My Dear Howie

I always knew it was going to be hard to say goodbye to him. From our first meeting, he captured my heart and took up residence within it. He left this world on Tuesday, the last day in September.

Howie was a shelter dog, although how anyone could leave such an adorable striped puppy behind, I could never imagine. But their foolishness was my fortune, because Howie -- as I've said many times before -- was the very best dog I've ever had.

He was a wonderful traveler, even when we had to drive for ten hours in a day, always cheerful, completely trustworthy, delighting in McDonald's for a breakfast egg.

And how he could run! We knew from the shelter that his mother was a German shepherd mix, and from his topline it was clear that he had some Queensland heeler in him, but whether the stripes came from a whippet or a greyhound, who knows? In a run with other dogs, there would come a point when Howie would just shift gears, and change from a rollicking mutt to a speed machine, leaving every other dog far behind.

When Alex and John brought Lillian home from the hospital, Howie carefully sniffed her, and then put the top of his head against her newborn feet. And then the cat walked in, and Howie ran him off with great roars of warning. Never was Howie anything but gentle and loving with the girls; as soon as Joan could crawl, Howie always cleaned her face as he passed by. (She loved it.)

He always had his eye on me, to follow me through the house, to keep me company outside. Even on his last day, he took up a station on the loveseat near my rocking chair, and every time I looked up, if he was awake, he was watching me. My dear, dear boy.

What I don't know how to speak of is how much I dreaded him getting older; he did it fairly gracefully, but the first time I saw him fall down, nearly two years ago, my heart started breaking. I knew that I wouldn't have him for very long after that, and was surprised that he made it into his fourteenth year.

In July he had a visit to the vet and she was impressed at how well he was aging, even though she managed to use the phrase "because he is so old" about ten times. But by then, he couldn't go for walks any more -- he could make it about a block up the street and back, and it would wear him out.

Over the past few weeks we saw him decline rapidly, falling down more and more often, sleeping most of the time, choosing to doze on our bed rather than keep us company outside. He began to withdraw, at night putting himself in the farthest location from us in our bedroom.

I miss him so much.

There will be other dogs in my life, I'm sure. I like dogs, and after all, my abuelita Grammy Palos always said that one should have animals around to let you know if there's anything evil about. But I strongly suspect that there will never be another one even close to Howie.

Howie Zimm   2001 - 2014

 

A Search for Meaning in Lent

Ah, Lent.

Kicked off by Sebastian's death, Ash Wednesday found me running a fever and sick with some annoying flu, with its attendant malais, coughing, and having to sleep sitting up. For a full two weeks I had the energy level of a salted slug.

During that time, the family tried to adopt a new pup, but sadly, the breeder lied about the little tyke's mental and physical fitness, and he was returned to the breeder's ownership so that she can be responsible when he seriously bites someone, which he will undoubtedly do.

Howie turned 13. That's old, and my dear little dog is definitely showing his age. He falls down if he doesn't focus on how he moves, and sometimes he panics when he can't get his feet back under him. Fortunately he doesn't roam around the house when I'm not here, and when I am here, he's with me, so I can get to him and calm him down until he can regain his feet. But I've noticed him bumping into things, and getting confused if he wanders into an unusual part of the yard; I have raise my voice to get his attention instead of the whisper or snap of my fingers I used before.

And Dink, my horse, is now 24 years old. That's old, too. He lost weight again this winter, so I have to supplement his feed with five pounds of senior horse feed each day. His energy level has tapered off and he's having trouble chewing his food properly.

A couple days ago, in a mood of purgation, I cleaned out my bedroom closet. It was disgusting; I don't think I'd cleaned in there for five years, maybe more. I ended up throwing out two huge garbage bags of clothes that were so junky (and unworn anymore) they weren't eligible to donate to charity, getting rid of ancient electronic equipment coated with San Joaquin Valley dust, and packing two more bags of clothes that were donatable that I just didn't want to wear anymore.

What does this mean for a Lenten message to me? Loss, impending loss, paring down the things I hold... I keep going back to this paragraph in St. Ignatius of Loyola's "First Principle and Foundation:"

... as far as we are concerned, we should not want health more than illness, wealth more than poverty, fame more than disgrace, a long life more than a short one, and similarly for all the rest, but we should desire and choose only what helps us more towards the end for which we are created.

I love my life, the world I live in, the people and creatures around me. But I do not own them. I must learn simply to honor them all, and rejoice in the Creation that has held them.

The photo is of blossoms on my cherry tree.

The New Book

Last year the half-wine barrel under the Japanese maple had begonias in it after the freesias were done. This year I dumped a bunch of packets of old seeds I found in the garage into it, and this one nasturtium came up, the last growth that the disintegrating barrel will sustain. At the end of the season, the barrel will become kindling, if it doesn't fall apart first.

One nasturtium -- what a laugh! The plant took over the whole planter and is sending out tendrils, hoping to conquer the planet. In spite of the shady location, this sun-loving creature is thriving, and gracing the landscape with a whole new look from begonias.

The crispness of the reddish-orange spots on the petals astounds me. How does it happen that such perfect designs appear on a lowly vine? It's a mystery, one that I never tire of seeing.

Yesterday, my friend Cathy -- Cathy the Mad Horsewoman -- officially gave up on rehabilitating her big horse Rusty. Years ago, when Cathy and I first rode together, Rusty was perfect, trusting Cathy to tell him what to do, completely in sync with his rider. They were amazing together. Then she had to go to work full-time, and gradually, when they rode out, his demeanor changed. He decided he was the one who had to be in charge.

He became so willful that when she tried to remind him of his station as mount, he threw himself around so violently that Cathy flew off the saddle and nearly had him fall on her as he flung himself to the ground. Her left wrist and arm shattered, along with her faith in her beloved horse.

The past year has been difficult; Cathy tried riding her other horse, old Peanut, but was so fearful of another incident that trail rides were fraught with tension; then old Peanut died, nearly 30 years old. Under intensive training, Rusty seemed to improve, only to revert to Mr. Nut Case again two weeks ago. It broke her heart, for she really loved that horse.

Yesterday she threw in the towel, and accepted another horse, on lease. His name is Chip, and I met him today. He's adorable, a short horse with a big body, a well-shaped head, and a friendly demeanor. (If I was in the market for another horse, I'd have bought him in a minute.) She's ridden him a couple times, and they seem to work well together.

It's a new volume for her, a whole new story on riding and horsey relationships. Her story with Rusty, her story with Peanut -- time to close the book on those years and begin a new one.

Maybe that's what life is all about in our late fifties: new stories, new books, close down the pages that went before. What's up next? Who knows where the new horse will carry us all.

Maybe Dr. Horse Ass Had a Point

After a couple days, I relented and tried the prescriptions Dr. H. Ass had commanded.

I've had three or four new lesions since then, but that's not enough time to see if what had been prescribed is effective. Except the salve, a steroid thing that did NOTHING for the itching and burning of the lesions, or for their healing. 

Late last week, I got a call from my doctor, saying I needed to go in and discuss the results of a recent bone density scan. Today I had that appointment.

Yeah, yeah. Due to my age, my lack of exercise for lo, these many years, my vitamin D deficiency, my calcium deficiency, and did I mention, my age, my bones are not in real good shape. We settled upon a strategy for the bones, but then revisited the itchies. Dr. H. Ass said the eruptions could be due to nerves, which -- God knows -- in my body are shot to smithereens.

We (my doctor, not Dr. H. Ass) talked about how I felt and reacted to stress stimuli, and now I'm taking a drug that she says will restore a balance in my neurotransmitters,  allowing my brain to explain to my nerve endings that "No, you don't have to fight or attack or run, things are going to be okay." That would be nice. 

So, the moral here is that women who are older need to get more aggressive with exercise. Beat the shit out of things. Gain some weight so that your hips don't get the idea they can go on vacations.  Take vitamins D and mineral calcium.  Stay active. 

Oh, and avoid stress. 

Hahahahahahahah!

What Next?

Tuesday morning at 4am I woke up, feeling wave upon wave of excruciating pain in my left shoulder.

I sat up to ease it, and oh, no, that didn't work at all; the waves just turned into a stabbing, burning encampment. Wondering what the hell I had done in my sleep, I found a more or less comfortable position, and fell back into the nightmares that have been bugging me lately. By 7:15 I was out of bed, hugging my left side, trying to find any position that didn't scream of profound personal injury. I thought that moving around would ease it; I was wrong. By 8, I was watching the clock to see it turn to 9am, at which point I was going to call the chiropractor and beg to be seen.

A hot shower helped not at all. At 9:01, I called Dr. Jack's office ... only to find that they open at 11am on Tuesdays. At the least provocation, I knew I would break down and cry from the pain. Fortunately, no one else was around. I prepped stuff for lunch, caught up on blogs to distract myself. At 11 o'clock, I was dialing and re-dialing Dr. Jack's number, until I got through and his lovely wife answered the phone. They had an opening at 12:40 and I took it.

The pain radiated not only across my left shoulder blade, but into my ribs on both sides below the shoulder blade. Oh, and onto my upper arm and top of my lower arm. I considered briefly that arm pain can mean a heart attack, but the source of the pain was clearly spine. Dr. Jack began to straighten out the kinks in my spine, setting off muscle spasms here and there as nerves reconnected properly, and when he was done for the day, told me to come back Thursday -- he'd done as much as he could in one day.

"Your body is going to tell you to 'stop' -- when you've pushed past your limit to heal, you will have to stop doing what you were doing," he told me. "Looks like you're spending too many hours at the computer."

When I left his office, the pain was far less, and confined to the muscles at the top of my shoulder and various places on my left arm. The rib pain was completely gone. Thank you, Dr. Jack.

Today, in spite of gulping ibuprofen all day, the pain was relentless. Then, at 7pm, I remembered that I had a tube of arnica gel in the medicine cabinet. I smacked myself figuratively on the forehead, and put the stuff on all the spots that hurt. Like magic, within moments, the pain receded to a tolerable level. Arnica won't heal something that's out of place, but by golly, it does more for me than Flexall ever did.

I'm hoping that tomorrow, Dr. Jack will be able to put my shoulder to rights. But I keep wondering, what is going to break down next?