Why Hubby Should Not Send Me To Buy Chicken Food

I should never be allowed to go into a Farm and Garden store. Or a pet store. Or the local animal shelter. Or anyplace with small cute mammals. Because I Am A Sucker. With a capital S. And it's worse when my daughter is along because she's basically a mini-me.

And so it was that today we went to get chicken food, and came home with a bunny. Because with 16 animals here at Casa del Crazies, we needed one more. In my defense, let me just say that this is the sweetest, absolutely cutest bunny on the planet. Absolutely.

Doggie Endless Pool? Sunday Snap

If you've ever owned a Lab, you know one thing about them: they love water beyond all reason and sensibility. We've made a semi-regular Sunday tradition of hiking with some friends and their kids (and our dogs), which gets us all out of the house and into the forest, even on rainy winter days. Their dog is this wonderful big chocolate Lab/Cheapeake Bay Retriever named Sawyer. And of course he LOVES water. Beyond all reason and sensibility.

So today, when we started hiking along Shotgun Creek, he made a beeline straight for the overflowing-with-snowmelt creek. One of the kids threw a stick in and he was beside himself with stick-chasing and swimming joy. The problem was this: the stick got stuck on the bottom, sticking straight up out of the water in the swiftest part of the current. And that dog was going to get that stick, no question about it in his mind.

The other thing you might know about Labs is that they're very single-minded. Once they're fixed on a target (ball, stick, duck), you better not be standing in their way. You will be flattened, logs will be jumped, and raging rivers will be forged in order for them to get to their target. So once Sawyer started swimming for this stick, he was stuck in the current in a kind of doggie version of an Endless Pool. And he was not going to give up. A couple of times the family managed to call him away, even divert him by throwing in another stick. But just as it looked like they might entice him out of the river, back he went for that one lone stick.

Even after we finally got him out and were hiking along the trail, he ran ahead and then cleverly looped back around behind us and went straight back to the creek and that stick. So today's Sunday Snap is the adventures of Sawyer, the dog who puts the "dog" in "dogged determination".

Sunday Snap: The Ultimate Christmas Gift

A year and a half ago, my daughter lost her lovely cat Bandit to antifreeze poisoning. She had raised him from a tiny kitten and as she tearfully said "I told him all my secrets". Since that horrible day, she has slept with a framed photo of him by her bedside, and maybe she still does tell him all of her secrets even though he's now gone.

So this year when I found the world's friendliest orange tabby abandoned in the brushy wildlands by the running trail, it was our good fortune and his. He and Asa have become inseparable, and despite the fact that his kitteny behavior has led to the wreckage of several drapes and assorted pieces of furniture and clothing, he's turned out to be a well-loved member of the household. As we celebrated Christmas and he spent much of the day lounging on Asa's lap, it occurred to me that he was a great symbol for the true meaning of Christmas: the giving of love, unconditionally. In his first few weeks with us, Asa was worse than any helipcopter mom I've ever met. She was so terrified that something would happen to him, she would hardly let him out of her sight. She was afraid he would choke on his own cat food, yet also reserved her feelings and didn't really fully give him her love either. I knew that the trauma of what happened to Bandit had affected her deeply.  Over the months, that has melted gradually away and they have developed a bond of their own.

I think by staying by Asa's side all of Christmas day, purring loudly in her ear, Miguel was saying how grateful he is to be in our household. To be receiving food, shelter, warmth, and above all  love. The ultimate Christmas gift.

Sunday Snap: Prissy Dog Meets The Elements

Normally Small Evil Dog does not like bad weather. She's really a prissy Manhattanite kind of dog - she would do well in a toasty apartment being taken out for walks wearing an Oscar de la Renta custom doggie sweater. She's not really bred for the harsh Northwest winters of sleet and freezing rain. This may be TMI, but if you put her out in the rain to do her business, she won't even walk out onto the wet cold lawn. She'll go to the edge of the deck and hang her dainty behind off and poo with all four feet planted squarely on the decking. That's when she doesn't just decide to heck with it and poo on the deck. Any wonder I call her Small Evil Dog?

But when the snow fell this week and the kids headed outdoors with great whoops of joy, sleds in hand to slide down our hill on a scant quarter inch of slushy white stuff, both dogs followed and romped around in the snow. Now in this photo, Callie looks like she's wishing she could head quickly back in by the fire, but she really did have a good time in the snow, I swear. What I'm terribly, terribly afraid of is that hubby will buy her some of those little doggy shoes to go with her ridiculous rain coat. And then I really will not be able to be seen in public with her at all.

Sunday Snap: Camouflage

You can tell why she's the perfect hunter. Here's my cat Patches moving through the forest at a dead run.

Don't Step Into the Middle of a Dogfight

Today Small Evil Dog decided to pick a fight with Wonderdog. In case you're wondering, Small Evil Dog is the one on the right. Don't be fooled by her cute face, she's like Cameron, the cute girl Terminator in the Sarah Connor Chronicles: she might seem like your friend but you never know when her chip is going to go bad. Today the chip went Wrong and she turned into the Terminator edition of a cute Beagle/Jack Russell terrier. Small Evil Dog chased one of our cats, got swatted for her troubles and decided to take it out on Sophie, who is normally so mellow that she'll happily submit rather than tangle. But today Wonderdog had had ENOUGH of Small Evil Dog's attitude and decided to give it back.

That's when things got ugly and I had to try to break it up. It's hard to pull apart two dogs who are going at it, and although our two play fight a lot, I've never seen them this angry. I ended up picking up Small Evil Dog, but Sophie was still attached by the jaws, and in a contorted position trying to lift sixty-five pounds of dogflesh-gone-mad, my back and shoulders are now paying the price. By halfway through my trail run this afternoon, my shoulders had climbed up to my ears and I had the approximate gait of Igor. Of course, this would also be the day when I promised Asa I would take her to the gym to play raquetball (following my own advice to keep the kids active in the winter). Thank god for the hot tub at the gym or I never would've survived.

This week I'm making hubby keep his word about that remote-controlled shock collar...

Runs With Dog

I'd like to think of myself as a Woman Who Runs with The Wolves. There's me, running naked and free through a primeval forest with my hair streaming out behind me in long golden waves and a pack of graceful beasts fanning out all around me, stopping to let out a wild high howl to the sky... Except that naked part. Okay, strike that. With forty-four years and two kids behind me, too much would jiggle. And let's face it, I got tired of my golden hair streaming right into my face when I run, so I hacked it down to a short 'do a few years ago. And well, the closest wolves in Oregon are the Wenaha pack near the Idaho border, but that's really a long ways from here.

I guess I'll have just have to settle for being a Woman Who Runs With Dog. Luckily, I can do that clothed, with short hair stuffed under my running cap, in broad daylight. For the past few weeks, I've been taking my one year old Heeler/Aussie Shepherd mix Sophie running on the Ridgeline trails with me. Unlike Evil Small Dog (my husband's Beagle/Jack Russell Terrier mix, the one who broke my arm running back in January), she is a terrific running companion. She doesn't chase squirrels or deer and she doesn't really care much for other people so she will  just skirt around them on the trail. Ditto for other dogs, she's not even into playing a game of sniffy-butt, she just keeps on truckin' down the path. If she gets too far ahead, she stops and waits for me with a very patient expression, understanding that my speed and endurance are limited compared to hers.

I know that in thirteen or fourteen years, I will repay her thoughtfulness as the tables turn and I walk with her into her old age. I may even put her into a trailer and wheel her along her favorite trails as I did with my wonderful Sabre, my best buddy and running companion of my twenties and thirties. Through the arc of our life together, we will have many adventures, but I know from painful experience that the times we can run together carefree down life's trails will be limited to about a decade. My years as a runner will far exceed hers, no matter how easily she springs ahead of me through autumn's leafy wonderland this morning. So I vow to enjoy this time we have together on the planet. She's all that I could ask for in a furry partner and more. Today we'll hit the trail together and run like we're wild and free.

Healing Properties of Dog Slobber and Glowing Balls of Yellow Light

Castaway! No, not a movie starring Tom Hanks and a disturbing relationship with a piece of sports equipment... my cast is gone. Gone precious, gone! I have to admit, I was happy to get the thing in the first place, since every bump and movement was sending my arm into paroxysms of pain. But it quickly got old, especially in those dreaded moments when you have an itch underneath (coat hangers are your friend).

I got a new set of X-rays yesterday and everything is healing up amazingly well. I have pretty much no swelling at the site, the joint looks great, the tendons all look fine, and the bone is healing nicely. Best of all, the doc who took a look at it gave me the green light to move around as much as I feel able, just cautioning me to "let pain be your guide". That's always a sticky wicket with me, since my pain tolerance is freakishly high (I once famously told my midwife I was worried that I wouldn't know when I was in labor. She laughed. Until it came true.) Still, I figure as long as I proceed with good caution and don't do anything stupid, I'm going to be able to train, at least in a moderate fashion. That's WAY better news than I heard from Doc #1, whose mantra seemed to be "Wait 6 weeks" to do ANYTHING.

I don't know how much of what I did after the break influenced the healing, but here's my regimen for speedy bodily repair:

- Big doses of calcium and vitamin D (as per Doc #1)
- My old standby, Wobenzym, for soft tissue repair (this is the one supplement I use when training hard as well, just because it helps me be so much less sore after intense workouts)
- As much sleep as I can make myself get
- No NSAIDS (doc #2 says that now most docs believe they're contra-indicated in bone healing anyways)
- Lots and lots of dog kisses
- Positive visualizations in which I mentally send big glowing balls of healing energy light down my arm to the broken place and visualize my bone and tissues repairing themselves.

That's it, that's my magic formula. But speaking of dog kisses, here's something interesting. Since I've gotten my cast off, my dog Sophie has been coming up and licking my arm constantly. I wonder if dogs know that something is injured even if there's no outward sign. She doesn't lick my good arm, just the injured one. As you can see, just trying to get a photo of my cast she kept interrupting with more puppy kisses. She obviously believes I need more love in my life, what a sweetie!

Sunday Hikes and Dog Duties

In case you couldn't guess from that last post, we went hiking yesterday. Yes, even though it was raining we still got out there. We've made it a routine now to go for hikes as a family every Sunday, and another family from our neighborhood has been joining us. Even when the weather's not so great, it feels good to get out there in the woods and it's fun to share that with our friends. We're so lucky where we live because we have trails just a couple of miles from our house. This trailhead is only 3.5 miles away but taps into a ridgeline trail system along the hills behind our city and also has a spur that climbs a local butte.

Yesterday we did 4 miles including the climb up the butte. You can see that my tiny little puppy from a few months ago is now almost a full-fledged dog. Isn't she lovely? That's Sophie, aka Adventure Dog. She loves to go hiking and exploring and I think she'll be the best running dog ever. She's already the smartest dog I've ever known. As a sheepherd/cattle dog mix, she definitely needs to have jobs to do. One of her jobs is to go down to the chicken coop every morning and evening while we let the chickens out, and to guard the door to make sure no chickens come out the side door to the coop while we're in there. She takes this very seriously.

Yesterday morning, when Wayne asked Mackenzie to go down and let the chickens out, Mackenzie replied with the 13-year-old refrain "In a minute". But as soon as Sophie heard Wayne's request, she went into Mackenzie's room where he was working on the computer, and pawed at him until he got off and went to do their job. How smart is that? I'm so in love with this pup!

Sleep Like a Puppy

Boy do I wish I could sleep like my puppy Sophie does! She plays hard, runs around like a little maniac, tries a thousand times to steal my shoes, then abruptly winds down and crashes into a deep untroubled slumber.

However, since she arrived, I myself have been getting less than optimal sleep. A puppy is, of course, just a baby. It's been enough years now that I had forgotten what nights with babies are like... sleepless! Now that she's 12 weeks old, she's down to only waking up once or twice a night, but the first week or two she was up three and four times. And since I'm not the world's best sleeper in the first place, it takes me a half an hour or so to get back to sleep each time. That adds up to one sleep-deprived Robin.

It's amazing how badly everything suffers when you get inadequate sleep. Workouts of course are the first to go. Intensity, stamina, strength, and brain power all suffer mightily when you don't sleep enough. I guess it's a good reminder to try to get those eight good hours in every night. Karate has been the worst because not only is it physically intense, it's very mentally taxing. My poor partners have had to be patient as I stand there with a blank look trying to recall the particular sequence of moves I'm supposed to be doing. It should be right there in my muscle memory, just ready to spill out of my hands and feet and into action. But apparently muscle memory is still memory and still subject to the inadequacies of a sleep-deprived brain.

I'm seeing the light at the end of the tunnel now. This weekend the family took pity on me and let me sleep in until 9:00 on Sunday morning, and Sophie only woke once last night, so today I feel almost totally human again. With a puppy face like this though, don't you think she's totally worth it??

My Next Running Partner

I think little Sophie here is going to be a great little running partner in about 6 months or so. She's definitely not short on energy or enthusiasm, and she's already walking pretty well on a leash. I'm not in a hurry for this puppy cuteness to wear off though...

Dog Days

Haven't had much time to post this week, something completely unexpected happened... we got a puppy! Although it's hard to believe, it's been two years since I had to say goodbye to my best buddy Sabre. The kids of course have wanted another dog, but we've just told them it had to be the right dog at the right time, and we knew that someday it would come along. Well, I guess this was the week!

Our neighbor took a trip to California and ended up rescuing a puppy down there from a bad home situation. She's a 4 month old Jack Russell terrier mutt/mix (we think with some beagle), and she's a real sweetheart. But of course she's also still a puppy, which means a lot of work. Overall though she has a great temperament, not a barker and a real snuggly pup.

I don't know if she'll ever be the running companion that Sabre was. And honestly, I think out of the four of us I'm the only one who really wasn't ready yet to get another dog. She's very cute and very sweet, but she really hasn't taken my heart like Sabre did. Maybe because he was all mine from the start and he and I spent so much time together, or maybe just because there's this place in my heart that I can't really open up yet. Only time will tell. But it's been just great for the kids. They knew Sabre their whole lives, so it was very hard for them not to have a dog around. So far they're doing a great job taking care of her, I'm hoping that lasts!

And so now we have eighteen, yes count them, eighteen animals! Oy! I keep having this panicky feeling when I've left the house that maybe I've forgotten something. Guinea pigs in their outdoor pen, check. Baby chickens have food and water, check. Hens are out of their coop for the day, check. Cats fed, oldest cat had medicine, check. Now dog is with us, check. Phew.

Note to Self: Buy Booties

It would seem rather late in the year to be buying cold weather gear, but it doesn't seem to be warming up at all around here. And having a race in May, which I usually don't do, is making me ride outside in all of this cold and rainy weather. My previous MO has been to not even think about biking outside until all the rain disappears, so I don't have a lot of the rain riding essentials (except my big flapping rain jackets and pants for around town riding.) I think from the state of my toes after today's ride, I might invest in some booties at the very least.
I came home frozen to my bike like a popsicle only to find that my hubby had been on the phone for awhile and predictably the kids had gotten up to mischief. Big bro' M. (trying to look innocent here) had devised an alien costume for his little sis from crepe paper and bags. The entire dining room looked like a bomb had gone off in a craft store, and I no longer have any tape in the house. But at least they were having fun, and I have to give them full marks for creativity!

At least it wasn't as bad as last week's ride, where I got a panic-stricken voicemail from my daughter that went something like "Mom, you've got to come home Now! The baby chickens are all bleeding from their noses!" When was the last time you got a phone call like that? And being twenty miles from home on a bicycle, there's not much you can do about "come home quick". As it turns out, the chickies got in a bit of a panic and a couple of them banged up their beaks on the cage wire. They weren't actually hemorrhaging out their noses as I was picturing as I listened to this message, just a couple of tiny scabs is all. We don't call Miss A. the Drama Queen for nothing.

Here's hoping next week brings warm weather, and bike rides without frostbitten toes, craft bombs, or chickens knocking on death's door.

Appointment With the Wrecking Ball

That's how my last week has felt, like impending doom is crashing down on top of me and I can see it coming mid-swing, powerless to stop it. My good friend Sabre is gone. He passed very peacefully, the vet barely had even got any of the IV into him, he picked up his head and looked at my husband and I, we told him it was okay to let go and he put his head down and just looked like he went peacefully to sleep, at home, in our arms. I'm sad now, and the house feels so empty, but the horrible waiting for this day is at least gone.

I now know why for millennia, people have felt that the seat of human emotion is in the heart. When you ache with sadness, it feels like a giant fist is squeezing the inside of your chest, and then later when all of the crying is done, it just feels empty in there. If another person tells me they know exactly how I'm feeling because they lost their pet rat, or a cat that they had for two years I'm going to scream. I know everyone's grief is different, but we like to believe that our individual grief is unique. I will never utter those words to anyone ever in my life: I know how you feel. No one does. And yes, he was a dog not a person, but Sabre was a part of the fabric of every day's existance. He went everywhere with us, got up with me every morning to open up the chicken coop and do the outdoor rounds, closed everything down at night. He went to work with my husband, went to homeschool events with myself and the kids. He wasn't out in a kennel somewhere or tied to a tree, he was right there by our sides, every step of the day. If we went down into the living room to play a game, he limped down the stairs, even as old and gimpy as he was, to be beside us. When the kids were little, if we left them napping somewhere, he stayed by their sides until they woke up, when he woofed for us softly. If every person on earth had 1/10th the goodness and heart that he had, the world would be a much, much better place.

Through this all, I'm grateful to have my exercise, my routines in place. They can be lifesavers for working through life's toughest emotions. I can envision sitting on the couch curled into a ball for the next year. But my training gets me up and going, gets me out on the running path, makes me run like all of my grief is chasing me and I can't let it catch me up. I clocked the fastest tempo run of my life this week, but the grief still caught me. I swam endless mindless laps, letting the water hold me up and soothe me. I got on my bike on the trainer and had an hour-long conversation with my son, letting us share our feelings through this hard time.

Now all of the waiting is over and the life has to go on. We drove to Portland yesterday to see the Quest for Immortality exhibit, a presentation of Egyptian artifacts, largely on the theme of death, rebirth, afterlife, and the struggles the ancient Eygptians had in coming face to face with the concept of what happens when the soul departs. We went to the Feed-n-Seed store this morning and got our spring chicks, symbol of new life and a reminder that birth and death are constants. I'll miss my old pup terribly, this house has a quietness to it that underlays all the noise of the kids (and peeping of baby chickens). Think I'll head out for a run, now that the rain has gone.

Saying Goodbye To A Good Friend (And Running Partner)

I used to have this great running partner, the best kind: energetic, fun, always up for a few miles no matter what the weather. He was young, just a teenager, and he could literally run circles around me, but he never minded that he was so much faster than I was, and I always felt great when I ran with him. Now he's an old man, almost 100, and he can barely limp around the block. His hearing is going, his eyesight too, hips are arthritic and mostly he sleeps. When he sees me pick up my running shoes, he sometimes gets momentarily excited, forgetting that he'd be wheezing before we hit the corner stop sign.

There are few beings on this earth as unerringly kind, forgiving, loving, protective, humbling, thoughtful, and faithful as my friend Sabre. I love him so much. The hardest thing about loving a dog though is that their life is lived on fast-forward. Just as you get used to their puppy antics, they're heading into middle age, and by the time you take for granted that they'll run another 10-miler tomorrow, old age is just around the corner. Then it's here.

Today we took Sabre to the beach for the last time. I have to admit that I've been secretly hoping he'd die peacefully in his sleep, because this is a decision I didn't want to have to make for him, but the time has come. My husband got him for my birthday the year we met, and that was fourteen years ago. We have had Sabre as our constant companion for our entire married life, and the kids have always known him as their friend and protector. If you ever wanted to see an agitated dog, all you had to do was have one kid running in one direction and one in the other. As a herding dog, Sabre's one life mandate was "look after your flock" and he would anxiously sprint from one to the other if they were ever separated. On family hikes with friends, he would constantly run from the front of the line of hikers to the back, ceaselessly ensuring that we were all safe and accounted for. Though he now walks with difficulty, he still followed the kids everywhere they went on the beach today, no matter how long it took him. Even now, I think it is his noble sense of duty that keeps him hanging on, long past when it seems that his body should be giving up. I'm pretty sure that in his doggy mind, he's convinced that he simply must look after us or some great harm will fall upon us. He has kept us safe for all of these years, and sometimes when I look in his eyes I know he will not let go, no matter how much pain he is in, if only for this reason.

So the time is upon us when we have to make the decision to say goodbye. There is not a dog on this planet who has had a better life, been more loved, gone to more beaches and forests and snowy mountains, camped with and been loved by more kids and adults, been cherished more by his family. If you look back through our family photo albums he is a constant, always by our sides. He's lying next to the kids as they read a book on the couch, he's next to the campfire or walking next to us, no matter where we are. Sabre's spirit has touched everyone he has met. Even walking him down the street, people would stop and comment on what a kind face he had, what a gentle spirit. If you are reading this blog and have a prayer or a good thought to send this way, let it be that I have the strength to say goodbye to a good friend who deserves an easy and peaceful end to a life well lived.