2-15-16 Hemming and Hawwing

Whew! It's been awhile since I wrote anything. Sometimes you just have to wait for that muse...that inspiration...that idea that I want to share.

I just re-read the last post and it was about my doggies. This one is too. Is this a sad life, that the only notable things that happen are via canine-ness??? So, unless you're a dog person, you maybe want to skip this entry.

I am a dog person. Always have been. Love, love, love them. I am NOT a cat person...at all. I am allergic to them, which probably contributes to that negativity. I think they are sneaky and unloving and would love to kill me. 

However, cats adore me. Seriously. A cat will enter a room full of people, walk around from person to person, but when it comes to me, jumps in my lap. More than once this has happened. The cat owner will exclaim, "Oh, he NEVER does that!!! What got into him????" He saw the challenge of someone not bowing to his cat-ness. That's just the way life goes for me. 

But, that is a bunny trail...

After we had Lex, Loy and I decided to get a dog. He was noncommittal on dog vs. cat personage when we met. He did not grow up with inside animals and did not really bond with them before his dad would make them get rid of the animals. But he was trainable!

Due to allergies and a hatred of shedding we always get something with part-poodle. (Side note: Did you know poodles don't have fur? They have hair. Therefore, they do not shed...but you do need to get them groomed. A fair trade-off, in my opinion.) Anyhow, we found a poodle-yorkie mix and paid our $5 for this mutt. This was in 1985, back before they named every mutt some fancy name and charged you lots of money. Beano, The Wonder Dog. She was never ending on her requests for ball throwing. She was fun with Lex (and, later, the other kids.) She was happy when you first met her, but didn't get embarrassingly jumpy. 

When Beano was kind of old, we decided to get a new puppy so that Beano could train the new dog in The Way of the Good Dog. After much searching I found a farm where the woman bred purebred poodles. However, her little money-maker got frisky one time and had a fling with one or more non-purebred dogs. Therefore, she angrily advertised poodle-mix puppies for $10. We drove down to Crete to check them out. 

It turned out that I liked one dog and Loy another, so we decided to get both. And Bandit and Smudge joined our family. We found out that we LOVED having two dogs. With one dog, she thinks she is a human...part of the family. With two, they realize they are dogs--they just think dog is the superior species! They are a pack. They wrestle and chase and cuddle. Beano hated them, though. They loved her, unfortunately. Let's just say Beano's last year was fraught with anguish.

Beano's end of earthly life experience was unusual. She was old and incontinent and had a hard time walking. We knew we should make that fateful trip to the vet, but did not want to do it. Finally, we had one can of prescription dog food left for her and we said when that was gone, we would take her in. THE NIGHT BEFORE WE WERE GOING TO TAKE HER I let her out, as usual. This is the truth...she never came back. We drove around, looking for this half-blind dog but to no avail. I got up several times overnight to see if she was on the front porch. Nope. The next day I went around to the neighbor's houses and checked under their bushes--I did not want the neighbor kids to find a dead dog body. But we never found her. I figure Elijah came with his chariot and took her. 

The only thing I did not do was call the pound. If they had her, I would have to post bail, then take her in to the vet. I decided it was cheaper to let them do the dirty deed, if they had her. 

Bandit and Smudge were good dogs--not on the Beano-level, but passable. Every time they slept, they snuggled together, it was adorable. They lived into their teens, then made that fateful drive to the vet one year apart.

We had a sabbatical year, so no dogs. But after we got home I told Luke (who was still living with us then) that we would get two dogs for him. I looked and looked. Poodle mutts were now called yorkie-poos or cockapoos or golden doodles and went for $800 or so!!! I rebelled! 

I had standards. No white or orange dogs. No dogs with super pointy noses. No dogs with smooshed noses. No underbites. Finally online I found one puppy that was a papillon-poodle mix, runt of the litter, the last one left. She was brown and black and cute as could be. We drove down to Kansas and picked up our little Papi-poo. I got to name this one and she became "Pip." 

A couple weeks later I found a shih-tzu-poodle mix in Minnesota who looked an awful lot like Pip...and I had talked to the pet store down here and they said this breed does not have the underbite anymore. So we drove up there to pick up our...shihtz-a-poo? (Loy refuses to call her this...and the breed is often called a shih-poo.) Luke got to name this one, so she became Sparky. 

But as the weeks went by I started to notice that Pip's roots were white and orange. And her puppy nose got very pointy. Sparky had an underbite, but I assumed her puppy pug nose would grow. Nope. So I have white and orange and smooshed AND pointy noses and an underbite in my dogs. 

They are crazy dogs, my Pip and Sparky. My frick and frack. My kit and caboodle. My Batman and Robin. My fish and chips. They never snuggle with each other. Pip has energy galore--guess that's a papillon thing. Throw the ball, throw the ball, throw the ball. Sparky is a snuggle, but she will just keep getting closer and closer and closer to your face. She wants to breathe your air. At the same time you are breathing it. 

They sleep in the laundry room every night (and now, finally, I am getting to the point of this entry). In the morning, while it's still dark Loy gets up and lets them outside. Then, when he lets them back in, they run their absolute fastest, tucking their little rears under and speeding, into the bedroom where they get to sleep with me until I deem the time civilized to get up. They bound up on the bed and lick and sniff me once, then they collapse on the bed. Every single day it is one dog on one side of me, one on the other. Touching me. It really is cozy. They are as if dead for that sleeping time. They do not move. There are no balls. There is no petting. We just cozy up and sleep.

About a month ago someone challenged me to read Psalm 139 and meditate on it. 

1 O Lord, you examine me and know.
2 You know when I sit down and when I get up;
even from far away you understand my motives.
3 You carefully observe me when I travel or when I lie down to rest;
you are aware of everything I do.
4 Certainly my tongue does not frame a word
without you, O Lord, being thoroughly aware of it.
5 You squeeze me in from behind and in front;
you place your hand on me.
6 Your knowledge is beyond my comprehension;
it is so far beyond me, I am unable to fathom it.
7 Where can I go to escape your spirit?
Where can I flee to escape your presence?
8 If I were to ascend to heaven, you would be there.
If I were to sprawl out in Sheol, there you would be.
9 If I were to fly away on the wings of the dawn,
and settle down on the other side of the sea,
10 even there your hand would guide me,
your right hand would grab hold of me.
11 If I were to say, “Certainly the darkness will cover me,
and the light will turn to night all around me,”
12 even the darkness is not too dark for you to see,
and the night is as bright as day;
darkness and light are the same to you.
13 Certainly you made my mind and heart;
you wove me together in my mother’s womb.
14 I will give you thanks because your deeds are awesome and amazing.
You knew me thoroughly;
15 my bones were not hidden from you,
when I was made in secret
and sewed together in the depths of the earth.
16 Your eyes saw me when I was inside the womb.
All the days ordained for me
were recorded in your scroll
before one of them came into existence.
17 How difficult it is for me to fathom your thoughts about me, O God!
How vast is their sum total!
18 If I tried to count them,
they would outnumber the grains of sand.
Even if I finished counting them,
I would still have to contend with you.

It dawned on me that when David says that God "squeezes him in from behind and in front" (or other versions say "hem me in") it is sort of like what my dogs do for me (although, obviously, God does it much more!!) When the dogs are there, I feel warm. I feel content. I feel loved. I feel like I do not want to move. I trust that they are not going to bite me (they would never bit anyone.) (How often I have thought, "I want to roll over but the dogs..." Then I think, "Oh, they're just dogs." and I roll over!) And when David says God places His hand on David...that is sort of like when the dogs place their heads on my legs. It's relationship. It's love. It's protection. They don't do that to people they don't know.

So, my dogs are naughty and rambunctious and crazy...but they remind me of God, which is good, right? They love me and protect me NO MATTER WHAT. And I'm still a dog person.

That's what I have to say right now.

Love,

Kitt.