Squeeky Clean

Meet Squeeky. The most disgusting dog toy on the face of the Earth.

Squeeky holds a special place in our home. He was Jake's first dog toy. When Jake came to live with Nevada and me, Squeeky came with him. Well, Squeeky, a really big tennis ball he won't play with, and a quilt that serves as his dog bed to this day. Jake is big on dog toys and having come from a broken home, being an orphan, and having been homeless street dog for 2 years before we met, relics from Jake's past are something near and dear to him.

Squeeky is his favorite toy. It's his go-to toy when you tell him to go get a toy. If you tell him to go get Squeeky, he finds it out of the thousands of other squeeky toys from which to pick in his dog toy basket.

Squeeky has friends in that basket. There's Sharky. And Octopussy. There's Squeeky Monster. There's the hundreds of plush animals upon which Jake has performed squeekectomies. Squeeking is clearly a big thing in our home. But Squeeky is the King. He's also the grossest possible thing to have to play with.

You see, Squeeky is old. And old plastic dog toys don't fade away, they disintegrate. And Squeeky is falling apart. Once a bright yellow toy with deep red features, and the most awesome rubber pink hair, Squeeky today has sort of melted.

I think maybe it is the unique nature of Jake's dog spit. In any event, Squeeky is only a faint memory of his former self. Even his squeeky elements are ragged.

So today Squeeky got a bath. Now he's Squeeky clean.

He is also sticky. Something about removing the dirt has made Squeeky super sticky. Not sticky in the way that a slobbery dog ball gets sticky, but rather a "I'm leaking carcinogens directly into your dog's bloodstream" sort of sticky. See those bumps? Sticky. They will attract dirt in a way that you can't imagine. Soon, Squeeky will look like he has the measles. I promise, in two weeks I'll take a follow up photo and you can see. It's gross.

Maybe its that elusive stickiness that makes Squeeky so popular.


In any event, I have decided that upon his death, Squeeky will go with Jake into that big dog park in the sky. Or maybe I'll just keep him around to see how long a squeeky toy can actually last.

Goofy Jake

I overlooked this pic of Jake looking goofy from our hike last Sunday. I just had to share it.

I'm screwed

I told Liv I wanted to climb a mountain with her next year. That entails doing something that I should have been doing all along...getting my ass in shape. So tonight, I brought in the agent of my transformation,

*drumroll please*

The Nordic Track, circa 1974.

So sure, maybe it doesn't look like much. There's no electricity involved. I just get on the contraption and glide my way to a great pair of legs, a rock-hard ass, and maybe a much stronger back. Ok, ok, so I haven't been on the thing in more than 6 months. So I had to hold on for a half kilometer until I found my rhythm again. It will come and you will be insanely jealous of D's calves in no time.

I brought it in from the cold. I washed off the dust. I stepped on the skis and took a few strides. It squeeked like a mother. I found the turbine lubricant (don't ask) and greased up the moving parts and ran it through a 1 km ride. No more squeeky.

But D cannot exercise by Nordic Track alone, because the iPod bit the dust and demusicified Nordic Track is impossible to bear. So, I will be coupling said cross-den skiing torture with a little bit of sweetness.

Sweetness in the form of Shaun T.

Shaun T of Hip Hop Abs.

Oh yeah.

I forsee a promising climbing season in 2009. That is, if Liv can tear me away from my personal trainer. I wonder if I could load Hip Hop Abs on one of those second generation iPods. =]

A cold winter begins

 

A reminder for me

Life occurs just outside your comfort zone.

These boots were meant for walking.....

I love it when funny shit happens on my birthday. I find it even funnier because when someone makes me mad, I threaten to throw shoes at them. =]

The Elusive Spontaneous Self Portrait

Jake and I went to Lake Murphysboro for a hike today. I decided that it would be a neat place to take our Christmas picture. Let's just say the art of the spontaneous self portrait takes practice. After looking at the quality of my results, I think I'm going to have to read my camera booklet and actually learn how to use this thing.

At first, no one was in the picture.

Then just me.Then just Jake.Then part of me and part of Jake.

Then there's the wet lick to the face pose.

I think this will have to do.

I decided it was best to focus on other things like a passing heron.

And Jake can be a handsome fellow.Until he gets bored.And then he gets sassy.

When your dog gives you the raspberry, it's time to go home.

On Being 46

Today, I turn 46 years old. As far as I can tell, there is nothing groundbreaking about being 46, except that it is a nice even number and puts me one slippery slope to 50, which all in all, I consider to be a much cooler age than 46. I like the idea of being able to write a reflection on my "first 50 years". In any event, 46, as lackluster as it might seem, is okay with me. It'll do for now.

I pulled out my birth certificate today only to learn that I was born in the afternoon, not the evening as I always assumed. My mother tells me I was induced. Figures. I am notoriously late. My mother had a doctor's appointment that day. It was cold and the streets were slick. (One must remember, this was the early 60s when December was a cold month.) The doctor told her to go directly to the hospital and he would meet her there. (One must remember, this was the early 60s when the average OB/GYN was male and they told you what to do, not the other way around.) She wanted to go home and get her bag and was afraid the slick streets would mean she was not there to meet the doctor at the appointed time. (One must remember, this was the early 60s when no vehicle had anti-lock brakes.)

Apparently, my father had a reputation for passing out in the waiting room, the bathroom, or just about anywhere with a flat surface, but he made it through my birth. Those were the days when the fathers paced in the waiting rooms until word came and then they handed out cigars, or, in the case of my dad, lay prostrate on the floor until someone came in and threw cold water on him and told him it was all over. Presumably, several days later I came home via a car with no seatbelts, lacking a padded dashboard, and in the arms of my mother and not some pansy safety-tested car seat. It is amazing I survived the ordeal.

I was born into a time of Perry Como and Bing Crosby Christmas specials. Television went from black and white to color, from What's My Line to the Midnight Special in a decade. My childhood was Mr. Rogers, Mr. Cartoon, Walter Cronkite, Howard K. Smith, Johnny Carson, Wolfman Jack, Dan Rowan and Dick Martin, Goldie Hawn, McHale's Navy (Ernest Borgnine and Tim Conway), Flip Wilson, Carol Burnett, and M*A*S*H. I watched Watts burn, helicopters landing in Vietnam, cops with fire hoses attacking peaceful protesters. I was in junior high school when Pong came out. I saw Bambi and Jaws in the same summer. I saw Star Wars and learned all the words to American Pie and Rapper's Delight. I spent an extraordinary amount of time in a swimming pool, ran cross country, watched the inaugural episode of Saturday Night Live, lost my virginity, and played Pac Man and Space Invaders. I saw Ronald Reagan shot and a space shuttle blow up on live TV. I remember the mornings we mourned John Lennon and John Belushi. I still have the issue of Time introducing America to AIDS. In 1983, I went to see Bruce Springsteen and The Rolling Stones because I was sure it was the last tour for both of them. I graduated, moved to a town with a building larger than 30 stories, and buckled down to make my way in the world. Married. Divorced. Back in school. My life has been interesting.

But now I'm dull, ordinary 46. I live in a house that I could live in the rest of my days without wanting for much. I've got it pretty good. I own my own washer and dryer. I have a garage with a garage door opener. I have no desire for a fantasy car or a McMansion. None of my furniture matches and I really don't care. I enjoy botany and reading and keeping upon politics and I try to keep my writing chops by updating this vanity blog. I do wish that I lived in a larger town with greater dating options. I'm not dead yet, despite what my sister seems to think.

Sometimes I wonder what different directions my life could have taken if, for example, I'd married my first love, or if I'd never married at all. If I'd gotten a degree in accounting instead of English. If I'd gone to law school instead of graduate school. If I'd become a veterinarian instead of a botanist.

And then there's the stuff I wouldn't have changed for anything. The dogs. The places I've lived. The traveling I've done. The people I've let in and the one's I let go. My years post-40 have surpassed the dreams I had for my life as a kid. I climbed a mountain in Yellowstone. I took Jake to the Pacific Ocean. I've toured Graceland. I've grabbed a cowboy's ass in Nashville. I've fallen in love with a man I couldn't have… and Utah. I've stargazed on the Continental Divide. I've depended on the kindness of strangers. I've lent a hand to those in need. I've learned to control my temper and my ambition. I've learned to live with my flaws, accept who I am, improve when I could, and really like myself. I have allowed myself to be the adventurer I always knew in my heart, I was.

I have learned some important lessons in my life.

• Embrace failure. It's ultimately more useful than success.
• If someone says, "You can't do that", it's probably because they didn't and wished they had.
• Laugh loud.
• Love large.
• Don't be stingy with compliments. Some people die without understanding how awesome they really are.
• Never pass up church food, spaghetti dinners, pancake breakfasts, fish fries, dinner at Grandma's house, dinner at your friend's mom's, or bake sales.
• The least among us is our equal.
• In general, people are doing the best they can.
• Unless there is a really good reason to say no, say yes.
• If there is a good reason to say no, don't be afraid to say no.
• Sometimes an entire crowd is waiting for one person to speak up. Be that one voice.
• Few things in life worth doing come without risk. Whether you succeed or fail, the important thing was that you tried.
• Forget other people. The only thing that matters is what you think of you.
  
• If a week passes and you haven't told someone you love them, you have a serious problem.
• If money, power, or position causes you to change your behavior, you don't know yourself and that is a much greater worry.
• Fear no one unless they threaten your life. Then, let the ass kicking begin.
• Everyone should have a signature dish.
• Most mistakes are forgivable. Some mistakes are unforgivable. Don't confuse the two.
• If you ask your friends to describe you and they can't or aren't willing to say three positive things about you to your face, you need to seriously reconsider your friends and your priorities.
• Sometimes, words are meaningless. In such cases, shut up.
• Complacency kills.
• When shopping, keep in mind that in almost all cases, you don't need that.
• When someone takes advantage of you, it's almost always because you've let them. You don't have to let them.
• Just for fun, every once in a while, do something you thought was impossible.
• Feed your curiosity.

I am Daktari. 46. Adventurer. Risk taker. And not half done yet.

This morning I had a hangover

This should explain a lot.

Tums: Not for those with an overactive gag reflex

I hate Tums. There, I said it.

I don't just dislike them. I loathe them. Tums to me are the equivalent of trying to get a toddler to take cough medicine.

I don't get heartburn often. But just like the hiccups, it seems that heartburn comes in a series of episodes back-to-back.

I've had heartburn for 3 days. I am sick of the pain in my chest. So sick, that today I actually tried to chew up some Tums and kick this episode in its ass.

100% of the problem with Tums is the flavor. The first two Tums I ate were orange. The second two were lime. Medicine should be neither orange or lime. It's just not right. And not just ordinary orange and lime, it's that tropical fruity crap. I swear, I thought I was going to gag and the stupid Tums still haven't kicked my heartburn.

Remember back in the day when they made minty Tums? Oh yeah, they called those Rolaids.

I gotta buy me some Rolaids.

Solving the world's problems at their root

An idea has been festering in me. I've been reluctant to show it the light of day, cause it's not fully formed and I don't want to look like I don't have my ducks in a row, but somehow the darkness isn't causing it to ripen and allows me to simply ignore it. So I'm bringing it out, half-baked so to speak, in the hope that discussing it will enable me to move my thought process forward.

I have been thinking that virtually all the world's most vexing problems can be advanced by empowering women. What sorts of problems? Oh little things like overpopulation, terrorism, world hunger, human rights abuses, you know, little stuff like that.

So how might that work?

One of the biggest obstacles to stemming overpopulation is lack of access to birth control. In a large swath of the globe, women lack any self-determination in the execution of their reproductive rights. Globally speaking, I maintain that women want control over the timing, spacing and number of children they bear. I maintain that no woman wants to bring children into a world where their chances of survival are slim, where they will starve or suffer needlessly. And yet, they are forced to do so by dispassionate husbands and a perverse social structure that supposedly "values" children. Women are not baby factories.

Freedom to pursue economic independence. When women are economically dependent on their husbands, they have little to no ability to carve a better life for themselves. They have little say outside the home. They are mere chattle. Money is power. Power is a voice. The power of many voices can change the world.

Equal rights. In Saudi Arabia, women cannot drive. King Abdullah has said that he is willing to lift that ban sometime this year. Not sure whether he has or not, but it's clear that it is meant to stave off calls for larger scale calls for equal rights and women's sufferage. Where women are prevented by modesty laws, social convention, and threat of death from full participation in society, men rule with impunity. And as they say, absolute power corrupts absolutely. Delusions of superiority, an unyielding sense of entitlement, fundamental religious beliefs are a breeding ground for terrorism. I believe that women, fully participating in society, would offer a balance. I doubt any woman wants to raise sons to go off on kamakazi missions for Allah. In any event, I think there would be fewer of them if their mothers were respected as full members of society.

Anyway, don't know where I'm going with this, but it seems that just about all these problems could be improved by ensuring that women have the same rights as men around the world. I know it is all jammed up right now, but it seems to me that when you get right down to the root of the problem, it might be improved exponentially by improving the lot of women.

How to satirize a black president

Just a sampling.

• The first president to not be able to hail a cab.
• The first president to die first in an action film.
• The first Huxtable president.
• The first president whose black children weren’t a tightly held secret.
• The first president whose head can be Photoshopped onto NBA slam dunk contest winners.
• The first president who’s deft at employing the suffix “izzle.”

Credit, yo.

I need a bailout

Source.

Politics is Refreshing: Fucktard Edition

I just love Illinois politics. It's always so fresh. Different. New President. New Senator. And now, new governor. Granted, I'm not upset about any of this. Blagojevich is a bastard, a megalomaniac, and disastrous for the state of Illinois.
He is also a moron.

From the full complaint:

During the course of this investigation, agents have intercepted a series of communications regarding the efforts of ROD BLAGOJEVICH, JOHN HARRIS, and others to misuse this power to obtain personal gain, including financial gain, for ROD BLAGOJEVICH and his family. In particular, ROD BLAGOJEVICH has been intercepted conspiring to trade the senate seat for particular positions that the President-elect has the power to appoint (e.g. the Secretary of Health and Human Services). ROD BLAGOJEVICH has also been intercepted conspiring to sell the Senate seat in exchange for his wife’s placement on paid corporate boards or ROD BLAGOJEVICH’s placement at a private foundation in a significant position with a substantial salary. ROD BLAGOJEVICH has also been intercepted conspiring to sell the Senate seat in exchange for millions of dollars in funding for a non-profit organization that he would start and that would employ him at a substantial salary after he left the governorship.

On November 3, 2008, ROD BLAGOJEVICH talked with Deputy Governor A. This discussion occurred the day before the United States Presidential election. ROD BLAGOJEVICH and Deputy Governor A discussed the potential Senate seat vacancy. During the conversation, ROD BLAGOJEVICH told Deputy Governor A that if he is not going to get anything of value for the open Senate seat, then ROD BLAGOJEVICH will take the Senate seat himself: “if . . . they’re not going to offer anything of any value, then I might just take it.”

ROD BLAGOJEVICH later stated, “I’m going to keep this Senate option for me a real possibility, you know, and therefore I can drive a hard bargain. You hear what I’m saying. And if I don’t get what I want and I’m not satisfied with it, then I’ll just take the Senate seat myself.” Later, ROD BLAGOJEVICH stated that the Senate seat “is a fucking valuable thing, you just don’t give it away for nothing.”

On November 10, 2008, ROD BLAGOJEVICH, his wife, JOHN HARRIS, Governor General Counsel, and various Washington-D.C. based advisors, including Advisor B, discussed the open Senate seat during a conference call. ROD BLAGOJEVICH expressed his interest in figuring out a way to make money and build some financial security, while at the same time potentially participating in the political arena again. ROD BLAGOJEVICH mentioned the Senate seat, the dynamics of a new Presidential administration with the strong contacts that ROD BLAGOJEVICH has in it, and asked what if anything he can do to make that work for him and his wife and his responsibilities as Governor of Illinois. ROD BLAGOJEVICH suggested during the call that he could name himself to the open Senate seat to avoid impeachment by the State of Illinois legislature.

(Emphasis mine)

The breadth of evidence collected on this idiot in such a short time makes one think that megalomania should, in fact, be considered a mental illness. All in all though, couldn't have happened to a nicer guy. At least we won't have to look at that Bob's Big Boy/Frish's character hair anymore. The guy was an embarassment to the state. Right along the lines of our last governor. Who is also in jail.

I'm not sure who is going to want the governorship now. It seems it is a stepping stone to the big house.

I was saving money for this?

After having destroyed my camera on Liv and Liz's Wild West Adventure earlier this year, I was saving my pennies for a "real" camera. A Nikon. That was, right up until today when I saw this advertising campaign out of Japan. h/t Feministing.

Wow. That's all I got. Nothing makes me want to buy a camera more than its ability to take high quality child pornography. The lesbian thing is just a bonus, I guess.


Or the potential to create my own jungle-fever-racist bullshit.

And this is just stupid.

Needless to say, I think Canon is getting my hard-earned dollars at this point. Nikon: what a bunch of fucktards.


Agency: Euro RSCG, Singapore
Photographer: Jeremy Wong
Executive Creative Director: Charlie Blower
Creative Director: Victor Ng
Art Director: Lee Hsueh Ling
Copywriter: Victor Ng, Stephen Kyriakou

The Pantry is Done

and don't ask me about it again. Ok, touch up remains. I dinged things putting all the hardware back on, but everything is back up on the wall and the screws are all tightened. So the best part of any job is admiring your work after you've finished. So here is the pantry before.....

and here is the pantry after.....

Nevada: A Photographic Flashback

Just a few pics that I overlooked that struck me as exemplifying Nevada. I thought I should share them somewhere, so why not here?

Loved to be warm. Sunshine and radiators were her friends.

Always dove in head first.

Liked lawn naps.

Earthworm wrangler.

Hated costumes.

Loved chicken.

Distrusted papparazzi.

Boldly explored new territory.

Scarcely ever got caught.

Was my one and only sweet pea.

I miss her. You can't even begin to know how much.

On being an unsuitable mate

Perhaps with another milestone approaching, I am given to bouts of self-reflection. And today's question is age-old. Why is it that I am so unlucky in love? And not so much unlucky in love as unlucky in finding love? This one has been ongoing for some time. Decades, in fact. This sort of self-analysis is difficult, for it is sometimes hard 1) to see one's self clearly and objectively, and 2) to face the hard realities of what is seen. Loads of things have changed from when I first became interested in men, but one stark reality has characterized the continuum: I have never felt more incompetent in any facet of my life than I have in attracting members of the opposite sex, nor have I so consistently failed at anything in my life. And I often wonder if there is anything I have sought more urgently or ardently.

From the moment I noticed boys, I noticed they noticed girls unlike me. As a teenager, I was: athletic, tomboyish, and, in one of life's truly memorable ironies, flat-chested. I was, in fact, voted the flattest girl in the 7th grade. In any event, boys liked girls who weren't like me. And this was back in the day when I wasn't at all outspoken. In fact, I don't think I spoke until I was in the 10th grade. If I was smart then, I didn't know it.

And yet, I have heard people say that so-and-so was interested in me but I was just so smart. There must have been something they saw that I didn't that made even attempting a relationship seem futile. But I have heard some variation of that intelligence theme enough to have it nag at me as a problem I can't really fix. It's not like I walk around trying to lord my intelligence over people. I just like to talk about stuff. I thought almost everyone did. I thought other people liked to think about things and knock around ideas.

Take Guv for instance. Just today I was talking to him. I was no doubt droning on about something in the news or something I'd been thinking about or how my day was going and he stopped me and said, "what is your IQ?" I mean, who asks that? I don't think I've ever asked anyone that. Ever. Because really folks, let's be honest. I'm not that smart. Guv is a college graduate. He has a masters degree. I used to think I was kinda smart. You know, I could clear a Jeopardy board as long as they didn't have some lame-ass categories like Mythology or Parts of a Diesel Engine or something. Yes, I thought I was smart enough. Right up until the day I got a job at the Field Museum and I found out what smart really is.

When I was a kid, being independent was a sign of maturity, and I wanted more than anything to be seen as mature. Couple that with the fact that my father liked to think he was teaching us to pull ourselves up by our bootstraps, and I'd have to say, he raised some pretty independent girls. But apparently, independence ain't sexy. The big complaint my husband had about me was that I didn't need him. I mean, I was single a long time before he came along and I had to learn to do a lot of guy things myself. Like fix things around the house and deal with car repairs. You get the picture. I have realized that I did need my husband. I needed him emotionally. Unfortunately, he couldn't provide. It was a lonely time. I'll leave it at that.

Despite never having dates, I never felt I wasn't worthy of dates. I don't think I suffered, ever, from a lack of self-confidence. In fact, I think I'm the greatest thing since sliced bread, and I'm really straddling the fence whether sliced bread is all that and change back from a buck, comparatively speaking.

I don't think I have been all that accomplished in my life. I've never risen above lower middle-management and I have changed jobs and professions a lot. I'm in graduate school in middle-age for Pete's sake. I haven't exactly made my mark on any one industry. So I doubt that my accomplishments are intimidating anyone.

That leaves me with looks. Now, this is where things get cloudy. I always thought I was pretty enough, but it seems virtually impossible to be objective about one's own looks. I was able, in my youth, to attract one or two that I also found attractive, so I felt lucky that my attractiveness equaled my attraction. But with my youth slipping away (ok, humor me already), I am left to ponder the realities. If I was unable to attract a suitable mate when I had youth on my side, what chance do I have now of meeting Mr. Wonderful? In the face of such logic, it becomes increasingly difficult to concern myself with my looks. I do try. I haven't given up. But it is hard to stay motivated.

I will give you that I am outspoken. Whatever shell I lived under as a child, I crawled out of with one fist in the air as an adult. Maybe it was always having to scrape for my place in this world. Maybe it was the realization that no one was going to stick up for me. Maybe it was a refusal to be marginalized. In any event, I am perfectly capable of taking up for myself. Granted, not everyone thinks it is ladylike to hold your own in a political, scientific, or religious debate. I exhibit sound logic. Perhaps this is what is so wrong. I don't just allow the men to win.

It would seem that being self-confident, independent, self-reliant, smart, and average to slightly-better-than-average looking aren't enough to get you by in this world, romantically speaking. And if that's so, then what?

Do I resign myself to spending all my time alone? Do I go invest in some cats?

Guv says I'm just upset because I think that men should find brains and education sexy and they don't. No, Guv. It's not that. It's that brains and education are about all I've got these days and no one is buying.

I couldn't walk in a pair of 4" heels if my life depended on it. I'm not ever going to enjoy going dancing. Without medical intervention, I'm never going to have a thin waist. I never had one when I was 20. As things stretch and gravity works, you simply have to accept what you are.

I am alone as I have always been. And this is the great failure of my life.

Well Played, Dr. J

D-fav J is now D-fav Dr J.

I hope you find it in you to celebrate this once-in-a-lifetime, well earned accomplishment. Thanks for a spot of sunshine in a bleak week for me, too.

You totally rock.

Things change and so do I

When I was younger, I was full of myself. Or piss and vinegar. Ok, maybe I still am full of it. =) My friends told me I should never marry. That I didn't have the temperament or the ability to stick with a relationship in the long-term. They were right and they were wrong. Well meaning as they might have been, they didn't allow me the capacity to grow.

We change with time. We change with experience. We change, sometimes for no reason at all. My sister and I once remarked that when a marriage goes south, at first you hardly notice it. You make accommodations, little compromises, deals with yourself. Somehow, you justify every disappointment in your mind until one day everything is so completely out-of-whack that you don't recognize yourself or the relationship anymore. Life is like that. Relationships are like that. Just one day, it hits you that everything has changed. Life is a slippery slope and sometimes it is all we can do to hang on, and sometimes we just have to let go.

With Nevada's passing, I was thinking about how much my life and her's changed over the time we shared. How we changed one another. We shared a lot.

When I got Nevada, I was a newlywed. I've now been divorced longer than I was married. She was there for the good times and bad of that. I hope she didn't much remember the bad.

When I got Nevada, Dakota was alive. She's been gone nearly 9 years now. I got Nevada as a companion to Dakota. Around 5 years old, Dakota slowed down considerably. She couldn't do the Frisbee anymore. Her hips were shot. I thought a puppy would bring out the old spark in her. It really never did. Instead of becoming more puppy-like, she became very mom-like. Interestingly enough, Nevada did the same thing when I got Jake.

Nevada came into my home in Riverside. That was a great house and a great neighborhood. We had great neighbors. In the winter, she loved to shove her whole head under the radiators and sleep. I used to fear she would cook her brain. Dakota, Nevada and I (and a soon to be dispensed husband) moved into our first real house together in Shorewood. There we lost Dakota and the husband, but we gained Jake. She moved with me back into my childhood home after the divorce. Then she came with me as I started a new life in a new home in southern IL. Her last home. The diaspora mattered little as long as we were together. Nevada's home was with me.

Nevada saw me through my second bachelor's, my first master's, and a good portion of my doctorate. That alone may qualify her for sainthood.

Some of the things that Nevada and I loved to do together, I couldn't seem to bring myself to do without her. Like go for hikes in Pyramid State Park. For the past several years, I haven't done that with Jake alone. Maybe it's time to take him for a good run outdoors. Maybe after gun season ends.

Unlike Dakota, Nevada never got car sick. She loved a ride in the car. You couldn't go anywhere without her. About two years ago, she simply stopped wanting to go to the store. Or the post office. I think it hurt her back or hips to jump in and out of the car. Since then, the only rides she has taken were to the veterinarian's office or for a long trip to visit family. I think both were equally hard on her.

Nevada's illness was an abrupt change in our lives. In reality, I've gone through two grieving periods with Nevada. The first was three years ago when I thought I'd lose her to her mystery ailment. I watched her waste away to nothing. It was one of the slowest, most pitiful declines imaginable. She was so sick. Concern became desperation became acceptance. And then I got her back. Addison's disease is completely treatable. But this time there were no miracles. I could only let her go. I won't say it was easier, but at least I felt she wasn't going before her time. Nevada herself is responsible for helping me be able to let her go. The girl exhibited grace in defeat. All she wanted was for me to be there at the end and I was happy to accommodate.

Watching a dog get old--accepting those changes--changing your own pace to accommodate her's--is like no other lesson you will learn in your life. You walk slower. You give treats you never would have considered when she was younger. Rough-housing gives way to gentle pats and quiet moments shared together. You sit on porches. You accept that some less-than-desirable behaviors aren't as big a deal as you once made of them. You accept that she has a right to her own mind and some of her own decisions. You accept that the medicines she requires, despite their expense, are owed for a lifetime of happiness she's provided.

My mother remarked that I have a way with my dogs. I've always had a way with my dogs. I think the reason is, I never treated them as pets or objects or with a sense of ownership. I have always tried to treat them as companions, as partners, as equals. Of course, I am responsible for their health, safety, and happiness. I think in some ways, they felt responsible for my happiness, too.

My girl is gone. Yes, I am sad. Yes, I am grieving. We grew together. And though our partnership is over, her value in this world is undiminished, because she made me a better person. Everything is different. And I wouldn't trade a minute of it for anything. Would you?