I Never Had To Walk Alone

I wrote this post a long time ago and never published it.  I reread it last night while I watched our dog, Sadie, try to figure out what to do with herself.  She was in pain and my heart was breaking.  Today we said goodbye to her after over 14 years.  Her body just gave up.  She was a good dog and she loved all 9 of her lives!  She was my constant companion and sometimes a pain in my ass but I never had to walk alone!  We walked about 6,000 miles (this is my best estimate) together and I admit, I'm going to miss her!

Just chillin' to the music

Instead of changing everything to the past tense I'm leaving it as written.
Here's to you girl....

I never knew having a relationship with a dog would be so complicated.  Let me start by saying I was a reluctant dog owner. Yes, we have owned one and sometimes two dogs for over twenty years!  When I say it that way I am amazed I lasted this long.  I am not your usual  "I love my dog... can't imagine life without it... let me spoil it.... aren't dogs the best?" dog owner.  Well, maybe I am... a little.   I enjoyed my dog most of the time and resented her and found her to be a major pain others.  Am I alone here?  In spite of my occasional resentment, I learned a few things from being a dog owner and observing her through the years.

Routine is a good thing
In retrospect we should have named her Pavlov.  She could be the poster dog for Pavlov's dog.  There is comfort in having a routine.  Sadie has always been the ultimate creature of habit.  Open the back door, she springs up and runs out.  She has her "go to" spots in our yards and goes to them in the same order every single time.  Her life is mostly a series of predictable actions and reactions.  I think this makes her happy.  She even knows when we vere off the usual walking route and tries to lead me "her" way.

Seize the Moment
Sadie is always up for anything...except a bath.  She can be sound asleep and if I get the leash and rudely awaken her from her slumber she is up and ready in a second.  She doesn't have to put her makeup on, brush her hair, check her calendar or worry about whether it will be too hot or too cold, she is ready!

Loyalty
Sadie probably knows there are times I resent her.  She probably also knows my heart is heavy every time we have to leave her at the kennel or with a friend when we travel.  I hate disrupting her idyllic life.  In spite of having been left behind many times, she always welcomes us home with her tail wagging and love in her eyes.
She is my fierce protector in Nova Scotia, just ask anyone up there with a large dog.  Any time a large dog comes near me, Sadie pounces to my aid with growls and barks at the intruding dog.  She is especially alert when TJ is out of town.  I think she takes a deep sigh of relief when he gets home. She is off duty and can finally relax.

Sadie in her happy place!

Patience
Any being who can wear a leg cast for 3 months and come out the other side with as much life as Sadie, has a lot of patience.  She never gave up, much to my dismay.  Ok, that's the reluctant dog owner in me coming out.
Hunting dogs naturally have patience.  Waiting on point until the clueless hunter finally comes to see what treasure the dog has found takes a lot of patience.  Sadie will stand at point watching a rabbit in the yard for a long time.  Every muscle in her body is quivering but she waits for just the right moment to pounce, unsuccessfully on the rabbit.  Patience.

Trust
I can do no wrong in Sadie's eyes.  Those are probably the only eyes in the world that I can do no wrong!  She has unwavering faith that every morning I will let her out, feed her and take her for a walk.  She knows that her needs will be taken care of every day and so far they have been which makes her trust us.  Sometimes I think she wonders about me when I take her to the vet.  She looks at me with those teary eyes as if to say, "What did I do?  Why are you brining me here?!".

Grace Through Pain
Sadie forged on with her life when all of us thought it was over.  She learned to eat, drink, walk, use the bathroom and sleep while wearing a cast on her leg for 3 months.  She still tried to run to the back door when we opened it so she could stalk squirrels and rabbits.  I know dogs can't really complain, but to see her never give up and never really complain was amazing.  Grace through pain.

Even at the end, when I knew she was hurting, she looked at me with those brown eyes as if to beg,
" Make it better."  A more helpless feeling I have never known.  I hope she is running like the wind on the great sandbars in the sky.  Walking without a dog on a leash will take some getting used to and be a daily reminder that she is gone.

How Long is an Hour?

I know...it's 60 minutes!  But why is it that some hours fly and others creep?  Our perception of time passing is skewed by the events that fill that time.  When you love what you are doing, the time seems to fly.  When you are driving down I-81 through Virginia... the time will inevitably creep ever so slowly.  Well, at least that has been my experience!

In no particular order here are some of the fastest and slowest passing hours this summer.

Endless Hours

We spend many hours with our family and friends at the shore and somehow time just slips away.  I like to say, "it gets late early up here".  I blame it on being in the Atlantic time zone.  The sun sets so late in the summer that before you know it.....it's late.  Those hours go by very quickly!

Any hour spent at our neighbor's house or our house watching the sunset, eating dinner or just visiting  will fly.
Sometimes we wish time would just stand still!

The Hour or Hours I Wished Would Never End

Ever since I bought our croquet set many, many years ago I have wanted to have a family croquet game on the lawn at the farmhouse.  I had visions of a very Gatsbyesque event.  We had thrown around the idea of dressing in all white and having a lovely game sometime during the summer.  We even tried to schedule a game but to no avail.  Then one afternoon it just happened!  I love it when things "just happen".  Jehnna did a beautiful job of documenting that evening here.  It was a very civilized and classy evening, complete with our own butler.  I really have no idea how long we were out there but the time flew by and before we knew it the sun had set and it was time to move on.

One of the rules was you had to continue holding your drink during the entire game.
Who knew croquet could be a drinking game?!.

The Hour That Lasted Forever

Our drive home never seems to go by quickly enough for me.  Most of the hours crawl by while I stare out the windshield wishing we were "there already".  I am just not one of those people who loves a long car trip.  I think too many car trips have burned me out.  However, there is one hour on our drive home that stands out as THE LONGEST HOUR EVER!

I had been warned and knew it was going to happen.  TJ had a very important conference call one of the days we were driving.  He gave full disclosure and told me when it was and that it would last about four hours.  I would have to be the driver during the call.  I was fine with all of this.  What we did not plan on was that there are very few areas on I-81 in the mountains that get good cell coverage.  No cell coverage while driving meant we had to find a city....on top of a mountain... with a good cell signal... for the conference call.  Meanwhile, Sadie the dog and I got to cool our heels and ....wait.  I was prepared to drive during the call but not just sit and wait it out.  I was fairly patient for the first three hours of the call.

Sadie and I did a lot of walking during the call.  We found a nice park and walked.  We ate lunch.  We walked more.  I went into the strip mall and shopped.  I read my email.  My patience wore thin, we were burning daylight....to quote a loved one.  I was getting tired and bored and just wanted to "get there already".  The fourth and final hour of the call was the last straw and seemed to last another four hours.

The idea for this post happened right here...the sight of.the longest hour of our drive home!

The longest hour may or may not have resulted in me pitching a spoiled brat hissy fit.  FYI having a spoiled brat hissy fit only makes an hour last a lot longer.

The Best Hour of the Week

Our pastor likes to say that the hour we spend in church is the best hour of our week and sometimes he is right.  This Sunday was surprising.  I already had more than half of this post written last Sunday before church.  Imagine my surprise when during the homily the priest shared a little levity at the end.  It played right into his point but it also made me do a double take.  He did an entire list of things that ended this lead in,

"Isn't it funny how.....

-$100 looks so large in the collection plate at church and so small at the mall?
-we all cheer when a ball game goes into extra innings or overtime but groan when the homily runs 5 minutes too long?"

I know exactly what he means!  Isn't it funny how fast an hour spent watching the sunset at the shore or playing croquet on the lawn with some of your favorite people can go so fast and how slow an hour in a parking lot in TheMiddleofNowhere, VA waiting for a conference call to end can go by so slowly?!

Hope all your hours are full, fast and endless!

So Long Farewell

It is the eve of my departure from one of the more memorable summers in my life. Well, at least now I remember it.

I have cleaned the bathrooms, mopped the floors, washed the towels and sheets, put everything away from the deck (sigh), bathed the dog, packed my suitcase, emptied the fridge (well, mostly), locked the windows that have been open almost every day for the last 2 months, checked my email about 100 times in an effort to not do all of these things and now it is almost time for bed. How can I make this time last forever? This summer has been the best!

I wondered at the beginning if I would be able to stay up here for 2 months. I can remember when I was a kid thinking that if I could stay here that long it would be awesome and then there were some years....when the kids were young, that I thought I would never be able to stay up here that long and why would I want to? I mean come on...no clothes dryer, no telephone (at the time), no TV, and I had to cook every meal! But I must be getting old or grown up or mature or something but I have embraced my time up here this year. Right time, right place, and oh, right weather. Did I mention that we had maybe 6 rainy days in 2 months? In my book, that is something to write home about. A summer to remember.

So it is with a bit of sadness that I will tuck in tonight. We put a lot of hard work into this farmhouse and this has been it's first real summer complete with visitors and family and dinners and sunsets and it has been all I anticipated. The place is starting to take shape. My/our vision is coming into focus. You can't always be sure things will work out the way you planned. So far, so good in this case.

Tomorrow, Sadie (super dog) and I head back down south. I hope she makes her flight...and gets through customs without any delay. I am going to put off reality for a few more days and stop off in NYC! Sadie will have to go all the way to Houston and keep TJ company. I will be acclimating myself back to civilization abruptly. Nothing like going from Green Acres to NYC in 2 hours! Whoo hoo, bring it on. I hope the wide eyed look when I come out of the train station doesn't give me away as a tourist. Do you think? It may take all of 10 minutes to become cityfied (it is in MY dictionary). Actually, it will be very unfortunate to lose all of this peace and tranquility in such a short amount of time. Houston will seem like a small town after the Big Apple.

So I bid you all farewell from my little piece of heaven....Nova Scotia and the farmhouse. Re-entry can be bumpy....stay tuned.

Shifting Gears

First... a "moment". TJ and I headed north on July 2, a Friday afternoon amidst torrential rain. The Houston airport was packed and all flights were running 2 hours late. Lovely. We decided to eat dinner and were among the masses at the food court when it happened. I looked up to see a large group of military men and women all dressed in their desert fatigues walking through the terminal. Then... the "moment". One person started to clap and then another and then before I knew it the entire airport was standing and clapping as the men and women passed through. What a patriotic beginning to our 4th of July weekend!

We made it to Pittsburgh ridiculously late that night/morning and shifted into reunion-palooza mode. The reunion was for TJ's mother's side of the family. 125 family members descended on the William Penn hotel in downtown Pittsburgh. I am sure they are still wondering what hit them!


Here are all of the Mahoney branch of the family, plus a few extras, who were at the reunion at the lookout over the river in Pittsburgh. I would like to say that it was refreshing to be north and that we had a welcome reprieve from the heat of the south but as luck would have it, the temps were in the 90's! BUT....the sun was shining and the humidity was considerably lower, ahhh. It was so great to see everyone together and to see the city that raised 4 great women who went on to raise 4 amazing families! Sometimes reunions are tricky, this one was not. It was a genuine happy to be together reunion.


I never knew Pittsburgh was such a nice city!


Sadie in her, Nova Scotia or Bust dog travel crate!
Next, we shifted gears again into Nova Scotia or Bust mode. We left beautiful, and getting hotter by the minute, Pittsburgh on Monday and headed to Nova Scotia. We flew to Newark where we were going to board the same plane as our dog Sadie who was flying up from Houston. Piece of cake! It was only 101 degrees in Newark that day. Glad we opted for the temperature controlled environment for the beast. We eventually arrived in Halifax at 10pm on Monday. Sadie arrived as well. The only trick was picking her up.

This part could be a blog post all unto itself! Here is the short version; we got through customs, got picked up by my Mom and Dad, we drove to the cargo hangar to get Sadie, we drove back to customs to get the paperwork signed, we drove back to the hangar, we called the night shift dude who showed up eventually and let us have our very cool, calm and collected dog who then peed for about a half an hour! She had been in that crate from 8:45 am until 11 pm and was still pleasant. Go figure!



We are all here and have shifted seriously into vacation mode! So much to get done around here but who cares? We are just happy to be here. I think I'll go cut some flowers and put them in the house. Maybe they will distract any visitors from seeing all the dust, dirt and clutter around here. Do you think?

July 2 -Houston- blood pressure- 152/90
July 3&4- Pittsburgh- blood pressure- 145/85
July 5-Halifax airport- blood pressure- 160/92!!!
July 7- Amherst Shore- blood pressure- 110/ 70 This place is good for my health! I think I'll just stay!

The Good, The Bad and The Vet

Crepe Myrtle in our front yard

One of the good things about summer in the south is crepe myrtles. These trees wait to bloom until June and the flowers are spectacular. They are a truly southern thing and bring to mind French Quarter courtyards and Savannah sidewalks.

The trees outside my kitchen window
These trees line the common area behind our house and they provide the view from my kitchen table, where I am sitting as I write this, and they are in full bloom now. What is not to love about hot pink?! Makes me happy just looking out the window.



And in the backyard

Another favorite summer thing for me are caladiums. They love the shade and apparently they love the heat because they are growing like weeds in the back yard. How do they do it?

Which brings me to the bad.....

It is wicked hot and humid down here! I am remembering the words I said a few months ago about embracing the weather. Well, I'm not sure I'm embracing it, let's just say I am tolerating it. The only reason I am tolerating it is because I know that in 2 1/2 weeks I will be migrating north to a kinder gentler climate! I can do anything for a few weeks, even survive in this climate. No need for that hot yoga class, just walking the dog I sweat as much as I did in a class. Want hot yoga? Just go outside and pull a few weeds... bending, squatting and sweating all at once.

Speaking of the dog....
Today we went in for the annual shots, check up, etc. Sadie needs all her papers in order for her big flight to Nova Scotia. Has anyone ever noticed that vets are some of the nicest people ever? My sister once said that she wishes she could go to a vet for her medical treatment, they have great bedside manner. So true! Today was no different. So, after being injected with about 10 different things in three different places, poked and prodded and given a lovely pedicure, Sadie got a dog treat. Yup, and she was thrilled. Should I give her some baby tylenol and put her to bed now? After buying the flight kennel, getting all the shots in order and the health certificate for travel and paying for the flight to and from Nova Scotia, Sadie better have the time of her life and maybe wash a few dishes when she is there to chip in around the house.

Time to go do some garden yoga.

Suburban hunting

Today after running a few errands I came home and let Sadie out into the backyard. As I was talking on the phone I heard her outside just crying and whining at something. I look... can't see what it is. She is just shaking and whining,looking through the fence as still as can be. Hmmmm, must be something out there. Upon closer examination I see it. Little Bunny FooFoo, hopping through the greenspace, eating the long grass and teasing the heck out Sadie.
The stand-off lasted a long time until Bunny FooFoo got bored and hopped off to torment some other poor suburban dog stuck behind a wrought iron fence. Smart bunny.