we had some big thing going on at the Kennel Club and I was to be there. It was about a week after the accident. Bill asked about another car. What kind should we get, since there were no Subaru dealers here. I hurt. I didn't care. It was up to him.

At the Kennel Club, Bill called my cell phone and said he'd found a car. A Buick. A Rhonda something or other. I didn't pay a whole lot of attention, but when I told my friends, they said, "A Rendezvous?" And their faces looked a little funny when they asked if I had ever seen a Rendezvous. (Dog people know every vehicle made which has room for crates in the back.)

I got home, and at that point my neck was screaming bad things at me, but I stopped dead in my tracks. My husband had bought a big Gremlin!

He came bounding out of the house, surrounded by clouds of excitement. "How do you like it?" he gushed.

"It's a Gremlin on steroids."

1970 AMC Gremlin photo from www.carpictures.com

"Oh that hurts my heart a little," he said.

But that Rendezvous has been a good car. Bill gloats when I put my crates in the Vous to save money on gas. There is a lot of room back there. And we drove it to a vineyard in Missouri on a fun trip with our dear neighbors and we laughed the whole two hours there and back. Bill giving the V sign to any other Rendezvous driver that passed, and calling it his Babe Machine.

And the dealer did take a big painting as partial payment, so that car is extra special to him.

Tomorrow the Vous will take me and Lindy Loo and Swede William to the Midwest Specialty. I didn't think I'd be going, but my friend Carolyn who's fighting the damn brain cancer is going to go. Crystal said the dogs and I can stay in her camper. And the Vous will drink a lot less gas than the van.

Bill's Babe Machine. I can't help but chuckle.

We'll be back Monday, but won't have Internet til then.

Hug your hounds

We're Back

[all of the photos are from a couple of years ago, and are all courtesy of Laurie Erickson.]

I went to see my dear friends, Carolyn and Greg, way up in western Pennsylvania. They have whippets and are my source of advice for all things. That's Carolyn (the beautiful one in pink) with me (the goofy one in yellow) and Greg is in the chair in back wearing a baseball hat. Carolyn knows everything about whippets, and I mean everything. And Greg knows everything about RV'ing. And he can tell a story that you end up laughing so hard that your tummy hurts and you have tears running down your face and you peepee your panties. Like the time their pop up camper wouldn't pop up and they had to stay in it, well... Greg tells it best.


Two of their dogs, eleven year-old littermates Easy and Spice are buddies of mine. Easy and Fat Charlie were best friends. They were the same speed, so when they raced, it was often in the very same races. (Whippets race for fun and championships, like terrierists do the earthdog tests, not like greyhounds. No betting, no money, just fun, fun, fun!) I would take Easy and Fat Charlie to the starting box, and Carolyn would pick them up at the end. Or sometimes we'd walk the 200 yards down together.) There is not much in the world whippets love more than racing. So Fat Charlie and Easy associated each other with the bestest fun. And Spice is a perfect mirror image of my Maria, and they were about the same speed and would be in the same races, and I would pick up Maria at the end of a race, only to have Carolyn say, "That's Spice!"




Carolyn giving Fat Charlie a cooling sponge off and a kiss after a race.


I haven't seen Easy for at least four years and it's been more than six years since I've seen Spice.


When I arrived, Greg and Carolyn were still at the doctor's office. At the door, eight whippets were doing their best impression of house-guarding Dobermans. As I peeked in, I saw the recognition in Spice's and Easy's eyes. First a little spark of puzzlement. Then a smile. I said, "Hey Easy Boy! Spicey Girl!" And then full blown Whippet Excessive Greeting Disorder - heaven to my ears.




"WOOO-HOOOOOOOOO," sang Easy and Spice! "It's youuuuuuuuuuuuu!!!

Hellooooooooooooooo!"



They danced their delight, and then the younger gang, who also know me but not as well, joined in the welcome. Once I was in the house, Easy and Spice turned inside out, and I hugged the living daylights out of them. I had rubbed my dress all over Fat Charlie and Maria before I left my house, so Easy and Spice got a good "sniff picture" of them. (I did the same thing in reverse before I came home. Fat Charlie and Maria and Giacomino and Mama Pajama and Sam I Am who loves Carolyn wagged and wagged as they snuffled in my suitcase. I think when the dogs get smells of far away friends they smile, just like when we see a photo of someone we love who's away from us.)



My visit was purely selfish. I actually stayed at some very kind and generous friends of Carolyn's, so as not to make more work for them, and to let them have their evenings to themselves. Carolyn is fighting brain cancer. We had our booths next to each other the last week of April in Oregon at the National (which we've done since 1997) and she seemed her absolutely usual brilliant funny smart shining self. (She later said she was having a hard time thinking of the word she wanted.) The next week her leg went funny. Now she has had brain surgery and is going through chemo and radiation. Mind you, this week when I couldn't think of a word, she found it for me. And even though I'm an RN, she came up with a better way than I could to keep track of her meds. And she was feeding her eight whippets and fixing our meals and doing the laundry and keeping up with her email and thank you notes. And making jokes. I couldn't keep up with her.

See why she is my hero? So that's why I had to go, and that's why it was for me. No "oh how noble of you to go" comments. Nope. Please, though, if you could send some positive energy, if you could offer a prayer for Carolyn and Greg, I'd appreciate it. Sometimes life just seems unfair beyond our human comprehension.

The dogs have the right idea. Enjoy every day, and rejoice at seeing friends.


[Greg and Carolyn gave me that shirt. It says Official Dog Walker: FREQUENT STOPS]

hug your hounds, and your friends and your friends' hounds