Good-bye, 2011...

... I hated you.

I've been trying to motivate myself to write a blog post for almost six weeks. I wanted to give some sign that all was well, that I'm alive and fine and engaged. Probably the biggest problem is that hasn't been true. I've been depressed and over-extended, distracted by the holidays and disconnected from how I really feel.

Lanie is amazing. She'll be 13 in May and for the most part she's still energetic and insane. We've noticed lately she's getting quite a bit grayer on her chest and forelegs, the whole front end of her elegantly fading as befits a lady of her esteemed age. She has also, without doubt, become much more cuddly.

Just this morning she woke up early, peed on the living room rug, and then came and curled up between us in bed.

We agree that a new brother will be a good thing for her. Sure, she'll spend a while pooping in furious protest at the loss of attention and competition for resources. That's reasonable. She's entitled to let us know how she feels. Anyway, she only goes in one spot on the rug, so we keep that covered with plastic under a towel for easy clean-up.

A lot of my "dog friends" spoke to me, in the early days after I lost my Drive, about how the need for a new dog was intense and immediate. It doesn't happen with people, does it? I certainly don't want a new mother or new grandparents. But when I had to say good-bye to my Drive, the only thing I could think of to make any sense out of the world again was to put my arms around another dog.

What was best for me wasn't best for us as a family. That was harder than I can say, and I know that contributed to the depression I've been wrapped in for weeks. This was the first time in years that I've been in that terrible dark place and not had my Drive to whisper to. It spiraled quickly.

I want to stop this spiral. I want off. I want a new dog. I want to meet the friend that's waiting. I'm so very ready.

And I'm here to let you know that I'm alive. This year has to be better. And coming sometime in January I hope to be able to introduce you to the newest member of our family. Soon, soon!

I hope 2012 bring amazing things for you, my friends. I wish you all the best.

 

Good News and Dismay

The good news first: there is absolutely nothing wrong with Lanie's heart. She is, in fact, absurdly healthy.

The dismay: I'm looking for a new vet, after seven years. I'm uncomfortable with change and averse to trying new things, but I can't overlook how unhappy I am about a few things. My plan is to get Lanie's dental taken care of soon, but to start looking around for a greyhound-savvy vet. It'll be a little complicated, since we're in a semi-rural area and vets are exactly thick on the ground in the first place, but I don't mind driving a bit if I have to. There is an emergency hospital nearby for the unthinkables that might take place at odd hours.

When my Drive had his dental last spring (April or May, I can't remember), the same thing happened to him that happened with Lanie. They called in the morning to say that his EKG was a little "off" and they wanted to take an x-ray of his heart. We had just lost our Bullie, not two or three days before, so I was already a mess, and they scared me. The x-rays came back "inconclusive." The vet painted terrible, dire pictures for me and, terrified, I told them to go ahead and do the ultrasound. Of course his heart was perfect.

To recap, I brought Lanie in for her dental last week, got the "questionable" EKG results, had the "inconclusive" x-rays done... And refused to okay the ultrasound. I am not made of money, people. I may have mentioned that. If I'd thought for a moment that Lanie had any problem whatsoever, it wouldn't have been about money, but all I could think was, "Didn't I just do this?"

You know why the x-rays show a heart that is borderline enlarged? Because greyhounds have large hearts. I learned, after repeated phone calls and persistence, that the EKG results were "off" because no one told the EKG analysts they were dealing with a greyhound.

Once that fact was made clear they said, "Oh, well, that's all perfectly normal for a greyhound."

I am not a happy customer. In the end, what made the decision for me was an extra $19 on my bill. "What is this?" I asked, as I was already forking over $200 for the stupid x-rays that weren't even necessary. "I'm being charged $19 under boarding?"

"That's our policy. It's for cage use and technician time."

"She was here for four hours! Getting stupid x-rays!"

"It's just policy." (I will spare you the rant on how much I loathe it when people hide behind policies.)

"I've been coming here for seven years and I have never, ever been charged a boarding fee." (I even checked, because I keep all the vet information filed.)

"That was an oversight, I guess. It's policy."

So! If you happen to live near me and know a great greyhound-savvy vet, let me know.

Thank you so, so much for the support and thoughts and advice I asked for last week. I meant to reply much sooner but I was flattened by some weird viral thing and spent a few days in bed feeling sorry for myself. :)

My Only Dog

"I'll stop smacking you when you get it out of my face."

Lanie is not a fan of the camera. After all, it it not made of food and it does not squeak. All it does it flash in her eyes, eliciting a death glare that only ladies of a certain age can manage.

At age 12 and a half, her pointy little face is white and her eyes have clouded. She used to hunt frogs relentlessly, making walks in the spring and summer a constant challenge as she lunged and snapped at the hopping meat-snacks. This summer, we realized that she simply doesn't see well enough to do that any more.

It's harder to tell if her hearing has faded. I'm disposed to believe she just ignores me more, since if I think too loudly about opening the fridge she will materialize from the ether.

She is a grand, goofy old dame. She is a glorious mixture of bravado and insecurity, terrified of a slammed door but not thunder. Helium balloons are the devil to her, but she will snarl and lunge if we make the mistake of walking her by the neighborhood bull mastiff. I am her humble servant who exists to feed her, but when she is scared she shoves her head against my chest.

Since we lost my Drive, she's been the only dog in the house. Always a velcro girl, I've noticed the length of time she lets me out of her sight has decreased. She's less content lately to be within sight range and now feels the need to be within petting range whenever possible. She has absolutely become needier. I can understand. So have I.

The strangest difference is her sudden, avid interest in going for car rides. I think she just hates that I sometimes leave the house without her. She hates being alone, poor sweetie.

I'll address the issue of "When will she be getting company?" in a different post.

This evening Lanie goes to the vet for bloodwork and an EKG, so that tomorrow she can be safely anesthetized for a dental cleaning. (She won't be spending the night there.) She's in overall excellent health, especially for a senior dog, and her teeth are not the nightmare that some greyhounds' are, though she has broken a canine recently. She was probably checking to see if something was edible by biting it, like a great white shark.

I'm reminding myself of all the reasons I don't need to be worried, and I'm worrying anyway. I'll keep you updated.

And I think I'll take my dog out to lunch. She loves the drive-thru.

Goodnight, Sweetheart

We said good-bye tonight.

My Bullie

Ima Bulldozer

June 1, 1998 - April 20, 2011

Be at peace, my sweetheart. No more hurting. Thank you for the honor of loving you.

You were a very, very good boy.

Goodbye, my love.

Always My First

Yesterday, I posted a pair of shots from Drive's early days with us, including the first picture I ever took of him, on his very first day. I've found myself looking at those pictures quite a bit, thinking about the day we met, and reflecting on the animal I brought home.

Drive will always be "my first greyhound." I've spoken so much about what he means to me now, the times when I find solace in his presence, the secret moments we share, the jokes we tell each other, the lift he gives my spirit every time he grins at me.

It took a while. Something that many owners of retired racers can confess to is how long it can take a greyhound to adjust to being in a home environment. Not true of all of them, certainly, but it was true of Drive. He was never in a foster home, so my solitary front step was the first one he ever saw and it terrified him.

He was cautious and reserved around us for months, and he was insane when left alone. Separation anxiety. In many of my pictures you can see a windowsill that was gnawed off. It was done in terror the first time we left him alone in the house for a couple of hours. After that incident, we bought a crate, just like at the kennels, and shut him in when he had to be home alone. We had to wean him from it over the course of five or six months.

I see, in a picture from July of 2005, how thin and bedraggled he looked. It's clear to my "mommy vision," at least. As listed on Greyhound Data, his racing weight was around 78 pounds. He weighed less than that when he came home to me. His coat was rubbed off in places and he had hot spots that tortured him. I have more than a few pictures of him with large naked patches on his sides where he'd chewed his hair off.

I don't know what Drive's life was like before he came to me. I don't want to know; it's behind him forever. As of April 9, he will have been my dog, my gift to myself, for 6 years. What's the right way to celebrate that? What's the right way to tell someone "Thank you for saving me a hundred times just by being there?"

As much as I joke about it being "his job," I never forget that he is Dog. It's not his job. It's his nature. It's his purpose. It's his meaning.

My Gentleman Bulldozer

This is Bullie.

Did I ever tell you how he came to be in our lives? An accident, really. A misunderstanding. He was rescued from isolation and loneliness after his owner was suddenly tragically unable to care for him, but his age at the time made the rescue hesitant to put him in a kennel. They put out a call for a soft foster bed for him.

I was close and I'm a sucker. Knowing nothing else about him and secure in my belief that I was going to give an old dog a bed for a couple weeks, I went and picked him up.

My understanding was faulty. My ability to somehow not love a dog is compromised. It didn't take long before we signed the papers and made him ours. After all, we reasoned, he's old. He's too old to get bounced around. He's not showy. He's shy. He'd be overlooked, we worried. He was almost 9 at the time. He's 12 and half now.

We tried giving him regular dog beds, but he prefers this grody pile of blankets, which he digs and kicks and arranges just so before throwing himself down. He's too unsteady now to fluff his own bed, so he'll come get one of us to help now.

He walks down the hallway and peeks into the rooms, looking for a person. When he finds me, he just tilts his head and stares. "I need help with something," he says patiently with his wide, placid brown eyes. "I'll wait here until you figure it out."

He doesn't stand up much any more. I rub him all over, every day, looking for sores or pressure points that might turn into sores. He's a giant dog, almost 30 inches at his shoulder, and now he's thin and frail. It's terrifying to watch him move sometimes. He's like an old man on stilts.

The past couple days have been rough ones for him. He doesn't get up to greet people anymore, though he lifts his head and soaks up whatever attention he gets. He can't move his bowels without falling over, so we've had to devise a sling to help him. His pain medications have been slightly increased and I'm confident he's not in pain.

What do we do? I've held beloved companions in my arms before, as they were released from life. The difference in those scenarios was that there was simply no question. The animals let me know in no uncertain terms: This is the time for me to leave. Bullie isn't being so considerate. The end will come down to a judgment call and I don't feel I am worthy to judge. I'm too selfish.

I want to spare my beautiful old man any more pain. I don't want him to fall and break a leg and end that way. I don't want him scared, I don't want him sad.

But I don't want him to go.

A Meaningful Look

This is the kind of expression that gets him squealed at and stuffed with cookies. He's not a brave dog or a smart dog or a young dog or even a particularly playful dog. But he's my best friend and my hero and when he makes faces like this I fall in love all over again.

It was this kind of woobie face that he made on the day we met, and then he gave exactly one uncertain wag of his tail as he looked nervously away. "Hi," his face said. "I don't know why I'm in here."

As it turns out, he was there because we needed each other.

Words on Wednesday

On Patrol

I've mentioned before that Drive is my unofficial therapy dog and he's been working overtime for a couple of weeks now. I hope you'll forgive our minor unplanned hiatus. I've been spending a lot of time with my head pressed close to his and my arms around his neck. His velvet ears have soaked up so much of my misery and pain and his sweet brown eyes have calmed my nerves more times than I can count now.

Sometimes this happens, and I am grateful for the love and understanding that beams at me like sunlight determined to burn through closed curtains.

I have a different blog for the self-absorbed prattling about my brain and its various misfires, so I don't like to go into detail here. This one here though, while giving every appearance of being just cute pictures of my dogs, is a secret tribute to my heroes.


See, I was down in that well again.

And again, knowing what dogs are meant to do and knowing that Dog and Man are meant to live together this way, Drive and Lanie helped pull me out.

Please help. You can make a difference.

Fundraising Auction

Five years post-retirement, this is what Drive's muscles look like. He does pretty well, for a spoiled boy who loves food and remains horizontal as much as possible. That's a greyhound "secret," that ability to sleep for 30 hours a day.

A friend once remarked to me, "I never knew dogs could have buttocks."

I need you to think about something else this morning, something aside from the glorious lump that is Drive. Drive is safe and loved, as are so many retirees and rescues all over the country. But there are some dogs that aren't safe, aren't loved. There are some greyhounds that were recently saved from unthinkable circumstances in Texas, and I need you to help them.

I am squeamish. I don't advertise that fact, being tough and whatnot, but I do not have the ability to look at graphic photographs of abused animals, so I will post none here. I will not link to any, either, in case you are the same. These dogs were starving, terribly ill, and infested with thousands of parasites, inside and out. One dog received an emergency transfusion while over 1,500 ticks were removed from his body.

“Fort Worth Animal Control Cruelty Investigation Officers took 28 dogs into custody Thursday night, July 8, 2010. GALT was contacted as greyhounds were included in the seize. At GALT’s request, Greyhounds Unlimited (GU) joined in this effort, as GALT and GU are the only adoption groups in the DFW/north Texas area to help stray and shelter greyhounds. Friday morning, representatives from GALT and GU met with Diane Whiteley, the Executive Director of the Texas Greyhound Association, to assess the dogs. Eight were taken by each group. Wednesday, July 14, GALT took one more female and with that now all 28 dogs are with adoption groups."

Additionally, a 29th dog was recovered later as a stray. He was two years old, and the best thing that I can tell you is that he was let go from a terrible, brief life while cradled in kind and loving arms. Kiowa Braden is at peace now and his suffering is ended.

So will you help the survivors? There's a link under the picture to a fund-raising auction for these dogs, and here are links for more information. I promise that as of this writing none of these links contain graphic images to upset us sensitive types, but the pictures I have seen of the "lesser" cases are heart-wrenching and nauseating.

Life With Dogs: Going Flat Out

GALT (Greyhound Adoption League of Texas)

Greyhounds Unlimited

And once again, the link to the fund-raising auction is here.

Thank you. From the bottom of our hearts, thank you.

In Service

This post is semi-serious, so please know I won't be offended if you look at the pretty picture and leave. I understand.

When I tell you that Drive is my best friend, it isn't hyperbole or cliche. Plainly stated, there are days I would not get through if I could not bury my fingers in his fur or wrap my arms around his neck. This blog is not about me, but I live with mental illness and that is relevant to Drive. Before him, I didn't truly understand the miracle that is Dog. (That's a secular, science-type miracle, for what it's worth.)

Drive does not, I must tell you, have the necessary temperament to be an "official" service dog. The training would stress him deeply. I did have a trainer tell me recently he might "settle down with age."

"He's ten."

"... Oh."

So maybe not.

Are you aware that while most people see service dogs as large breed animals who hear and see, there is a whole separate category into which Drive could fall? I mean, if he could learn the commands and since it took me almost a year to teach him to go up some steps, I have my doubts and I won't force it on our relationship. If you're interested, here's a little information on "Emotional Support Animals."

When I say that Drive is my very best friend, I mean that deeply and truly. Over the past five years, through some of the hardest and darkest hours in my life, Drive has helped me live. He's helped me want to.