The Things You Pick Up at Politits

I dropped by Dcup's and found this delightful meme/notmeme

Other Names Meme:
1. WITNESS PROTECTION NAME: (mother’s & father’s middle names): Jean Brian

2. NASCAR NAME: (first name of your mother’s dad, father’s dad): Linton Ralph

3. STAR WARS NAME: (the first 2 letters of your last name, first 4 letters of your first name): Pepegg

4. DETECTIVE NAME: (favorite color, favorite animal): Red Dog

5. SOAP OPERA NAME: (middle name, city where you live): Evan Salt Lake

6. SUPERHERO NAME: (2nd favorite color, favorite alcoholic drink, optionally add “THE” to the beginning): Black Old Fashion

7. FLY NAME: (first 2 letters of 1st name, last 2 letters of your last name): Peon

8. GANGSTA NAME: (favorite ice cream flavor, favorite cookie): Chocolate Peanutbutter

9. ROCK STAR NAME: (current pet’s name, current street name): Cyrus Lincoln

10. PORN NAME: (1st pet, street you grew up on): Tippy Lincoln

And to follow Dcup's lead, I won't tag anyone, unless they comment. Then you're in the game.
I did think her answers were hilarious, while mine seem rather ordinary. I always liked the alliteration of my name, but it cramps the style when creating a Star Wars Name. Sounds like a stutterer. And was there ever a less Fly name than Peon?

Stella Speaks in Response to a Comment at My Place

Red, let a native Californian school ya, even though a Red Rasputin is a cocktail.

Proposition 8 was purposely written in a deceptive manner, especially in the initial draft. Many people thought if they voted Yes on 8, they supported same-sex marriage. The ads were utter prevarication.

The original ballot language read: "[Prop 8] Amends the California Constitution to provide that only marriage between a man and a woman is valid or recognized in California."

The election official's change, however, gives the legislation a more straightforward read:

"[Prop 8] Changes California Constitution to eliminate right of same-sex couples to marry. Provides that only a marriage between a man and a woman is valid or recognized in California. Fiscal Impact: Over the next few years, potential revenue loss, mainly sales taxes, totaling in the several tens of millions of dollars, to state and local governments. In the long run, likely little fiscal impact to state and local governments."

Red, note the convoluted language. The only fiscal impact is that companies and the government that insures heterosexual families would be required to insure same-sex families. Where this "tens of millions" came in, I do not know, especially when the end of the proposition states "likely little fiscal impact." Huh?

"The Proposition 8 ballot was created in opposition to amend the constitution and overturn the 2000 Proposition 22. Prop 22 was an initiative to prevent same-sex marriages from being recognized by the State of California. The measure was defeated by a wide margin of 61.4% to 38.6%. Oppositionists tried to fight this decision in the California Supreme Court and the decision was upheld in May 15, 2008 and same-sex marriages were finally allowed in California."

Your logic is flawed, Red. I find the comment you selected bordering on bigotry. Your quote is from one minister at one church: hardly a consensus on African-American voters.

Please take your question back to the Mormon Church and the Knights of Columbus who violate separation of church and state. These organizations, along with right-wing Christian fundamentalists, such as the Christian Coalition, poured millions of dollars into passing this proposition—most of these organizations are not in California and don't belong in our politics.

Furthermore, , "Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger said Sunday he will not join legislative Democrats in a court fight against Proposition 8 despite his opposition to the same-sex marriage ban, but he believes the courts ultimately should and will allow such marriages in California.".

Sadly, Attorney General Jerry Brown, has his hands tied to defend the laws of the State of California. He has stated he wants to ensure that same-sex marriages that occurred between May 15 and November 3. But, that's another story.

Ms L. at SaoirseDaily2, Sends Earrings to Civilize the Savage Beast in Me

There are two more pair, and I will soon be modeling them for you. I tried to photograph all three pair on a dark green velvet scarf, but my hands shake due to bipolar meds. I would need a tripod to take a photo that isn't blurred at such close range, so I am forced to let my computer do the work for me. It is interesting to me what the direction and source of light does to the color of flesh.

Ms. L of SaoirseDaily2 fame is a very talented jewelry maker and does a great job choosing the right earrings for a particular woman. I have been wearing this pair all afternoon. My hair is a fairly simple bob and an earring that doesn't dangle a bit is invisible.

Thank you Saoirse darling. I love my new earnings and will step up my wardrobe so I can justify the lovely bit of glamour hanging from my earlobes. You are a dear. And I just might be a bit less savage, looking so civilized.

The Mormons and Proposition 8

The Washington Post is reporting on the Mormon Church's support for Proposition 8. Don't forget about this violation of The Constitution. And that this is a very rich Church with a very small central governing group, ruled by one wise old "white man" chosen by god, and his twelve apostles or elders, all of whom are also white men. Did I say rich white men? I should have.

Women with ambition in the Mormon Church are relegated to The Relief Society. Men rule, women serve. And everybody in the church pays tithing. So come all ye saints is a way to enrich the church. If you are poor and live in a country where you are oppressed or have very little chance for improving your situation and the nicely dress duo of clean cut, sweet faced, well behaved, young men knock on the door of your hovel offering not only eternal salvation, but the possibility of immigration to the US of A, what would you do? Utah has very few restrictions for immigration. Utah will expedite the visas for converts. And once here they will help you find housing, a job, and the tight embrace of the church.

Mormons also run "charities" where we donate, and they sell. And in these hard times, they just raised their prices for the stuff they get for free but sell back to us. They own vast swaths of downtown real estate. They build enormous Temples all over the world, and send out an army of young men (only recently have they allowed young women to join in the conversion brigade). Please pay attention to what this fundamentalist, right wing, wealthy, and well connected Church is doing. This is a church with great organizational skills. They are the only financial backing Mitt Romney would need to finance his next bid for the presidency. They run Utah and are making inroads in the national government.

D.K. Raed said...

"They run Utah" ... and most of Idaho, a heckova lot of Nevada, northern Arizona, and western Colorado -- all part of the original "Deseret Territory".

Thanks for putting this up UT. As I shopped in Costco today, surrounded by polyg women, I always wonder why they are so eager to obey. The Relief Society -- don't get me started, it's a relief to not be a part of that zombiette society. It's enough to make me swerve the car a little too close to the curb as I pass those clean-cut white-shirted young men bicylcing around town.

People think they are so nice & mannerly, but I live near Mountain Meadows Massacre, so I can never forget they are capable of extreme violence, if so ordered by that "old white prophet guy".

Art for Art's Sake

I've been longing for some new art. I've grown used to the pieces hanging on my walls and hardly give them a glance anymore. I've also lamented the mostly rather primitive works of art that we give one another when we want to pay homage to our favorite bloggers. Susan at Phantsythat is a remarkable artist and talented writer. And it seems Randal asked her for a painting. It amazes me that those with extraordinary artistic gifts so seldom see themselves as the enormous talents they in fact are. Prior to this, the prettiest award being passed around was the Marie Antoinette award given to me and others by Liquid Illusion. My first award was the E for Excellent award and I treasure it, then I got the Rebel Grrrl award, and that thrilled me because it was finally acknowledged, and celebrated. Halleluia!

I'm a woman who never won anything prior to blogging. So now I love the awards. I can't get enough of them. I was amazed that in this particular time of economic peril anyone would think Marie "let them eat cake" Antoinette was a fitting award, but she is pretty, you've got to give her that. And it does make one think of the French Revolution and the quite literal toppling of a corrupt regime. Which of course makes me think of the guillotine. What a lovely word for such a fierce and fatal final execution. And there sits Madame Defarge, on a stool, knitting as the heads roll off the block and into a basket at her feet. I, being somewhat old, no longer lovely, and rather bloody-minded at this point in our nation's history, feel rather more Madame Defarge-like and would like to see some rough justice for the rulers who brought us to our knees, forced some of us to lose our homes and cars and livelihood. I'm wanting to see the Bush administration, the entire pack of liars and thieves beheaded, and I would sit smiling as I knit and watch the heads roll. Oh yes I would. Am I nice? No, not so much. Did I ever claim to be? Where is my sense of forgiveness? Killed long ago.

"But didn't you say you don't believe in capital punishment?" Well, yes I did say that. But that's because so many people on death row were not rich enough to hire world class legal teams to defend them. And the "justice" system is filled with republican justices appointed by republican regimes, and the prisons are now so often privately owned and operated and are crying "poor me, I need more prisoners to justify the hefty profits I make running these mighty fine prisons you pretty much gave me"--like the ones in Texas that are owned by the Chenneys and looked over by the likes of Alberto "I don't recall" Gonzales. It must have been some mighty horrific conditions and abuses of power that prodded a Texas grand jury to charge both Dick Chenney and Alberto Gonzales. Remember that Texas is the state George Bush governed and calls home. Now that takes balls, Texas. Good on ya. I'm not so embarrassed to have been born there now, if only for a moment or two. Oh how I'd like to see those two heads roll. Let's open another bottle of wine and toast that thought.

Anyway, to get back to art. Susan has painted a Heart Mandala and is giving it as a blogger award. And Randal Graves and the Boarder Explorer and I are three of it's first recipients. There will no doubt be more. And maybe this will open my heart chakra a little. But forgiveness for those criminal bastards will be a little harder to accomplish. Nothing less than a War Crimes Trial will do. Maybe I do have a trip left in me. Lets all meet up at the Hague when the time comes. And to celebrate after the convictions, I say we spend at least a couple of days in Amsterdam.

A Fine Romance

If you haven't read the notes on my last musical Sunday post please do so now. This is a continuing sloppy saga of fatally flawed infatuation.

I've Got to See You Again

Is it possible to fall in love with someone you've never met, whose voice you've never heard, whose only words are typed upon a page, who lives in another country, who scares you a little? Maybe love isn't the right word, maybe it's only flirtation, or the time of night he speaks to you through the lines on a page, like the words in a dream, when you know that it's real and not real at all.

Bill Evans, piano, Chuck Israels, Bass, Larry Bunker, Drums

This was the year I sailed for Italy.
Thanks anonymous for the suggestion, which surprised me. Weren't you the one who said, It's much like the music of Richard Wagner's not as bad as it sounds? I would rather listen to cats fucking than anything by Wagner. Wagner is torture. Bill Evans is sublime. Shall we continue this conversation?

Giant Steps

For all the Sunday morning Jazz lovers
John Coltrain, posthumous winner of a Pulitzer, a giant talent.

Try a Little Tenderness

For Kelso. He knows why.

A Bit of a Squirrely Update

Linda of Vulture Peak Muse left me a comment in my first chapter of the three part series on Squirrels in the Attic, informing me that squirrels use their feet like raccoons, they carry their food into the attic through the red tile roof and since they put foot to mouth, they are not likely to like cayenne pepper. I went on a hunt for large amounts of cayenne pepper and lucked out at Big Lots. Big shakers of cayenne pepper for $1 apiece. I bought eight. Today we, my two tenants and I, embarked on the cayenne pepper raid. I supplied the pepper, the masks to protect the pepper appliers from inhaling pepper and other crap (literally), the rubber gloves, and the ladder. They climbed into the attic crawl space above the upstairs bedrooms and bathroom and found the openings where the squirrels are entering, sprinkled the pepper generously around all places where there is any sign of squirrel activity. In the nesting area, all over the walnuts in storage up there. Wherever there is any sign that a squirrel has been, it has been sprinkled with a heavy coat of cayenne pepper. Thanks Linda. We'll give it some time and I'll report back to you as I know whether or not this has discouraged the squirrels. I know you're all holding your breath waiting for these answers.

Men (the condensed story)

I like the idea of men. I like men in the abstract. I like one man in the present real time and see him often. But he has seen me marry and divorce, love and leave, and in the end isolate myself from the company of men. We're old friends and are likely to remain old friends so long as we never try to live together.

I am heterosexual, though I have wished I weren't at times. Sadly, I can attest to the fact that sexual identity is not a choice, or I would be a lesbian. I gave it a try, and it isn't for me. Too bad, because I can't seen to find a man that I can actually live with. I must confess that the fault could be mine and not the men I've known, since I am a "difficult" woman. More on that later.

I have tried, god knows, I've tried to make it work with not just one, but three husbands, several relatively short term lovers, and even one very very long term lover. And when I leave them, as I have done, sometimes more than once, and in one case over and over, I know that it isn't really that there is something intrinsically wrong with the man I'm leaving, but that the relationship (not necessarily the man) doesn't give me what I need. Which brings up one question. What do I need? What did I want from a particular man that I wasn't getting? And the answers aren't easy to find. But my past, my long distant past, holds clues to that answer. If you've read my novel or any of the older stories you probably could answer that question for me, because all the clues are there.

So let me try to start at the beginning with a list.
1. My biological father had no use for me and made it clear to me that I was in the way. He did not leave us, but once my mother made a run for it, I never heard from him again.

2. My three much older brothers left home one at a time and never really looked back. I don't blame them at all. Given their age and gender, I too would have left and never looked back.

3. My second father, the one who adopted me and was my "real" parent for a year, then started sexually abusing me and kept at it for five years, told me I was too old for him when I turned eleven and started menstruating. You can imagine my confusion.

4. My mother was a narcissistic bitch who was from day one in competition for attention with her only child. And so, a very bad role model for what it is to be a woman.

5. I was very pretty. (there is no good or bad about that on its face, but with the other deficits of my family's collective psychosis turned out to be a very bad thing for the sensitive person I was to become) Too pretty for anyone to see much beyond the prettiness and see the person inside. I know very few people, men or women, who would feel sorry for a woman who was as pretty as I was, since envy and the comfort of dismissal make empathy impossible for the envious.

That's a pretty good start. So I begin with abandonment, then shift to abuse and then abandonment again where the significant men in my early life were concerned. Add to that the angry, competitive, hostile mother, and you have the making of a woman unable to bond or trust. So, I might be capable of loving, but never able to fully trust. I always believed that any man I loved would leave me (the early imprint) and so I left first. It was the only way I knew to avoid abandonment. Really very easy to understand laid out like that (like a patient etherized upon the table). So I do not dare to eat a peach. Unless alone, that is.

There is more on this subject. But not today. Today I am vacuuming.

Bill Evans on piano with basist Scott LaFaro, and drummer Paul Motian

Oh to have been young and in New York for this. Recorded live at the Village Vanguard in 1961. And check out the hands. Ahumm

Squirrels in The Attic, Part 11: The Savage Women

I am an old woman living in her converted garage so I can rent my house and afford to eat and pay my bills. But getting together the money to pay property taxes gets harder every year. And every trip to the grocery store costs more to buy less. I dread leaving my house. I have a full tank of gas in my van, and it might last the winter if I'm careful.

I have no credit cards. I filed for bankruptcy the last year of my mother's life. Caring for her had made working impossible, and it made my bipolar illness worse. She was too difficult for anyone. And I was her only living relative and had the legal, as well as moral, responsibility to care for her. Then suddenly, with all money gone, she finally qualified for Medicaid. And under Medicaid's watchful eyes we got a social worker, and meals on wheels, and three days a week an aid came to our house to bathe her and take her for a walk. And for the first time I slept for an hour without fear.

Early on in her dementia she saw her brother in the house and wanted me to make him go away. He had been dead for years. She wanted to sleep with me, and I could think of not a single thing on earth I would have hated more. Once I woke in the dark of early morning to find her standing looking down on me. How odd that my mother could still strike terror in my heart. Panic and terror was what I felt at the prospect of my mother in bed with me. I thought she might kill me. It was more probably a projection of my own dark wishes.

One morning in the deep of winter I went into her room to wake her, change her diaper, dress her, fix her breakfast. She wasn't in her bed. I searched the house and worried that she'd found the hidden key, and let herself out into the snow and freezing temperatures. But the key was in its place and all the doors were still locked. Than I ran through the house again, looking everywhere calling her name, while my dog Lucy searched with me. We went down to the basement, looked in her closet, under her bed, and finally I checked the attic where squirrels were nesting in the last of the shredded insulation and torn bits of paintings, scraps of summer dresses. And there she was, bedded down on the wood floor with the walnuts and the squirrels, her nightgown hiked around her hips, curled like a fetus. Sagging diaper leaking, her wrist cold to the touch. It was freezing in there with the uninsulated ceiling. I had trouble rousing her. I was afraid she might be dead at first, and for a moment I thought of leaving her there and going back to sleep. Then the moment passed, and I did my best to scoop her up and take her to her bed. I quickly changed her diaper, put her in a warm, clean nightgown and while I changed her like a sleeping baby, her eyes slitted open and glanced sideways at me and she said, "Lucy." Not a question. Lucy was her little sister. Lucy lived in Arkansas then, but had also been diagnosed with Vascular Dementia as well. My Aunt's lifelong companion was blind, and I wanted not to think about their reality. I tried not to think about the implications of my mother and her sister and their mother and all the Savage women who had something called Malignant Hypertension which, prior to blood pressure drugs had claimed all the women in my mother's line young--all with massive strokes, or heart attacks or they just dropped dead early with no apparent cause, until the advent of the treatment of high blood pressure with diuretics. And as the drugs got better we survived the strokes to end our days in nursing homes, drooling and vacant and wearing diapers.

I remember when, after my grandmother survived her second stroke, my mother and her sister swooped in, packed her shit, sold her house, and divvied up the jewelry between themselves. They left her in a Nursing home, never to visit again. I wasn't living in Salt Lake then, and I wasn't told about any of this until months after it was accomplished. I was horrified. Two daughters, both single, and neither for a moment considered caring for their mother.

Now I know why. They were smart. They each had a strong survival instinct. And grandmother was a drooling idiot. And I was a sentimental fool, who wanted to believe in the power of love to overcome distaste. Some kind of love. But they wanted to have their lives. And she, they said, would never know the difference. But still, didn't they owe her anything?

There is probably no one more sentimental about love and its absence than a child who never felt loved. We grow up craving it and never recognizing it since it feels so unfamiliar. And we seek the familiar because, though it might be abuse, it feels like the thing daddy called love. And if mother is withholding, we give everything to try to earn her love. And eventually nothing feels like love. And if you believe the family mythology that you were never good enough, you know you don't deserve love. So you work a little harder, sacrifice a little more. Until you live alone and she now needs you at last. And just when you can really help her, you turn into her dead sister, who she always hated anyway.

So I thawed her cold body, fed her broth, and tried so hard to be the good daughter. I know now that it wasn't for my mother that I was doing all this. It was for me. I wanted to see myself as the good daughter, since no one left alive would every know what I was, but me. It was my image of myself that so needed to believe despite the lifetime of abuse and criticism, that I was a good person, and good people take care of their dying parents.

She seemed no worse for her slumber with the squirrels. She was as active and odd that day as any other. She fought with me over the shit in her diaper, just like any other day. I had a number of concerns about her running around the house with poop in her pants. She had, in the recent past, taken to removing her poop and hiding it in the most inappropriate of places--and really, is there any appropriate place to hide poop but in the toilet? I found it along with a fork behind a sofa cushion. I found it under her pillow, and have to admit that I considered for a moment leaving it there. It was only my daily stripping her sheets and washing them that made this unworkable. She hid it in the dryer as I've said before. One never thinks to look into the dryer for shit before tossing in the days laundry to dry. Do you?

There were special nighttime diapers that were supposed to be able to absorb any amount of nighttime bed wetting. It's a lie--don't believe a word of that advertising. So every morning, once I managed to get her changed and dressed and fed, my next job was the daily bed stripping and sheet washing and bed making. So leaving her hidden turd under her pillow wasn't an option no matter how much it might please me to do it.

As the days went on like this, I found myself unable to remain awake in the afternoons. I set an alarm for every official moment of the day, but once the getting up and doing morning chores and the answering the door for the meals on wheels guy, after watching my mother eat her tuna sandwich with sloppy gusto, I would take us upstairs and lock us in my suite of rooms, where she could "type" on my computer for hours, while I drifted in and out of consciousness.

My mother had once been an executive secretary. There was a time when she could take dictation shorthand and type ninety words a minute with complete accuracy. Hoping for the best, I turned on the computer and pulled up an empty page. I typed a few words on the keyboard and watched her eyes light up as words appeared on the screen. She all but pushed me out of the way, eager to get to the typing. It seemed she had something to say. So for awhile I watched. Her fingers hovered over the keyboard, gnarled knuckles, ravaged nails (but festooned with gaudy rings I could not pry off her fingers). Then she dropped the little finger of her left hand upon the z and the zzzzzzzzzs flew off her finger like sparks across the screen. Line after line of small z. I tried to show her that all the other letters were there, but she briskly pushed my hands away to very deliberatley place that finger lightly upon the z and leave it there. I moved to the small room off my office that held my bed and slipped away into the sleep of the damned.

I awoke to the slap of my mother's hand across my face, and her distress as she pointed at the wall behind my head. She looked at the wall and said her first words in days, and in obvious alarm, "Can't you hear that?" It was the squirrels scrabbling in the walls.

Bill Evans Trio: My Romance

(I am reposting this while I get my brain working again. Today isn't starting well. So, for awhile, lets ponder the troubles of my failed romance. It might be instructive.)

When I met Tom (the man I call first love/last love) he was just beginning to play the acoustic bass. I've always had a thing for bass players. There is something about the instrument--it's rather womanly looking, and the man playing it has it in an embrace between his legs. His arms are wrapped around her and he is fingering...

I like men with good hands, finger dexterity, and stamina. Bass players fit that bill, pianists, guitarists too. For a brief period of time, Tom used to ask me to sing to his bass or piano accompaniment. I was reluctant, but eventually gave it a try. I have a deep, smokey voice, fairly limited range, but almost perfect pitch and a great memory for the lyrics of jazz standards. Solo bass is one thing, bass and vocalist is another entirely. I would lead him through my vocal arrangement of My Romance in my key, and he would say, but that's not the right key, that's not the key it's written in. And I would say, but it's my key, my range. If you want me to sing with you, we will have to play it in my key. He would say, "Sing it. I'll follow." And we would run through the song over and over, and just when I would get comfortable with the arrangement, relax and really start enjoying myself, he would change it up, get loose and start throwing in a bit of bass virtuosity. Without warning, he would play a solo in the middle of a duet. It ruined everything for me as a singer. And then I refused to sing for him. It's a metaphor for what went wrong with us.

For Simstone, Who Will Understand Why

If you want to know more about Simstone, the link is in the title.

I Have Been Tagged by Boarder Explorer

Boarder Explorer (whose blog is linked in the title) has challenged me to abide by these very difficult rules. I chaff at rules, wanting to modify them to suit my needs or taste, but the rules are the rules and must be obeyed. I have a very hard time fnding an entire album I like all the way through. This is one of the reasons I love ITunes, since it allows me to buy only the songs I love. But I will try to extrapolate from the songs I've purchased recently what albums I would currently pick. But my taste in music is pretty lopsidedly tilted toward a category that is missing in this list. So that will end up being my "if I would only have one" category pick.


THE RULES:

1. Post your list of the seven best albums, the seven bloggers you will tag, a copy of these rules, and a link back to this page.
2. Each person tagged will put a URL to their Blogger Album Project post along with a list of the seven best albums in the comment section HERE.
3. Feel free to post the “I Contributed to the Blogger Album Project” Award Graphic on your sidebar, along with a link back to this page.
4. Post a link back to the blogger who tagged you.

But first, will someone help me find my URL and help me transport this over to here?

MY SEVEN ALBUMS:

* Latin: Moriza, Meu Fado Meu

* Blues: My blues roots go as far back as Howlin' Wolf, but when I look at my faves it's Eric Clapton, Live at the Fillmore doing Crossroads:

* Pop: And to satisfy many of my musical joneses, I give you my version of pop: Amy "trainwreck" Winehouse singing the title song form her album of the same name Love is a Losing Game

* Country: Amy Lavere's Anchors and Anvils with one song favored above all others

* Soundtracks: Randy Newman's lovely score for Pleasantville

* Folk: The McGarrigals and Rufus Wainwrigit Songs of the Civil War, and my favorite song, Hard Times Come Again No More

If I could have only one album: Diana Krall, The Girl in the Other Room



1. Dcup at Politits. Don't hate me for this. It just might be what you need right now. You never know.
2.Linda at Vulture Peak Muse, because there is more to life than visual art, though we all loves us some visual art
3. Nan, at All The Good Name Were Taken, because I want to know more.
4. Beach at Life and Times of a Carolina Parrothead, and it can't all be Jimmy Buffet
5. James our Average Patriot, because I want to know what a happy man listens to.
6. Mathman, because is is something of a mystery and I want to know what she posts and what he posts
7.Linda Sama the ageless hippie chick, because she's my sister and I want to know how related we really are--call it sibling rivalry

There are three omissions from this meme. There should be a jazz category, a rock category, and a classical category. Just saying.

Liberality

I stole these maps today from Liberality. But before I found these maps at Lib's place I also found a button I had to have, and a vote I could make in favor of Unions, and a poem by Allen Ginsberg I hadn't read before. She has been remaking herself or at least the part of her self that is her blog. It is gorgeous. Go go see for yourself.

Special Needs

My dog, Cyrus' Veterinarian is the House Call Vet. He calls Cyrus a Special Needs dog. Those of you who've been reading me for awhile have heard Cyrus' story before, so if you know all this, skip this part. Cyrus was either born in a "shelter" or was dropped off there when he was very young. He's a lovely Rottie mix but spent his first nine years in that "shelter." I put quotes around the word shelter in this context, because there is some question as to whether the woman who ran the shelter was running a legitimate shelter or was just a hoarder and animals were part of what she was hoarding.

At first her house and shelter was located in a suburban part of Tucson. As the number of pets grew, so did the discontent of her neighbors. She was reported to authorities and eventually moved her shelter to an area in the desert about 200 miles from any populated area, and thus it was also 200 miles from a veterinarian or doctor. She was in her late forties when this move happened. Her records were sketchy, so not much is known about the health care or behavioral problems of her animals. When she was in her mid fifties she died suddenly. Her family kept calling and getting no answer or return call. They eventually called the authorities and it was discovered that she was dead and all her animals were in desperate straits. That's when Best Friends stepped in and rescued all her animals.

At this point Cyrus probably got his first real medical attention. He was bathed and groomed, probably for the first time in his life. He was anesthetized and given a thorough going over. His teeth were cleaned and a few extractions were done. It was discovered that he had arthritis in his hips and that one of his legs was at risk of needing an ACL repair. They discovered a thyroid problem. And true to any creature with a thyroid problem he was over-weight. He was ID chipped. He was found to be a sweet natured dog, and with a little socialization was deemed ready for adoption. But Cyrus would need just the right home. Cyrus was depressed.

It's hard to find people who will take an old dog. Most people want a puppy. Or if not a puppy, a well trained one or two year old. But I love old dogs. I'm a bit of an old dog myself. So after many calls and much time spent on the internet, we arranged a day when they were having an adoption event at one of the suburban Petcos. They did not tell me the size or breed of Cyrus. The reason for this oversight is that they had arranged for me to adopt another dog, who, at the last moment, exhibited behavior that make her unadoptable, so Cyrus was a bit of a last minute substitution. And in truth, I think they were afraid I would say no to such an enormous dog with health problems. His medication costs very close to $100. a month. Now I've added supplements to his diet, which brings the monthly pill cost to over $100 a month. This is a wild extravagance, but I would go without cable TV if my budget got that tight, and it is close to that now.

When I first saw Cyrus he looked depressed. In the midst of Petco, surrounded by thirty other animals there for the adoption event, he was lying flattened, head down. The only indication that he wasn't sleeping was the open eyes, tracking the activity. When I told the woman from Best Friends my name, she started crying. She reached across the table and hugged me. "We are so grateful to you. So few people will take an older dog. But you will really love this dog."

Best Friends gave me a two month supply of his meds. and about a weeks supply of his food. They'd had him on Kirkland kibble and mixed it with a bit of canned food to moisten it some. He was on a diet, so I was told exactly how much to feed him twice a day. So far so good. He came with me without any resistance, but I thought right then that Cyrus was a profoundly depressed dog. I had his medical records, complete with dental x-rays and copious notes--all of which has been very helpful to the House Call Vet.

I'm something of a recluse. I have my own mental health issues, and one of them is that I feel slightly agoraphobic when I leave my property. It's doable but I'm never completely at ease out in the larger world. This is probably a result of early abuse. I always preferred to play alone in my room and was forced to go outside to play with other children. Bipolar disorder has probably made this tendency toward agoraphobia more pronounced. But with Cyrus, I felt it was important to take him for a short walk twice a day. He was docile on his leash and would walk with me very nicely. He seemed interested in his surroundings, did a lot of pee trumping, and paid close attention to his environment. He was nice when we passed other dogs out walking with their people. And then one day while we were out, we heard what sounded like gunshot. Cyrus turned and started to drag me back home. He weighs about the same as I, so when he is pulling on the leash, I am the one being led. There is almost no stopping him. I did manage to get him to stop. I crouched down beside his head and talked calmly to him. He was trembling all over. And I then realized that he was not able to listen because he was terrified. We came home very quickly and he has refused to budge from the property ever since. He will go outside to do his dogie business, morning and night, but that's it.

The month of July was a nightmare for Cyrus. I contacted Best Friends and talked with their trainer. She said to put him on Melatonin and sent me an article about dogs with fear problems. We have no idea if Cyrus was ever shot at or if it's just the "normal" fear of a dog who is noise sensitive, but Cyrus and I are two of a kind. Both Best Friends and our House Call Vet have assured me that I have not made Cyrus crazy. Cyrus was raised in a crazy situation. He has lots of face scars so has probably been in some nasty dog fights--too many dogs in a too small area with too little supervision or training. And now if Cyrus is outside for his first pee of the day and has just lifted his leg, and a car off in the distance backfires, Cyrus cuts that stream and runs to the house. He will not go outside under any circumstances if I close the door behind me when we get outside--he simply wheels around and puts his face to the door, waiting for me to open it. In order to get him to go outside, I must go ahead of him, the door must remain open, and as soon as he's done he runs into the house and flops down on his bed.

Our Vet has reassured me that I am probably the perfect person for Cyrus. Cyrus seems happy enough to be in what must seem like a very luxurious kennel here in the little house with me. He has one large dog bed next to my bed and one near my computer table. He and Roscoe (Melea's big yellow Lab) spends three or four days with us when Melea is at work or out for the evening and the two dogs get along swimmingly. Roscoe likes to lick Cyrus' face which sometimes sends Roscoe into an air-humping frenzy.

For the first four or five months Cyrus was with me I never heard him make any noise at all. No bark, no growl. But now if someone comes to my door, Cyrus sits up and barks very authoritatively. So I now have a very large guard dog in the house, and Roscoe is the guard dog that keeps anyone who doesn't know us from entering the property without an escort from either me or Melea.

So the crazy old woman has a crazy old dog and we comfort one another.

Alma, for Anitaxanaxnow

It's almost poetry. For you Anita.