Food for thought

Since he joined our family, Rubin has been a challenge. Not a bad one, just testing our patience (mine in particular) and posing problems we never thought we'd have to deal with. The main problem has been his inconsistent eating habits.

I've never had a dog who didn't like to eat, but Rubin is the most particular and finicky dog I've ever met. A whole bowl of the most expensive canned food will be set in front of him, he'll sniff it then walk away. From another room I can hear his stomach growl from hunger, still he won't eat. I'll offer a treat and sometimes he'll take it, but if he's particularly hungry, he won't touch it.

He also struggles with what I call intestinal distress. I won't go into details, but after getting up late at night to take a anxious dog outside to do his runny business, I'll take him to the vet whereupon I find out he has neither parasites or giardia just an upset tummy. Prescription? Rice, boiled chicken, cottage cheese, and pumpkin.

He won't eat it.

This last time his intestinal distress lasted over a week, which was unusual. The vet prescribed doggy pepto and antibiotics. In addition, I was supposed to give him "flora" in his food -- a brown powdery substance that came in expensive packets. But how was I supposed to give it to him if he refused to eat?

I took to stuffing globs of food into his mouth until he swallowed. As you can imagine, a battle ensued. I'd fix his food, he'd run to the other room. I'd encourage him to eat and he'd race upstairs fearing I'd force food into his mouth. The weird thing is that once he ate that first shoved in mouthful, he'd eat. It was like his little brain said, "Hey, that tastes pretty good. Who knew I was so hungry?"

Still, we have this psychological battle going. Ann tried feeding him, but he'd only eat if I weren't in the room or if I left his food out while I went to work and he could eat alone and in peace. But mostly, he wouldn't eat.

He'll eat when other dogs were at the house though. He'll watch them devour their food, wait for them to finish, and then put his face in his bowl and finally eat what's served. We talked about getting another dog just to help him out, but realized another mouth to feed wasn't the best idea with our busy schedules.

The final solution was to make his food. I balked at this because I didn't want to be "one of those" kind of dog owners who was over the top spoiling my dog more than I might a child. But he needed to eat and I needed to figure out a way to get him to eat.

Through some research and an accidental contact with a woman who teaches classes on cooking for your dog, I found a recipe that seemed simple enough -- ground meat (beef or chicken or lamb or pork or bison), grated fruits and vegetables, flax seed oil, turmeric (yep!) and some liquid acidophilus. I mixed up a batch of what I called Canine Hamburger Helper and what do you know, he ate.

Like a Lab. Voraciously, enthusiastically, and hungrily...like he hadn't eaten ever before in his life. I felt relief. My dog wouldn't starve to death and he had an appetite. No more force feeding, no more coaxing with sprinkled cheese or exotic dog treats.

Of course this morning, I'm sitting here waiting for him to eat and he's not. Ann says I worry about it too much and that makes him nervous. She's most likely right, but I still find it frustrating. I guess that's my life lesson -- learning to let go of the things I can't control. Leave it to Rubin to provide me with another chance to work on my issues.

He does that a lot -- reflects back what I need to learn. I always say you don't get the dog you want you get the dog you need and Rubin is proving that in spades. I need to relax more. I need to learn to let things go and not stress out about them. I need to slow down. I need to be kinder to myself and allow myself breaks. All of my "issues" are reflected back to me through him. The only thing I can do is take a deep breath and learn patience -- not with him, but with myself.

That's a hard lesson and one I've been trying to learn for most of my life. Still I have to give him kudos for trying to teach me. He's a brave little boy to take me on as a student. I sure wish he could see that he'll need more nutritional strength if he's going to meet this challenge.

And in the background as I type, I hear him sigh deeply and with an edge of exasperation as if to say, "Who's the challenge?"

Coming Back

Right now I'm sitting at my friends' computer at her house in Port Townsend. I haven't been back to PT in two years and I have mixed emotions about it. We drove in yesterday and were happy to see the skies clearing and the sun trying to make an appearance. It was good to leave the rain of Seattle behind, but there is so much more to a place than the weather.

I lived in PT for 17 years. 8 years ago I left and moved to Seattle. Those are the surface facts. The deeper details are a tangled web much of which I can't and maybe don't want to recall. But when I return here, especially after a significant absence, I am overwhelmed by the subdivision of my feelings. That's the best way I can describe it -- distinct plots of emotions and memories as neatly laid out as a housing project.

In one plot is the history of my relationships here. I had many friends in PT, but now it's winnowed down to just two with whom I stay in contact. Ironically, those are two people I met right before I left PT and while they keep me informed about all my other friends, I find it odd that when I come back to visit, I end up visiting them and not everyone else.

In another plot is my life on the farm -- the long-term relationship that held me here for longer than I should have stayed. I am reluctant to explore this acreage in any depth because it all seems so long ago and while important in the development of who I am now, I don't want to expend the energy. So when we drove by the road that lead to the old house yesterday, I glanced but had no desire to take a look. Some plots are best left unattended.

Then there's the plot of my teaching career that includes the students I worked with as well as all the teachers I've known. Last night some of those teachers were here and it was good to catch up -- to survey that plot again -- and realize I am still remembered. We also ran into a couple of former students, which is always a little awkward because I can't always remember their names or their personalities. Still they smile, we exchange a bit of history, and then I can move on holding a bit of that past in my back pocket.

There is the plot of new friends some of whom were here last night as well. I like the merging of those boundaries -- old friends introducing me to new people and then establishing my own relationship with people I didn't know while I lived here. And then there are the acquaintances who I sort of knew many years ago, who are friends with some of my older friends. They are like a web of connection through which I can pass on well wishes to those people I don't see anymore.

Of course there is the plot of gossip and after a late night of dinner and visiting, to settle down with the three last remaining friends to talk about who is dating whom, where so and so is working, and how much weight everyone has gained or lost is a nice indulgence. I feel as if I don't really have to put forth the energy to visit those plots because I catch up through the eyes of others.

The most significant plot to me, though, is not the people or the memories or the stories. It's the place. I miss many things about PT -- the food for one -- but what I miss most of all are the tall trees, the musty forest smell, the open pastures, and the beaches. We're going to go for a long walk on the beach this morning and though the rain has finally found us, I'm still looking forward to the salty air, the sandy walk, and that view across the water to the straight line of the horizon.

When I lived here, it was those long walks in the woods or along the beach that gave me peace. They were also the medicine that made me realize how much of my life I'd lived in fear. I suppose it's not ironic that now I've made a job out of walking dogs in the city since walking here in PT (usually with dogs) was the way I grounded myself, the way I found sanity at a time when I thought sanity was lost. Still, if I could take one thing back to Seattle with me, it would be the nature of this place -- the smells and sights and the long, long walks where I never see another soul.

Everyone is still asleep from last night's party. While I want more sleep, I found myself lying awake and listening to the morning chorus of birds calling me to go outside. I took the dogs out in the backyard and while they were eating their breakfast on the porch, three adult deer silently leapt over the fence and sauntered across the lawn. Luckily the city dogs didn't see them, but I watched and smiled, realizing I need to come back every now and again just to remind myself of the acreage on my past.

Happy Dance

As I write, there is a very long-haired dog sound asleep beside me. The curly one is on his bed in the living room -- his usual morning position.

My body is relaxed but tired today. I somehow thought that ending my teaching career would give me more time, but as of late, I've been busy. That's not a bad place to be considering, but it's not the place I thought I'd be. I worked last night at the pool -- apprenticing actually -- after spending the day walking dogs. Standing in a warm pool after walking 5 or 7 miles is exactly what my tired feet need, but both jobs are physical. Therefore, I'm tired -- a good tired, but tired all the same.

Still, like Woobie in the photo above, I find myself doing the Happy Dance...well, that and pinching myself. "Is this really my life?" I wake up asking. "Am I really making a living working with dogs?"

Okay, so I'm not rolling in the dough and I'm lucky to have Ann who has both a frugal approach to life and a good paying job, but still, I'm holding up my end of the financial part of our marriage and doing something I love. There's a lot to be said for that -- marriage and work I love -- and that's why I keep pinching myself. I keep reviewing exactly how I got here and most of it feels like a cosmic combination of luck and timing.

And dare I sound like one of those woo-woo guests on Oprah, there is something divine in trusting both my instincts and the universe. Sure, I still have the bad habit of worrying too much and an even worse habit of wondering if I've faked my way here and am actually not as good as everything thinks I am, but those feelings are not as intense anymore. Which I guess is to say that I'm trusting more -- trusting that perhaps I am good enough, perhaps I am competent and kind, perhaps I got here by my own character and not so much by chance.

While Woobie's Happy Dance exemplifies how I'm feeling about where I've landed, Rubin's levitation is also representational of each day when I realize I am in this amazing place in my life. "Hey," I find myself saying as Rubin is doing in this photo, "Look what I can do?"

Maybe I should write a book that will land me an interview on Oprah. Instead of "Eat, Pray, Love" it could be "Walk, Water, and Wonder." Even though some days the reality is more like "Poop, Rain, and Wrinkled Skin" either way, I'm still dancing and walking through my life a few inches off the ground.

Age

Yesterday we sat in the sun at my parents' house surrounded by elders -- my parents, two friends with whom I grew up (surrogate Aunt and Uncle as it were) and a more recent friend. We represented age by the decades -- 50s, 60s, 70s, and 80s. We talked of the past, we talked of the future, we talked of now, and we talked of our ailments. Collectively, there was enough medication prescribed we could have started our own pharmacy, but we didn't dwell on the aches and pains. We didn't dwell on anything too long, which is precisely why I loved the day.

And the roses...
And the canine youth amongst us...
Instead, we ate German. Bratwurst, sauerkraut, potato salad, German beer, and German chocolate cake. I ate myself stuffed and devoured the time with my aging parents and our aging family friends. Happy Birthday, Papa (the occasion for the festivities). You have always surrounded yourself with interesting people and I am happy (as are Ann and Rubin) to be counted among them.

On the drive home, Ann and I got to talking about the 32 years difference in our ages. There was a time in my life when 32 years seemed like an impossible journey, an eternity of sorts, but time, of course, has changed all of that. 32 years seems as quick as lightning these days and when I look forward to those years, I wonder how to slow them down, how to force my heels to the ground and press the brakes a bit harder.
The other day I heard a story on the radio that one of the low points of happiness in one's life is at the age of 50. The highest points are childhood and old age. Apparently, I am in the dip though things feel pretty wonderful right now, which either means the statistics are wrong or my life is going to get measurably more wonderful.

I vote for the latter.
Sitting around that sunny table (and where has the sun gone today?), I started to look forward to the days ahead. All those "old" people knew how to relax, knew how to appreciate good food, good friends, and good memories. All those elders knew that these moments were what it's all about and so they sat in the moment and took a deep breath. This is what I am learning as I slip from age 51 to 52. Or perhaps it's not a slip at all, but a step forward, a march onward.
I'm glad I've had such role models. And I'm not just glad that the important adults in my life are all still alive, but that the important adults in my life are people I love spending time with. I get to laugh. I get to eat good food. I get to take in the wisdom and question the assumptions. I get to ask for another bratwurst and hint at the need for a larger slice of cake. And I get to do what a lot of my friends don't -- I get to spend time with my aging parents who are relatively healthy and just as quick-witted and sharp of mind as they were when they were my age now.
So Happy Birthday again, Dad and thanks to both of you for inviting us to your wonderful party. Now, let's see if we can find that sunshine again!

Peeing in My Pants

In the pool with Gussy. Photo courtesy of Wellsprings K9.

As a child, I remember wetting my bed. I didn’t do it often, but I still have a clear memory of lying in bed after a terrifying dream or a dream where I think I’m sitting on a toilet and then the shock of waking up to the warm chill of wet pajamas and a soggy bed. I have vivid memories of the bathroom linoleum under my feet, the glare of the stark bathroom light, the icy washcloth in my mother or father’s hand, the smell of the fresh pajamas, and the feeling of clean sheets as they slid me back into bed.

I was never a chronic bed wetter, but the occasional times when it happened were enough to imprint long-standing feelings of shame. My parents never shamed me, they just methodically cleaned me up and put me back to bed, but still I learned early on that peeing in one’s bed or clothing was wrong. That, of course, didn’t stop it from happening as a child. Sometimes I wet myself after a fit of uncontrollable laughter or out of fear or when I waited too long and got stuck halfway to the bathroom and felt the warm humiliation trickle down my leg.

Once, when I was a teenager sent on a community ski bus up to the mountains for lessons, which I detested, I avoided the bathroom for long hours because it required fumbling with the layers upon layers of clothing my mother insisted I wear. Then, when I knew I had to go, but was neither close enough to the bathroom nor quick enough to drop my three layers of pants, I wet myself on the side of a very steep hill. At first, the warm sensation was a relief to the bitter windy cold of the mountain where I didn’t want to be in the first place, but the comfort was brief. Soon, the smell of urine overwhelmed me and my wet long underwear froze against my skin.

The bus ride home was interminable; my peers, none of who were my friends, sat as far away from me as they could.

Eventually my body and my common sense kicked in and the act of peeing in my pants became in impossibility. If I were swimming in the lake wearing my swimsuit I’d have a difficult time peeing in the water. Hiking in the mountains, squatting behind a tree or a boulder, I’d have to drop my drawers and wait for the longest time before my body would allow the function to happen naturally. My brain had learned and my body had complied, I must pee in a toilet with my pants down and my bottom bare.

Now, years upon years later, I have a new job, which requires that I wear a wetsuit for the entire length of my shift. I stand in a hydrotherapy pool for hours at a time helping injured and aging dogs recover muscle memory and tone by swimming in warm water and massaging them at the side of the pool. I love my job and despite the dryness of my chlorine skin, the bruised claw marks on my legs and arms, and the feeling that dog hair is permanently embedded in my nose, I can’t imagine working anywhere else or doing a different kind of work.

Until it comes time to pee. Sliding a wetsuit off and then back on takes time and I don’t have much between clients. So I invested in a wetsuit with a zipper that runs the full length of my crotch from my belly button to my lower back designed specifically to let me relieve myself. My boss calls them kinky pants, which they really are, but they serve an important function. They allow me to pee. Or so I thought. During my first 15-minute break between dogs in my new wetsuit I unzipped, squatted, and waited, but soon I found myself in a panic.

I had to go. I mean, I really, really had to go, but nothing came out. The pressure built and no matter how hard I concentrated, I could not pee. At first I thought something was wrong with me. A bladder infection. Kidney failure. A disease for which no scientist had conceived a name. Then I took off the wetsuit and I peed like a racehorse. Sweet relief. I put on my wetsuit, worked with another dog in the pool, and then once again made the attempt to pee using the handy zipper.

Torture. I could not pee. I breathed deeply. I tried to relax. Nothing. The pain was excruciating. What’s wrong with me? I thought. Why can’t I pee? Again, off with the wetsuit, racehorse time, and back on with the wetsuit to work with the last dog of the day.

“You’ve been conditioned to not pee in your pants,” my partner says later that night.

“But there’s a hole for me to pee out of,” is my response. “Why can’t I pee out of the hole?”

“Because your mind and body still sense that you have on pants and you haven’t peed in your pants in decades.”

There are so many processes where the brain takes over. Breath, heart, eyes, reflexes – functions that don’t need to be learned, but just are. Learning to pee in a toilet is learned. Diapers work up until then, but once you learn to pee in a toilet, there must be a neural pathway created that says, “Do not pee in you pants” and pretty soon, you can’t. Your brain won’t let you. There’s a communication block or an understanding that pants on means no peeing. Pants off – pee. Despite the little hole in my wetsuit, my pants are technically on. For all intents and purposes my brain can’t conceive of a hole in my pants as reason enough to release my bladder.

I kepy trying. By the third day, I’d figured out that I can pee in my wetsuit if I’m standing up, but that wasn't going to work for all sorts of reasons. Eventually, I sat on the toilet, the zipper unzipped, stretched my legs out to the side, leaned back on the toilet seat, took a deep breath, closed my eyes and willed every muscle in my body to relax.

Success. Ridiculous success. I’m rewiring my brain, I think, I’m rewiring my brain to be able to pee in my pants. To put aside all the shame and guilt and humiliation and allow myself the simple, convenient relief of peeing, though not technically, in my pants.

This will take some time.

Where I Stand

It's Sunday night. Tomorrow I go back to work. 3 hours of teaching, 3 hours of dog walking, and then obedience class for an hour. That's a short day. I think I can handle it. Tuesday's not so bad either, but Wednesday's shaping up to be a long one and Friday, too since I'll be working at the pool with the dogs. Oh, and let's not forget that I work a full day on Saturday. Thursday will allow a breath, but only a short one.

This is my life for now. Until June 11 when I am done with teaching and will be able to retrieve my mornings again. It's weird thinking about being on a non-teacher schedule. I know it's hard on Ann since we've almost always had the same schedule, but she knows this is the way the rest of the world works and so she is resigned to spending some Saturdays alone and waiting up on some nights.

At least it's no longer REI where I got home at 10 and worked one day every weekend. And I was sore from lifting backpacks onto the backs of rich people for less than $10 an hour.

It's a transition and my body can feel it from head to toe. There's the physical changes -- walking dogs for 4 hours a day then climbing into a pool with them for massage, active exercise, and doing my best to keep them level and swimming -- as well as the mental ones -- learning the difference between cross friction massage and passive range of motion, memorizing superficial muscles and all the tendons, and keeping track of the intricate communication system of client charts, scheduling books, and employee notes written on blue sticky notes.

My head sometimes feels like it's going to explode. But it can't yet because I must finish report cards -- 2 page narratives for 22 students -- and I must finish out the school year including a late night event for the students' final performance. My head must stay intact. My body, too.

Today was my only day off this week. Next Sunday and Monday I'll have off as well. There's a part of me that just wants to lie in bed all day and read a book while eating an omelet followed by waffles with strawberries and whipped cream. Working so much has helped me lose weight though I'm not sure it's a healthy way to lose it. At the end of a 13 hour day, when I've eaten very little, I down a quick dinner and fall into bed. On the days when I'm not working as much, I binge on as much food as I can tolerate hoping to supplement the calories I've missed on the days when I don't have time to eat.

I'm hoping it all levels out after June 11. I need it to level out. I need to feel the rhythm again in my life.

Soon.

Defining Rural

I didn’t want to wake up this morning. I wanted to sleep in for a long, long time. This is not a bad thing for I am usually an insomniac waking up at 2 in the morning to ponder details that seem important, but truly aren’t. When the alarm went off a 5:50 this morning, I groaned. Usually I say, “About time” since I’ve been lying awake for a good hour or so just waiting for the alarm to sound.

Not this morning. This morning I was deep in sleep dreaming about a contest where I could win oodles of money if I could give a good definition for the word “rural.” All the other contestants went before me and most had no idea what rural meant. When the judges finally got around to me I said, “Rural means a greater distance from what you think you need, which ultimately means you must drive your car way too much and pollute the natural, rural world where you’ve chosen to live.”

When the alarm sounded, I groaned (as I’ve said), but I smiled at my answer. I knew I’d won the contest even though I was no longer in the dream.
But I was still sleepy. Very, very sleepy.

Hours later I know if given half the chance, I could curl up under a warm blanket and take a long, long nap.

It’s not going to happen, but thankfully today I’ve scheduled my own massage. While it’s never happened before, I can imagine myself falling fast asleep on the massage table.
This is all a result, I suppose, of working three jobs – teaching in the mornings, walking dogs in the middle of the day, and working until late in the evening at the dog spa. I know I can’t sustain the “both ends of the candle” routine, but on June 11, teaching will end and I can sleep in.

I hope.

For now, though, my body and mind are tired. Actually, they are exhausted and aside from the teaching demands, it’s a good exhaustion. I’m at my growing edge these days learning the anatomy and physiology of dogs, massage techniques and medical documentation during my time at the pool, and continuing my education about dogs and their owners (something I do every day with my dog walking business).

I’ll be happy when my teaching job is done and I can sleep in a bit more though the early morning sun is making it difficult. Still, I’m amazingly happy. Not sure how that’s happened. Not sure how I’ve landed in a place that feels so right, but someone said to me yesterday that I am where I’m supposed to be and I guess that feels exactly right.

I guess I really did win the prize!

Queer Reflections

I am in my final month of teaching. After 24 years, I've tried to "retire" once before (two years ago), but then the financial crisis hit and I panicked. So I took a part-time job back at the old school where I taught before. The money has been nice, but I am so ready to be done.

But that doesn't mean I haven't been reflective about my career. I have. I know I'm a good teacher. I know I've done a lot of good in my career. I know that I've made a difference in a lot of lives and that if I had the stamina for it all, I'd teach to my grave. But I don't have the stamina. I need change. I need to be challenged and frankly, I've met and faced all the challenges teaching has had to offer.

Still, this morning as we were reading our all-class novel (Totally Joe by James Howe), I realized that so much has changed over the past 24 years. The novel is about a middle school boy who is "totally gay" and figuring out what that means as he moves through those difficult years of adolescence. It's a great book and given the popularity of the television show GLEE, the novel has given us a lot to talk about.

20 years ago (even 10) we NEVER would have talked about this stuff. By this stuff I mean, gay stuff. 20 years ago (even 10) I couldn't be out to my students. In fact, 20 years ago I was doing my best to hide my identity for fear I'd be fired or accused of something immoral. Now, as I look out over my classroom of 22 students, three have gay and/or lesbian parents, two have gay uncles, and 75% of the class adores the show Glee and the gay character, Kurt.

Sure, they still giggle when Joe, the character in the novel we're reading, talks about kissing a boy and sure they get a little squirmy when he talks about playing with dolls and dressing up like a girl, but then they make comments that floor me. "I don't want Joe to break up with Colin," one student said this morning.

"But Colin' being a jerk," said another in response. "Can't he just be comfortable with himself?"

"But that's the point," another chimed in. "It's hard to be true to yourself if everyone is teasing you and calling you hateful names."

Of course, they have a long way to go in some regards. They're writing their own stories as well and none of the characters in their stories are gay and even the kids with gay parents didn't give the characters in their stories gay parents, but still, I marvel at how much more enlightened this generation is than the previous ones.

And I suppose I played a part (a very small part, but a part nonetheless) in "enlightening" generations about queer issues over the last few decades.

There are parts of teaching I'll miss. Reading novels out loud and discussing them is one of the things I'll miss. Kids have amazing insights and even though I've read some of the novels 10 or 15 times over, when I read them with kids, I learn something new every time -- a new perspective, a new connection, a new insight.

But there's that stamina thing again and I just don't have the stamina. It's time to pass the baton to some other queer teacher who can enlighten the next generations.

Been Awhile...so much has changed

I know, it's been awhile. It's been such a long while I forgot my login name and password.

Not that anyone cares. I write this to clear my head, which of late is very crowded.

I woke up at 5 this morning. I'm bummed that I couldn't sleep longer especially since it's Saturday and I really have no reason to get up early. But here I am, awake, my head spinning and my feet cold.

Inside the crowded space I call my head is the following:

I must get up and begin reading my text for animal massage school. Yes, I've enrolled and the materials arrived the other day so with yellow highlighter I've been reading about dog senses and cat's whiskers (among other things) and the whole time I'm worried that I'm not going to remember a thing when it comes time to take the end of the chapter quiz.

There is no food in the house. What shall we have for breakfast?

The house needs a good cleaning. When will I find time to do that?

I must go to work at 11 this morning. Yes, Saturday work, which is really an apprenticeship at this point and perhaps this is what crowds my brain the most. I applied for a job working at a hydrotherapy pool for dogs. I got the job (to my joyous surprise) and have been working their about 12 hours a week. Every moment I'm exposed to so many new things that I'm both giddy and overwhelmed. I can I learn all of this?

Sheila, my new boss, is phenomenal. She knows so much and is extremely thoughtful and patient teaching me. I catch on quickly to the routines none of which have anything to do with the dog's rehabilitation. Things like turning on the jets, cleaning the filters, washing the floors, and returning phone calls. I find myself gravitating to those tasks because when we're in the pool, an aging or injured dog between us, I am flooded with vocabulary I am trying desperately to understand. Proprioception, Plantar Extension, Plantar Flexion, Hyper tonicity and on and on and on.

Then there are the techniques for swimming the dog -- using the pulley system, not using it; balancing the dog by holding the outer back toes or rotating the tail between your fingers; holding the dog against the side of the pool using your knees and hips; inverting the dog and pressing their spine against your belly; medial lines and lateral lines and on and on and on.

But what makes it hard to sleep is not the learning so much as it is the fact that I have four jobs going at once. I am still teaching in the mornings, then walking dogs in the middle of the day, and then working at the pool in the afternoons and evenings. Oh, and let's not forget the article I'm supposed to write for school (part of my job description), which makes a total of four jobs.

I know it's temporary. I know the teaching will end on June 12 and for that I am eternally grateful. But getting to June 12 feels like a long wait. I just want to be in the pool learning more or sitting on my couch reading about gait analysis and massage techniques so when I'm walking dogs or working in the pool I will feel confident.

Yes, that's it. A lack of confidence wakes me up each morning and in the pit of my stomach, I can feel this excited hesitancy bubbling away, which activates my brain and gets the thoughts and lists ticking away at 5 in the morning. So today, even though it's Saturday and I'm allowed to sleep in, I got up.

And let's not forget that my sister flies in this afternoon. What psychic energy that's going to take. Energy I don't feel like I have right now. Still, I'll do my best to be present and polite, to listen to her endless stories about her work and her cats and god knows what else.

I'm glad I have a few hours at the pool this morning. Despite all the challenges of learning new information and even feeling a lack of confidence, when I'm in the pool working with a dog, there is a calm that comes over me. It's primal in many regards and it feels exactly like what I need right now in my life. Something grounding. Something where my brain and body must connect in ways that doesn't happen when I teach or even when I walk dogs or even when I write.

Of course, I'm tired now. Ready to go back to bed, but instead I'll figure out something for breakfast and move through the day one foot in front of the other.

Can't See the Stars

I can't see the stars tonight -- way too many clouds along with wind and rain. But if I could, I think they'd be out of whack. Here's why:

Friends' house got broken into and ransacked today.

Rubin's friend Monty is feeling crummy and has the squirts.

The doctor finally put me on blood pressure medication...it makes me feel old.

Everyone unexpectedly converged here for dinner throwing off the night I needed to organize the last of my taxes (they're done I just need to tie up loose ends and WRITE THE CHECK TO THE IRS...who me, yelling?)...and go over the edits for my Caylx piece.

But there's always tomorrow.

Ann's at a school event, though I'm hoping she comes home soon. Rubin is under the desk grumpy with me because I cleaned his ears.

I need a bath.

I need something sweet.

Things feel a bit disorganized.

So I'm trying to remember the words of one of my students last week who, during her parent-teacher conference, said, "I think I'm doing well in class because I'm using my time affectionately."

I need some of that wisdom right now.

Wish I could at least see the stars.

The Book I'm Not Reading

I'm actually reading a book, but last night we saw Patty Larkin in concert with John Gorka. He was okay, she was fabulous. Amazing guitarist. I don't know why she's not better known. It's not really the lyrics that are amazing, but rather Patty's riffs. As our friend said last night, "It's like she has extra joints on her fingers!" Anyway, she sang one of my favorite songs -- The Book I'm Not Reading -- with the chorus that says, "I need someone to read me stories."

That's what I was supposed to do with the current book -- read it out loud with Ann, but she's still finishing up Kingsolver's latest (The Lacuna), which I finished a while back and then I read Erdrich's new one (Shadow Tag) and had nothing to read while Ann was still working her way through Lacuna. So, I picked up "The Girl Who Fell From the Sky" by Heidi Durrow and Ann asked if we could read it out loud. I said yes, but then started reading it and am now halfway through.

My excuse? It's not a good read aloud, but it is a good book. Quite good.

I've been on a reading binge of late. I suppose that's a good thing because it helps get more stories in my head. Next up is Ash by Malinda Lo, a young adult novel that is the retelling of the Cinderella story with a lesbian twist.

All this reading means I haven't been writing. Well, I've been "helping" Rubin write his daily dog blog, but I haven't really been focused on "serious" writing -- writing that involves no quotation marks. But today, the mail guy delivered the copy edited version of my story that has been selected by Caylx for publication in July. It's filled with all sorts of editing suggestions complete with an editing guide to help me figure out the chicken scratch in the margins.

I'm half tempted to send it back and say, "Looks great, go ahead," but I feel the need to look at it closer and find something that I disagree with if only to make myself look intelligent. HA! (All the while the editor may well be checking out this blog to see if they made a mistake deciding to publish one of my pieces! Such is the nature of internet publishing, I suppose. Note to Caylx editors: If you're reading this, I am a reasonably intelligent woman who, like most of my generation, have a wobbly sense of self esteem that, despite years of therapy, still asks, "Did they really like what I wrote?")

But the point is, I'm reading more than I'm writing these days and replaying the sage advice of one of my mentors (Diana Hume George) who told me that reading IS writing so never apologize. I'm not apologizing, Diana, just shouting out through this blog that I'm being productive.

Really.

Oh, and I've been cooking. Tonight's concoction was pasta with olive tomato sauce. Simple, easy, and mighty tasty. Now we have enough food for the week! Alas, I always make way too much, but it's a good thing since we both like to eat leftovers for lunch.

Still, in the back of my mind are the threads of a story. I'm not a fiction writer, but I keep trying to convince myself that if I write the story like it's true (the nebulous definition of creative nonfiction), I can pull it off. First, though, I must read to keep those creative juices flowing.

I must admit, it's not helping to watch season two of "Damages" on DVD. I can easily binge on Glenn Close and the show has so many twists and turns that dig me deeper and deeper into the story, I'm expecting to strike oil soon!

Terrible metaphor, but remember, I'm in my reading mind, NOT my writing one.

Dreams of Swimming

I woke early this morning after a dream where I was swimming deep underwater though the water was actually in a pool that stretched out from someone's home for blocks and blocks. I think I was in the neighborhood of Lower Queen Anne trying to find the house of a dog I walk. I found the dog, but as soon as I put him on a leash and realized there was water all around the house, the dog turned into a 4-year-old boy. And just like the dog, the boy/dog had very red, curly hair.

"Can you swim?" I asked.

"Living here," he said, "I have to!" Then he laughed and dove in.

I followed though I held tightly to the leash that was attached to the boy/dog's belt. We held our breath, but we didn't need to. We could talk underwater and soon I realized I was breathing underwater as well.

"We have to go through that tunnel," the boy/dog told me and so we swam into a narrow passage only to be met by a large, long lizard. Instinctively I knew the lizard was harmless because he looked at us with the same fear and trepidation that we looked at him.

It was then that I heard the voice of a friend who said, "Whatever you do, don't turn around. Swim toward the lizard." My friend had driven me to this watery house and she was waiting for us in her car out on the street. We were trying to swim toward her and somehow she could observe what we were doing.

I started to swim forward, but the boy/dog turned around and swam the other way and I no longer had hold of his leash. Even the lizard looked worried especially when a bright light lit up the tunnel from behind us.

This is when I woke up, my sciatica burning a hold in my left leg and the strong urge to pee overwhelmed me. I got up, hobbled to the bathroom, did my business, and headed back to bed, but sleep was hopeless with my burning leg and butt nagging me awake every few minutes.

Sometimes dreams are just dreams, but sometimes they are not. I can't really figure this one out. I know there is some flux in my dog walking schedule with the said red-headed dog's family putting their house up for sale while trying to find a new home hopefully in the area. Another dog walking client is doing the same (moving that is), so perhaps my curious dream reflects the uncertainty of these two clients.

But the swimming part is intriguing. I love to swim. Swimming calms me. Swimming is a meditation for me. Being able to breathe underwater is often something I can do in my dreams. It feels natural and since I think I spent half my childhood in a pool, it makes sense that I find water to be a safe place.

But the lizard thing and the bright light behind me, the light that I knew represented fear, confuses me. What does that mean?

I'll have to think about this today. There maybe something there, there may not, but I know that I've been trying to work something out in my dreams lately, I just am not certain what it is. Regardless, dreaming of swimming makes me want to actually go swimming, which may be a result of my massage therapist encouraging me to get back in the pool to help with my sciatica.

Easier said than done these days, but I'll do anything at this point to end the burning in my butt and leg.

First up, though...a walk at the park with Rubin...my own curly-headed, semi-blond little boy...so he can go for a swim and romp around in the big field with all the other dogs.

Crossing the Rubicon

Not until I watched the ridiculously overdone ROME series did I put two and two together: The Rubicon is river in Italy. Crossing was forbidden. Thus when Caesar crossed it, well there was hell to pay...really overwrought hell according to the HBO series.

Silly me. Being a history major I should have known this, but somehow that little fact didn't stick. I wonder how much else goes unstuck?

My dreams last night were all over the map, but the one that sticks ended with a huge house fire, an emaciated father standing with his almost dead young son in his arms, and the father shouting to the fire, "Take me, not my only begotten son!" And then the father collapsed and died. I didn't stay asleep long enough to know what happened to the son.

I can't even begin to imagine what that dream was about. Religiously themed dreams rarely populate my sleep, but this one was definitely religious. Except when I woke up from the dream, I kept thinking -- Who was God? The father with the son in his hands or the fire? I imagine many who question the foundations of Christianity have asked that very same question.

The dream has stayed with me this morning. Not in a bad way. Not even in a good way. It's just stuck -- images, sounds, and all -- unlike the factoid about the Rubicon.

Of course, now that I know about the Rubicon I'll not forget it. When things stick with me, it's hard to un-stick them and while that might seem like a good thing, it's not. At least, not always. They become tidbits I gnaw on at the weirdest times -- usually in the middle of the night -- and I have a hard time letting them lie flat. I pick at them constantly.

Perhaps my dream was informed by my late night reading -- Barbara Kingsolver's "Lacuna." I read a lot of the reviews before I purchased the book and most weren't glowing. Reviewers liked the book, but thought it lacked something and they kept comparing it to her other novels, particularly "Poisonwood Bible." That must be a bummer for Kingsolver. Kind of like a famous musician always asked to play their hits from 20 years ago. Does she always have to write that same novel over and over to get noticed?

I mean, I liked Poisonwood, but I also really liked "Prodigal Summer" -- so different from each other, but each with enough weight to draw me in and make me live the stories in my head even when I wasn't reading. Lacuna is very different and yet those images, the rhythm of the voices stick with me even when I'm doing the most mundane tasks.

Yesterday, I had to venture into Costco for some needed items. Costco is always overwhelming, but on a Saturday afternoon, it's stupefying. I survived simply by recalling the voice of Harrison Shepard, the storyteller in Kingsolver's book. His voice calms me only it's not his voice, it's really hers and that is why I find this novel as powerful and wonderful as her previous ones. The character is in my head and yesterday, while elbowing my cart through the crowded Costco isles, I thought about Mr. Shepard's voice (aka Ms. Kingsolver's) again and again. How does she do that, I kept thinking, how does she make me hear him, see him, feel him when all the while it's her?

I like it when things like this stick. It's a comfort. So it's hard for me to figure out how my religious dream of begotten sons connects to the soothing voice of Kingsolver's story. Maybe there is no connection and the psychic patchwork of dreams threaded these facts together until I was left with images of a dying father and a limp son falling perilously close to the flames.

I cannot make sense of what sticks and what doesn't. We each have our own Rubicons to cross, I suppose, I just wonder what hell I'm trying to pay.

No News

I'm doing my best NOT to read the Huffington Post. It was a New Year's Resolution. I made it because I found myself reading it every chance I got and the more I read, the more yucky I felt. It appears that everyone has an opinion about everyone else and even though those opinions are often conflicting, the headlines are bold and threatening, warning of dire consequences should one opinion prevail over another.

I started reading the Huffington Post during the last presidential elections. I wanted to follow the polls and the pundits in hopes that my candidate would get elected. Now that he has, the polls and pundits are chronicling his every move and subsequent opinions about his performance beat on the website like an erratic and ailing heart. After reading the posts, I find myself searching for my own feelings and opinions and often can't find them because they're buried under the words of "experts."

Years ago -- before I was a teacher, before I was a dog walker, before most of my life -- I worked in television news. I was a "behind the scenes" worker who coiled up cables, tested microphones, and sent signals back to the news station for LIVE reports. I enjoyed my work, but found it extremely stressful since everyone in the newsroom took their jobs so seriously it was hard to remember that most people weren't glued to a police scanner just waiting for the next disaster.

I decided to leave the news business because I realized - while driving way over the speed limit to a car accident I'd been ordered to so the station I worked for could have "first coverage," - that local television news was about nothing more than paranoia and tragedy. The stories on the morning, afternoon, and evening broadcasts warned about all the things that could go wrong -- faulty wiring in new homes, baby food with potentially hazardous chemicals, diseases that could befall anyone who touched this, ate that, slept here, or vacationed there.

If the stories weren't fueled by fear, they were focused on someone's sorrow. Numerous times it was my job to hold a microphone up to a surviving victim of some heinous crime or worse, the grieving family. I followed reporters who knocked on the doors of the parents of a murdered woman or stand out on chilly nights while the reporter told the tragic story of the "family in the house behind me."

I have a vivid memory of being summoned from my warm bed on an early winter morning to cover the story of a fire in the north end. A husband and wife were found dead in the burned down house and we stood outside waiting for the body bags to emerge because body bags made for good visuals. And so we waited, for hours, because it turned out the husband was a famous artist who had just been sued by his daughter for years of sexual abuse. We didn't know that at the time, nor did the neighbors who set up lawn furniture to watch the action while they ate their breakfasts before heading off to work.

Turns out the daughter had set fire to her parents' house in revenge for all the tragedy her father made of her life and so we spent the next week searching for people who knew the family, who could provide any information. "Did you see this coming?" was a common question followed by "How does it feel to know she did this?"

It was tragic and therefore was the lead story in the 5 o' clock news followed by a story about a dentist who sexually molested his patients.

Depressing. The job was depressing and stressful and so out of touch with reality. Yes, those horrible things happened, but when all you could focus on were the horrible things it was difficult to find any not-horrible things in the world.

That's kind of how I feel about HuffPost. Well-written, articulate analysis that focuses on the problems of the world is, in my humble opinion, no different than poorly written, inarticulate crap focused on the problems of the world -- it's all just focused on the negative and pretty soon, that's all you can see.

So, I've taken to reading food blogs and photography blogs, and postings about rescued dogs. I still listen to NPR because I can tune out what I don't want to hear and at least once every few hours, there's a great story about creativity or music or a funny new play in New York that I'll probably never see.

This week in my classroom, we're taking a brief look at the Civil Rights Movement as a prelude to a new novel we'll be reading. In my introduction to the students I said that to me, history isn't about events or wars -- it's about people and their stories. So we'll be taking a look, I told them, at the individual stories of the 1950s and 60s. Some will be sad, I explained (because their 5th graders and they are moved by sadness), and some will be inspiring. But remember, I added, that people change the course of history and it's their stories that can inspire us to action.

Those are the stories I wish I could read more of on the Huffington Post. Imagine how that might change our outlook on the world around us?

Living with Elvis

I woke this morning and greeted Elvis in the mirror. We do this every now and then, arranging a visit about once every 7 or 8 weeks. Generally, our get-togethers are brief -- he smiles, I scream and then it's over. But today, looking at Elvis in the mirror, I realized he was going to be around for awhile seeing as how the woman who cuts my hair - Mary - is finishing up her honeymoon in Paris for the next few weeks.

If it weren't her honeymoon, I'd be made at her. How dare she take a vacation (to Paris of all places) and leave Elvis to wreak havoc on my life!

Elvis, you see, lives in my hair. After a night of tossing and turning, smooshing a pillow on top of my head or burying myself in the covers, my hair rises like a mountain on my head. "The bigger the hair," Mary tells me, "the closer to God."

She doesn't mean it. Neither of us are religious and therefore not focused on being closer to God, but still, one look at my stack of hair and even she is singing Elvis tunes.

Many people admire my hair. Not now, of course, not when it's got a life of its own, but in general, when Elvis is away and my hair behaves itself. At 51, I am lucky to have a thick, healthy head of hair, gray though it may be. People often comment on it-- the salt and pepper coloring, the waves or curls if it's recently gotten wet from rain or from swimming, the thickness of it -- but when it gets long, like now, it is so strong and so thick that it doesn't fall around my face. Nope, it stacks up on top of my head.

Once, when I was bored with my haircut, I decide to grow my hair out. It took forever and though I knew I'd have to live through the ugly stage, I didn't realize that the ugly stage would put me in the company of entertainers like Elvis or Conway Twitty or those tele-evangelists who must have to spray their hair with lacquer to get it to stand so tall.

I use gel to subdue any elevation and still, it rises every morning like prehistoric mountains pushed up by shifting tectonics.

My hair got wide, too when I was trying to grow it out. The longer it got, the more it grew out sideways never gaining enough weight to hang down long. So now I keep it short, but if I don't schedule a haircut every 6 weeks or so, the top part grows sky high and Elvis comes by for a visit.

"You need a haircut," my teaching partner said to me the other day. Even though I laughed, I was a bit wounded.

"Elvis is in the house," I sang out. She laughed uncontrollably.

Mary doesn't come back for another two weeks. I'll need to pick up some more hair gel when I see her. I've been over-indulging in the stuff in an attempt to tame the wily beast, but still, every morning, Elvis and I meet in the mirror.

The only thing I'm missing are sideburns and a sequined-studded white leather coat and pants.

Too bad Halloween is so far away.

To Be Resolved

This is the time of year when I am always more resolved than others. I make resolutions and then get frustrated (sometimes even before I start) that I don't stick to them. Still, I feel compelled to come up with a list of things I'd like to change about myself and my life's routine. I'm not sure if it's some ingrained message that I must make resolutions or if the dark evenings and long nights make me more reflective of my laziness and disorganization.

Okay, I'm not that bad, but this time of year everything, including me, slows down. Yesterday, for instance, I had planned on reorganizing the kitchen cupboards (perhaps after seeing my mother's highly organized kitchen over the holidays), but found myself on the couch watching reruns of Law and Order SVU, many of which I had seen before. Eventually I fell asleep under the warm down and flannel blanket and woke up in time to feel the guilt of not finishing a task I'd set out for myself.

So I got up and cleaned the house. While it needed to be done, the kitchen cupboards remain in disarray this morning and I feel slightly guilty that I did not complete my goal.

Why then, would I choose to make a list of resolutions for 2010? It just feels like an invitation for failure.

Yet, resolutions this time of year feel compelling and so I find myself making lists in my head about losing the last 10 pounds I can't seem to shake, setting up a routine for morning stretches and meditation, joining a yoga class, and putting myself on a news fast to fight off that hopeless feeling every time I hear the stock market has dropped, terrorism is on the rise, and that the man that I voted for President is acting more like a Republican than the Progressive I so hoped he'd reveal himself to be.

But let's face it -- I am a tad bit OCD and making a list is as satisfying as making certain the picture frames in the house are straight or the ottoman is centered in front of the couch. It doesn't help that recently I went to the doctor for a much needed (and rather avoided) physical exam. Blood tests revealed that while my bad cholesterol is a bit high, by good cholesterol is stellar offsetting the bad effects of the cruddy stuff. And even though my blood pressure is moderately high, the fact that I don't smoke or drink and exercise far more than most my age, I am at a low cardiovascular risk.

Sweet.

But give a woman like me a high number - as in my bad cholesterol -- and you'll find it on her list of New Year's resolutions as "Eat Oatmeal!" When the doctor gives the same woman an order to monitor her blood pressure once a week, know that said woman will monitor it twice a week and religiously write it down in the handy-dandy little card given to her by the doctor. In addition, she will resolve to meditate in the mornings, take yoga classes at least once a week, and practice breathing in times of stress.

Though I might not write down my resolution list this year, it runs like credits in my head scrolling by me in a bright white on a dark background. I will be resolved even when I try to fight it. The trick is, as it always is, not let the resolutions fade by the end of January. That's a resolution I struggle keeping.

And yes, I know I am not alone.

To Write About Death

Death, they say, is a part of life. I get it. I know it, but still, until you have to deal with it -- the death-it -- it's easier to just talk about it as an elusive someday. But as I get older, the someday gets closer and I am forced to let death be a part of my life.

It started with Jim M., a man I thought of as a beloved Uncle, but who was more than that in many ways. He was substance and satire, sturdy and symbolic. If I were to pick one person out of all the family friends who would die first, I never would have picked him. Even though he smoked for a long, long time -- longer than he should have -- and even though he had one of those hard, round bellies cardiologists warn you about, I never would have picked him to be the first.

Probably in the whole scheme of things he wasn't the first, but for me, he felt more like the first than anyone else.

There were other deaths in between Jim M's and Ann's mom, but their impact was not of the same weight or significance. That sounds cold when I write it, but deaths have different weights, like a Richter Scale. While some are a magnitude of 5 and there is significant damage to lives and hearts, a magnitude 6 is ten times more significant and you feel that damage as if it were a thousand times more powerful.

Ann's mom, Genevieve, was in many ways a thousand times more significant, but for very different reasons. It was unexpected. It is unresolved. No one really knows for certain how she died, under what circumstances, and the clouds around her death will most likely remain there for years and years to come -- unresolved. Jim M's death was tragic, too. Asbestos the weapon, corporate greed the murderer.

That's what they share in common, I suppose -- what their deaths both share in common -- that they were both murdered though no one will ever truly be prosecuted for the crimes. No amount of reparations can replace either of them be it money from lawyers willing to settle or from estates spread from Mexico to France.

And then, Jim F. dies as unexpected as any of them, and I am consumed by memories of my childhood, of the days and weeks I spent with his daughter, my best friend, on their 20 acres in what was once a rural part of the county. Carrol, his daughter, had a huge influence on who I became as an adult. She was wildfire and I was water. She was a tiger and I was a kitten. She was the ascent from the highest peak and I was rock firmly resting on solid ground. She'd jump from a plane without a parachute and I wouldn't even step onto the plane. Night and day, but we balanced each other in many ways.

I think her father, Jim F. knew that. Though he was rarely around, rarely really in Carrol's life, he stormed through often and frequently enough that he knew I was the common sense to Carrol's irrational risk-taking. And for that, he treated me like a daughter. Not all loving and cuddly or even supportive and proud, but rather he smiled when he saw me and he'd occasionally give me a hug. He's ask about my life, check in on what I was doing, and he'd do so with the utmost sincerity.

I can't imagine what Carrol is feeling. Her relationship with her father was stormy at the best of times and tsunami-like the rest of the time. She feared him in many ways (I did too...perhaps more than she did), but she always defied him. She'd swing from one end of the teenage angst continuum to the other never resting in the middle, which is where her father would have liked her to land.

Still, he was proud of her, he loved her -- that was obvious -- but there was always the hint of cynical disappointment that his daughter didn't quite turn out like he'd imagined.

Of course, the dead get off easy. It's the living who must deal with all of these questions and doubts, losses and longings.

I've been trying to write a sympathy card to the Jim F's family all day, but I stumble over my own words. Yes, I am sad at his passing and even sadder that his family must now keep on living with all that baggage of their relationship with their father, husband, brother, but Jim F's passing is a 3 on my Richter Scale and I'm struggling to not feel bad about that. Maybe he should be a 5 or a least a 4, I keep thinking. Maybe if he were a 4 the words would flow more easily and the sympathy card would say what I need it to say.

Instead, I just keep thinking about that funny man -- the odd and scary one, too -- who had a biting wit and a quick temper. I keep remembering how we were forbidden to go into his study and how, as a kid, I thought for certain it was protected by an invisible electric fence. I keep remembering how, when Carrol and I would bake cookies or heat up soup, he'd gruffly tell us to "Clean the damn kitchen," or "Don't make a damn mess" and I find it hard to be gentle and thoughtful in my sympathy for his family.

To write about death is more complex than any other topic I've ever tried to write about. It has such layers, stretches to depths I can't quite grasp. It's tangled like roots and knotted together in complex twists my fingers hurt with the attempt to pull it apart.

Ann put a photograph of her mother on the wall in the study the other day. I know she needs to do this, but the other night I had to tell her that it was hard to work when Genevieve kept looking at me with her sad, tired eyes. "Perhaps we could find a different photograph," I suggested and Ann agreed. Ann's sister sent a photograph the other day with a note that said she, too, was trying to "bring up some fond memories."

That is all we are left with in the end, I suppose, shreds of memories that hold us up in the tumble of our grief. Too many are tumbling these days. I want to recall the memories, allow myself to remember fondly, but sometimes I find myself just shutting down. It's too much, I think, it's too much and I worry that this is just the beginning.

Death is a part of life. Death is a part of my life now more than ever and the future does not look promising.

And then I think of when I first heard the expression of Mother Jones who said, "Pray for the dead and fight like hell for the living." I always thought that was a feisty bit of advice, but now, with these deaths of the past few years, I understand what she was saying in a much different way. It is the living who need us the most.

It is the living who I need the most.

Due Dates

Ann flies out tomorrow morning for Phoenix where she'll meet up with her younger sister for the 3 1/2 drive to Mexico. There they'll connect up with their mother's much younger boyfriend and they will divide up their mother's ashes.

Genevieve died Monday morning and our house has been about answering phone calls and Skype calls and emails -- from France and Mexico and Madison, Wisconsin. Ann spent all day yesterday in her classroom preparing lesson plans for the week and tonight admitted that she's lost her patience with demanding parents and energetic second graders.

Nothing's really hit her yet. At least, that's my unprofessional assessment. She cried on Monday morning just a bit, but has been focused every day on working, preparing, and making plans to travel to Arizona and then to Mexico. I know she'll cry eventually. She's not the kind who doesn't cry. She hates it when I tell her, but she's not a pretty crier so I can only imagine how ugly it will be when she really opens up and lets herself feel the loss of her mother.

And then when it hits her that her father is gone, too. They'll be a flood.

We're planning a memorial in early December in Phoenix. Ann has asked me to go with her then, but not tomorrow. When we made that decision it seemed like the best one, but now that I think about her in Phoenix and then Mexico absorbing it all and crying in that tight-fisted way she does, I wish I were going to comfort her.

But I don't think there is much comfort to be offered. Her mother died. Unexpectedly, but not necessarily surprisingly. Her mother's health had always been iffy and she was stubborn about her medications and doctor's opinions. You couldn't argue with her. She knew what she was going to do and there was no persuading her otherwise. She'd lived her whole life like that so it makes a kind of ironic sense that she'd die that way clutching her heart that she was convinced was perfectly fine even after all the doctors told her otherwise.

Ann is pragmatic, though. Unlike me, she doesn't hold onto things past their due date. She feels her grief with intensity and commitment, but when she's grieved, she moves on with sensitivity and practicality. I'm not sure I could do the same, but then I'm the person who holds onto way too much stuff long past its due date.

Still, I wish I could be there when the tears come just to hold her, just to listen, just to hand her tissues and remind her to breathe. That's the problem with her crying, really. She holds her breath for what seems like hours. Her face scrunched up and red it's like she'll burst. And then I say, "Breathe" and she laughs just enough to take some air in once, twice, and then holds her breath again and then I wait, nervous about how long it's been since her last breath and I say, "Breathe" and we go through the whole thing again.

Rubin is worried. He sees her packed bag by the front door and all night long he's curled up by her feet, wherever she may be, and sighs these big deep sighs. He's reminding her to breathe too. He wants to be there in Phoenix and in Mexico, but instead, we'll be here waiting for her phone calls, her Skype calls, her emails...waiting for her return.

This is the time of my life, isn't it, when people die? I've been lucky (if luck is really the right word) that not too many people I'm close to have died yet. There have been some, important people, but when I talk to others my age, my death statistics are a mere blip on the screen compared to others. Of course, that might mean that my blip, when it happens, spikes all at once. For now, my grief tank is pretty full compared to so many others.

Compared to Ann's.

Ann comes home on Saturday evening. I'll be there, of course, with open arms and the dog waiting in the car in the airport parking lot. She'll like that, to see the dog and know that she's coming home. She'll talk about the difficulty of it all -- finding the will, bringing home the ashes, seeing her mother's belongings, meeting the boyfriend for the first time. She'll talk about the stories she remembered with her sister and the hot weather in Phoenix and the hotter weather in Mexico. She'll talk about her Dad, remembering his death again. And she'll talk about her mother and the complicated relationship she had with her, they all had with her.

And I'll make potato leek soup again, from her mother's recipe, and bake fresh bread and on Sunday morning, we'll get up and I'll drive to the wonderful French bakery in West Seattle and buy a fresh baguette and some pomme chaussons for us to eat. I'll make her my best latte and rub her feet and later, when Rubin gives us that look, we'll go for a walk down by the lake and look for the turtles who like to bask in the sun.

It's November now. They'll be no turtles. It's too cold, but we'll look anyway. You just never know.

Gnawing

I like how Rubin deals with his frustrations. Take this photo where he's destroying a large stick with glee. I sometimes feel like I need a large stick on which to gnaw. Even the word "gnaw" sounds mighty appealing. It actually fits the action which it labels.

Currently, I'm still sort of gnawing on being "fired" by one of my dog walking clients. Everyone tells me not to worry. She'll pay me for last month's services and that will be that. But late at night (or early in the morning) I find myself still gnawing that stick. It doesn't matter what the gnaw is about, I just can't seem to let it go, which is funny because, in the middle of the day, when everything is rational and balanced, I'm actually glad to be rid of her. And her dog, too.

That dog was my most difficult walk and since I walked her every day, I started to dread the 1 o' clock hour. I liked her well enough, but the physical energy I had to exert to get that dog to focus on walking nicely was exhausting. A few weeks ago I got a massage from my favorite massage therapist. She started digging into my left shoulder when I flinched and gasped. "Sorry," she said, "But there's something deep here."

"The dog," I said only I named the dog and then I told her how hard I had to work to not be pulled down the street by this exuberant, out-of-control dog. Weird thing is, I really liked the dog. I mean, when she settled down and we got to walking, she was really quite fun and silly. But settling down and getting to walking sometimes took 50 minutes of the hour we were together. Sometimes, because I felt so sorry for her that she had to go back into her crate for another 5 hours after I dropped her off, I'd take her out for a longer time at no charge to the owner. That wore me out even more.

But today, when I was making a pear streussel and using the last of our tomatoes for a pasta sauce, I said to Ann, "I feel free knowing I don't have to walk that dog anymore."

Ann just kept correcting papers and so I added, "She really wore me out!"

"The dog or the owner?" Ann smiled without lifting her head up from the 2nd graders' spelling tests.

Good question.

So in those balanced moments like today, I'm glad my schedule has opened up more. I'm glad that my left side won't be pulled up and down hills, that I won't be jerked left to right or have to pick up large poos 5 or 6 times in one walk.

It's just at night when that I start gnawing on it all, replaying the whole thing in my mind again that I wish, like Rubin, I could just find a huge stick to destroy enthusiastically and then be done with it! Fall fast asleep in a little ball, my feet flinching with the memory of it all.

49 hours

My clock will be turned back one hour on Saturday night. I want to turn it back now, but then everything would be wrong tomorrow.

Still. Not everything has been right this week.

I want to turn it back now because I want time to turn back just a little. Not a lot. Just one hour of a little.

This has been a weird week. Ann's mother died at 5:30 Monday morning. We received an email from her ex-convict, Mexican much younger boyfriend. In broken English he wrote "your mother dead" and we sat staring at the screen like someone had just sent us a chain letter that we didn't quite understand.

Phone calls to Mexico and France and Phoenix and even to Peru. Arrangements. Cremation. Emails from her mother's Facebook friends. More phone calls. More emails.

Ann must buy a ticket to Phoenix, but not until her sister comes home from her vacation in Peru. They must make their plans. The day they drive to Mexico. The day they drive back to Phoenix.

Still Ann has not cried. She did at first, but only a little. Now it feels unreal. It's just a thought, not a reality yet. I know when she sees her sister she'll cry. They'll both cry and that will be good.

Meanwhile, I will stay at home until December when we will fly down together for a memorial. Meanwhile, I will continue working at the school in the mornings and walking dogs the rest of the day. The rest of the week.

Only one less dog since an owner "fired" me. A training dispute, she called it. Ironically, I was formulating a letter to fire her. So today, I didn't walk the dog I normally walk every day and I was happy about it. Well, sort of happy. I wasn't nearly as tired as I normally am on a Friday. I no longer have the dog pulling at my left arm, lunging forward on the wet sidewalks, making me worry that I'd slip on the slick leaves.

Yes, training differences. We can call it that.

And in between Ann's mother dying and the dog not being walked today were all these stupid worries that consume me at times, making it hard to sleep, making it hard to believe in myself, making me doubt the path I am on. Can my body take being a dog walker as a career? Can I make a living at it? I mean, I am making somewhat of a living, but I can't walk that many more dogs to increase my income. Do I really want to go back to teaching?

And what about Ann? She deserves time off, too. She deserves to find a passion and follow it. But we need her health insurance and her steady income. If I went back to teaching, even more part time than I already am, she might get that break and my body might not hurt so much from dogs pulling me down the street.

But it was only really one dog and now that dog is gone. I will miss her, but at the same time I won't miss the owner who thinks everything the dog does wrong is my fault. Yes, I am too excited and therefore the dog jumps on me and bites my hands or my collar or my hair. Yes, I am too excited. If I were calmer, she'd behave. Calmer like the owner only every time I see her with the dog, there is the same behavior -- the biting, the jumping, the crazy flaying and spinning.

Training differences. I should say.

So much is swirling around my head. Ann wants me to get angry and realize that this is for the best. No more dog that destroys my body. I want Ann to cry about her mother's death so I can comfort her. She must be sad. Or maybe not yet. Maybe it's not her reality yet.

It's so hard to figure out what to do next. That's why I need the extra hour so I don't have to anything next. The other 48 hours I'll do something -- mostly practicing letting it go -- but during that one hour I just want to sleep in or sit in the sun (if there's sun) or eat a waffle with blueberries or raid the Halloween candy one more time.

A 49 hour weekend. How blissful. Or so I hope.