Change Is Hard

I worked all day today, very unusual, from 8:30 till 5.  Then rode the bus back to the park and ride lot and then meandered home through the traffic.  The good news is that I totally forgot that tonight is Monday night and Katie and I have doggie school so I wasn’t stressed by the amount of traffic.  Not stressed until I got home a little after 7 and asked her if she wanted supper.  She was looking very excited about the prospect just as I remembered that we had to go…RIGHT NOW…to school!

 So…off we went and guess what?  She did the best she’s ever done.  She followed directions, pretty much, and did her best imitation of an adoring dog heeling as requested.  The down and stay was a bit rough, as was the stand and stay, but we’ll work on that this week. 

Why did she do so well tonight?  Was it the rush to class?  The no supper before?  OR was it because we practiced this week?  Drats, doing our homework just might really make a difference!  Of course she is currently stealing my running shoe and dashing off with it to chew the shoelaces.  Any adoring dog imitations are off here at home!

I registered for a creative writing course from Washtenaw Community College.  I’ve always wanted to take something like that.  I thought (foolishly) that I’d be able to do that while I was at UM.  Reality set in right away that there was no time for anything beyond the work involved with attaining the degree.  But this course is only 6 weeks long, it’ll be done about the time school starts. 

I am looking forward to working on writing skills and getting feedback from an instructor.  Conversly as soon as I registered for the class a couple of weeks ago I forgot all about it.  So it started last Wednesday and I didn’t even think about it till last night on our drive back from Ann Arbor.  Now I am two lessons behind.  Typical!

As for the 90th birthday party.  That was fun.  My uncle is 90.  His two children and their children, my husband and I as well as my two brothers were there for dinner.  Some of us started asking questions about his life experiences and stories just spilled out of him.  He worked for the war department during World War II, so you can imagine yet not imagine the things he lived through.  He has all these stories bottled up inside, and I think he is anxious to tell them, yet we had not asked before.  We sat spellbound for many minutes listening and questioning.  There is so much more he can tell us; we need many more hours like the few we spent on Sunday evening.

The trainer at Katie’s dog obedience class advised me to put lemon juice on my hands when Katie is trying to play by biting them.  She said that Katie would hate the taste of lemon juice and would stop the rude behavior.  Really.

This morning I decided to give it a try.  Katie was in rare form, prancing around, nipping at legs and hands, wanting to play.  Even in play she wanted to nip at the hand throwing the ball.  So to the refrigerator I went, out came the little yellow plastic lemon containing lemon juice.  Katie was intrigued.  Was this a new toy?   I poured lemon juice into my palm and spread it all over my hands.  Katie sniffed.  Her eyes lit up.  She began licking my hands, tentatively at first and then joyfully, with increasing  exuberance.  It began to tickle and then we were rolling around on the floor, me laughing, she licking my hands, both of us having a wonderful time.

OK.  So lemon juice is not going to deter Katie from chewing on hands.  I guess we’re back to the stern “NO!” which was almost working as long as we were consistant.  The lemon juice is back in the fridge, Katie is asleep, exhausted by all the play.  Once again she has defied the experts.  I guess she’s a one of a kind sheltie puppy.

There was an orange sliver of a moon hanging low in the sky as I jumped off the bus at 10:20 this evening at the park and ride lot where I had left my car over seven hours earlier.  The bus heading back to the parking lot was more full than I expected so late at night, but after awhile I was too tired to do my usual people watching.  I turned away from them all and glanced out the window.  There, reflected back I saw myself, but for a brief instant it was my mother’s face, not mine, that gazed back.  Not surprising I guess, since tomorrow is the third anniversary of her death, and I guess she’s been on my mind.

Three years ago on that day she drove to church early to play piano for Sunday school, as she had every Sunday for years.  She played the organ through half the morning service, as she had for years.  She went to sit beside my father just before the sermon as she usually did.  But she told him she didn’t feel well, and he took her to the emergency room.  A few hours later Dad returned home without Mom, clutching her purse in disbelief.  She drove to church just like every Sunday, but she didn’t come home. 

It was the first lesson of many I and my family learned that year about living each day fully.  Because you just don’t know. 

Progress tonight; I thought about my mother and my eyes remained clear.  No tears on my cheeks, just a faint smile reflecting in the bus window.  That’s because I realized tonight that I can see my mother’s face whenever I need to.  I’ll  just  look in the mirror.

As I was doing laundry this morning and feeling a bit underappreciated  I remembered my father’s “magic sock drawer.”  My mother died unexpectedly in July of 04, and in December of that year he wrote his first (and only) Christmas letter.  In it he wrote that he was doing OK alone, other than the fact that his magic sock drawer seemed to be broken.  For 52 years his sock drawer had always contained clean socks.  Now, without  Mom, the drawer no longer produced.  I was wondering this morning if my husband knew where his clean clothes came from.  I’m sure he does.  But that led me to considering that most people have the equivilent of a magic sock drawer somewhere in their lives; sometimes it just takes time and effort to remember. 

Me, I have a magic checking account that always seems to have a little money in it.  That’s even more magic now that I’m not working very much.  And better still, I never have to balance it, it just gets balanced every month without me wondering about it.  So I guess being the magic for the sock drawer is OK in return for being the receipient of the magic balanced checking account.

What’s YOUR magic sock drawer?  Does your magician know how much you appreciate it?

So much to tell you, where to start?  First of all the wedding we attended last weekend in Illinois was very nice.  Great to see friends and watch their daughter get married.  All that young hope and excitement!

Second the puppy did well with her personal puppy-sitter.  But I think she missed us even with all the special attention she received.

Back to real life, I was scheduled for five hours in the library’s youth department yesterday.  Five hours is a very long time to be in the middle of a very energetic group of youngsters.  Most of them ranged in age from newborns to 9 or 10 years old.  All of them appeared to be noisy and demanding.  Some of them were cute.  Most of their behavior reminded me of recent puppy episodes.  I guess this makes me a dog lover rather than a child lover! 

This morning I went to my favorite park, Kensington, and ran/walked four miles.  Ran a quarter of a mile, walked a quarter of a mile.  That worked as the beginning of getting myself back into shape to run the Crim race in Flint which is the end of August and is 10 miles, and maybe, just maybe the Detroit Free Press marathon (or half?) which is the beginning of October.  Not much time to get it together.  Here it is July and I can sort of run 4 miles!  Friday I will try to do 6.  This is way too fast to add miles, but a girl’s got to do what a girl’s got to do to get ready.  And really I’m only running 1/2 the distance; even that is more like a loping shuffle than an actual run.

On my last running quarter mile, up a hill I have dubed “heartbreak hill” a young couple came running up behind me.  With no heavy breathing they passed me on the hill discussing taking a two minute walk break at mile 15.  Right.  I remember those days.  Vaguely.

But it was very good..very very good, to be back out there, remembering the comradery between runners, listening to the bits of stories from people that passed me or I passed.  Yes I passed some people!  Watching the lake turn colors, feeling the sweat drip, even the aching in my left foot.  It was all good. 

You’d think as a library student I would have no stress at all.  And lately it has felt blessedly that way.  But yesterday and today I’ve been trying to get ready to leave town, my sister is in from NJ to “puppy sit”; the dog has been even more insane and now apparently has an urinary tract infection.  Great.  Trying to schedule a vet appointment and leave on time to get to work stressed me out this morning.  But on the way to work, driving behind an endless line of commuters across the back country of Oakland County I saw, standing right beside the road three sandhill cranes.  Mama, Daddy and a young adult.  SO COOL!  I’ve never seen a young one before.  It was a miniture of the adults.  Stress reduction was immediate.  I was so lucky to have spotted them.

Anything and everything can be a minefield of emotions.  Going to the grocery store opens me up to all sorts of sudden and painful memories.  Today in the produce department were fresh apricots.  Decades ago we camped at a state park in Utah among an old appricot orchard.  The appricots were ripe and free for the picking.  We ate many of them.  I associate the ripe smell of an appricot to the warm nights under the Utah stars. 

For a second, upon seeing and smelling those apricots, I felt a stab of pain.  Then there was a slow smile that chased away the sad thoughts as I remembered the four of us kids climbing up the canyon with Dad and Mom, chasing each other up the path so eager to see what was at the top.  Looking out over those appricot orchards and campers, across the red mountain face to other mountains on a cloudless afternoon.  Gorging ourselves on appricots while sitting around the campfire at night.  Falling asleep exhausted.  Waking up so exicited to spend another day “out west.”

 These are good memories. I can choose to spend time dwelling on the pain.  Or I can choose to remember the fun.  Appricots, sunshine, campfires, moonlight, stars shining so bright we could touch them from the tops of the mountains we explored.  Those were special times.  That’s a lot of memory to be attached to an appricot.  Makes you smile doesn’t it!

Free at last!  Yesterday was the last day puppy Katie had to be a cone head!  Last night I took it off and she was SO excited!  She rubbed her ears for a long time and then began to prance around the living room.  She brought her favorite toys to me, and then we played a rousing game of fetch with most of them.  We played until she exhaustedly went off for a nap behind the sofa.

I settled on the sofa to relax and watch some television.  Suddenly something, I don’t know what, trigged memories of my mother’s funeral.  Instantly I was back at the church, watching someone else play the organ Mom had played the week before, seeing the coffin in front of the pulpit as we all spoke.  Long, low, racking sobs emerged, grief held in too long spilled out.

Unseen by me, puppy Katie crept out from behind the sofa, and crawled up onto my chest.  Softly, oh so gently, she reached out a paw, and then gently licked the tears from my face.  Soon I was giggling and hugging her and then she sprang from the sofa and ran for her toys.  We were again engaged in play. 

Such is the love of a puppy.

Tonight Katie is going on day 8 of wearing the cone that keeps her from licking the stiches she received after being fixed last week.  She’s OK with the cone.  I’m really tired of it.  She wants so badly to play, and we’re supposed to keep her “quiet.”  No jumping or running or leaping or licking or chasing.  No insane games of fetch.  No leaping on owners heads while they are sleeping.  No fun at all.  She is so antsy she is biting hands, nipping at legs and feet, crying, bringing her toys and dropping them at our feet, watching us constantly with big eyes.  Can’t we just PLAY?  Please?

So this evening I took her on her first grownup dog walk in the neighborhood.  She has forgotten what little she learned in puppy school about heeling and behaving on a leash.  We got about two houses away and she noticed the big brick mailbox they have.  She’s never seen such a thing before and she sat down, refusing to advance any further.  At all.  Period.  I picked her up and carried her past the menacing mailbox.  Next came the empty trash cans left by the side of the road after garbage day today.  Another first for her. She sat.  Again I picked her up and we advanced up the road together.  We went four houses up and four houses back.  By the time we were in our own yard she was dragging.  She is now asleep on her princess pillow.  This may be a much better way of wearing her out then allowing her to just sit on her pillow and watch the world go by.  Better for me too!