From Surf to Turf in A Week's Time.

The first weekend of December, we celebrated like this:

A few things about these pictures, in no particular order:

~ The green green above is my Grandma's backyard, smack in the middle of not-so-nice LA. And oasis for great grandkids.

~ The beach is Santa Monica

~ It was cold, but during our beach outing the weather was perfect and beautiful

~ Yes, my husband and son went in the water. No, the rest of us did not.

~ Yes, my husband has a black eye. No it's not from me, but from coaching wrestling.

~ Funniest misunderstanding of the trip:  When my aunt asked Darrick about his injury and he said, "I make black guys look good, huh?" And it took all of us about 3 times making him repeat himself before we realized he wasn't being awkwardly racist. "Black EYES. EYES."

~ That matriarchal beauty with my kids is the woman of honor who we traveled to visit: My gramma!

This past weekend, we mixed things up a bit by heading in the other direction:



Notes on these pictures:
~ We cut our tree this yaer just south of Heber. There was about a foot of snow on the ground in most places from a storm during the week.
~ Snow angels are all the rage this year, you know.
~ Also: snowman, complete with charcoal eyes and carrot nose. She left the nose and 'buttons', but insisted we bring home the hat, smile, and eyes.
~ The tree is obscenely large and we love it.
~ We strung white lights and haven't touched the tree since. And we like it that way.

One good thing about Arizona is that we can do this. We can fly to LA one weekend and bask on the beach and love on my grandma, then head up north to tromp in the snow and get cold and drink hot chocolate in the back of my mom's pickup truck the next. I am loving it. I am loving my kids this year and how engaged and excited they are about Christmas.

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Post-Script: We hung our stockings from the banister, though we later had to move them to acommodate the tree. Luca pulled out the stockings we had for our dogs and asked about them. I asked what she wanted to do, and she said, "I want to hang them up, mommy. We should try to remember them all the time. I think it's important." And then tonight I was out finishing my last run of C25K and a little mini pinscher dog came running up to me barking. Her elderly owner was waving frantically from the driveway, no doubt afraid I'd freak or get mad. Without thinking, I called out, "Don't worry! I have dogs!". But I don't, and I still miss them. Rest in peace, little loves.

Good-Bye Ruby Tuesday.

I will share more when I am feeling up to it, emotionally, but this weekend we said good-bye to sweet Ruby. Her health was failing and we were at a point where we had to choose to try to treat her or, at the age of 12, almost 13, if we could let her go. It was one of the hardest choices we've ever made together as a family, and she is now and will be missed incredibly. She is the dog we raised from puppyhood, who changed peoples' perceptions of pit bulls and who gave so much faithfulness, love, and devotion to our family. She was Rohan's best friend, and for our son who's not old enough yet to understand, I mourn more than I do for Darrick and Luca and myself. She was everything a family dog should be and more, and mere words cannot express how heartsick we are over saying good-bye to her a mere 15 months after making the same decision for Miss Piggy.

What an immeasurable blessing to be entrusted with the heart and the life of a dog. They give us more than we could ever give them and in return we owe them this one gift of setting aside our mortal emotions and attachments and freeing their souls to run on endless green lawns once more.

Rohan has been asking about her, and when he says to me, "Where's Ruby?" my heart knows the answer is "With her sister Piggy, giving herself to the earth once more. She, like her sister, is everywhere."

Rest In Peace, Sweet Ruby love.
May, 1999 - October 1, 2011

Deadpan.

If you've read this blog for any amount of time, you probably know that a year ago this summer, we made the really difficult decision to put our dog, Miss Piggy, to sleep. We put it off as long as was humane, then took her one evening to say good-bye. We also brought her remains home and buried her in a hole in our backyard.

Life's lessons about life and death are never just taught and let go when you have kids. You don't have the conversation about how the dog is dead and gone just once, but many many times in multifarious ways. You explain it on the day you make one of the toughest choices of your (dog loving) life. You explain it the next day as you read a book about saying good bye to a family pet. You talk about the body returning to the earth and enriching the soil with its power, just as the animal once enriched your life with her love.

And, if you have a very literal toddler in the house, you talk about it in practical, measured, real terms.

The dog was ill. No, it's not the kind of illness you can catch from her. She died. When someone or an animal dies, they are gone from the world we can see forever. No, she's not really gone forever. She's in your heart as long as you remember her. Her body will help the flowers and trees grow, so she lives on through them. Where is she? (Shit? Do I believe in heaven for dogs???) Um. In a hole in the ground. Out back.

Ever since she made the connection that "Piggy's in a hole in the backyard." we hear her talk about it ocassionally. There was the time when my mom took both my kids to storytime, and the story was about a dog. When the reader asked the kids who had a dog at home, Luca called out, "I have two. Ruby who is lazy and Piggy who's in the hole." Surprisingly, no visit from CPS, nor animal control, was paid us that week.

My kid is nothing if not linear and literal. She's one of the most sensitive kids I've ever known (take that for what it's worth, since she's also the first kid I've ever know this well) but one thing she is not is sentimental. So talking about her dog in a hole doesn't make her sad or wistful. It's just another fact of life.

Meanwhile, our other dog Ruby is no spring chicken. At 13, she's been having issues off and on with one of her front legs, and other than giving her supplements and managing the pain for her, there's not much we can do about it. Surgery IS an option, strictly speaking, but not a viable one in her case. Her condition took a nosedive about a week ago, and as a result she's now struggling more with things like climbing the stairs to sleep in our room or jumping on the couch. Real first-world dog problems, I realize, but those creature comforts are very much a part of the lifestyle with which she has become accustomed.

Yesterday, she made a leap for the couch and didn't make it, falling back on the new wood floors and doing a roll/flip move that left her righted lying on her belly in the middle of the floor. Once we assessed that she hadn't hurt herself more in the fall (she hadn't) we started talking about how sad it was that she couldn't get on the couch anymore.

Luca was deep in trying to force her brother to play some game she was making up as it went (that no doubt involved her being in charge and him obeying) when she looked up at us and said, with the most deadpan delivery yet, "We should probably just go ahead and put her in a hole now, guys."

And then, she went back to playing.

Windows Down.

It's unseasonably, well, beautiful in Arizona right now. Typically May ushers in unbearably warm weather which is but a tease of the oppressively hot hours and weeks and months to come. But this year? This year the weather has toyed with us a bit, fluctuating from pretty warm (upper 90s) to downright enjoyable.

Yesterday, I ate my lunch outside of my office, in the shade where the wind would rustle some leaves and cause goosebumps on my arms. I stared at big, cotton candy clouds on the bluest sky.

As I drove home it struck me: people are so used to their little segregated personal worlds that they don't even think to roll down their car windows in rush hour on a day as perfect as this one was. I, of course, had my windows down for the ride home. And I couldn't help but feel sad for all those people recycling the same cold air in their closed-up cars. When life hands you a day like this one, the least you can do to show your appreciation is roll your windows down.

Hope and Butterfly Trees.

I started this year with so much hope. And then, in the first 2 weeks it seemed like the damn world was crumbling around me, on my feet and on my head. I have always been sensitive, and sometimes the dark mysteries of the world break me into pieces and I feel hopeless.

What I know is this: bad things happen.

I also know this: life is so beautiful and even when the water's up to your chest threatening to choke you, there is the sun coming from behind the clouds.

I also know: I am cheesy. And I am SO ok with that. I am thankful that I feel pain for things I can't control because it also means I feel deep joy for the good that swirls around me, lifting me from the water's swells.

I feel like I've found some footing. I feel like a new year was carried in on cold January nights and has settled into my bones with the balmy 70 degree days. I feel hope.

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Three is a rough year, for me as well as for her. For all of us really. Three brings tantrums and willfullness that frustrate, and yet I flip the coin and see a reflection of myself. It's there, in her. My proudest moment this year so far was the one where my Grandmother looked wistfully from my daughter's face to mine, and proudly proclaimed, "She is little Katie all over again." The world sees Luca through a lens of pretty girl, blonde hair and green eyes like her father, delicate and wise and well-mannered. My Grandma, though, she sees who Luca is. She sees the spirit in those old-soul eyes and she sees me. And nothing could make my chest puff with pride more than the thought that this girl who I love so deeply it sometimes hurts makes my Grandma think of me.

But the food battles and the clothing battles and the bedtime struggle as my brain and mouth speak in unison to tell her, "You need to sleep in your own bed." while my heart and my arms scream a silent protest of, "You belong near me."? Those are killer. I battle the two mothers inside of me and usually listen to the one who feels like she's right. Advice and Shoulds be damned.

Last night she cried and then her wise little mind kicked into overdrive and supplied her with 101 excuses and reasons why she needed to be next to me to sleep. And inside my heart was cracking, but on this night she needed to sleep in her bed and I in mine. And suddenly I realized I was going head-to-head with her and that didn't feel right either.

"Lu, I have the answer," I offered, and she took my bait.
(sniffling) "What, mama?"
"We can sleep in separate spaces but meet in our dreams."

And so together we spun a dream, where we both would be butterflies with pink and purple wings. Over a rainbow we would travel separately, coming together at a big green tree to meet in our dreams. She sprinkled the tree with flowers of purple and pink (you might notice a theme?) and then she stopped and looked sad. When I asked why, she asked how Daddy and Rohan could join us. I suggested they appear in many forms (bees and bears and honeybirds) but none of those would do. In the end, they were gifted wings of flight like ours, butterflies with pink and green and black wings. And so it was decided, that we would meet and she would know it was me because I would bring her a gift.

"Mommy?" she smiled at me. "I want to bring something to you too. And something to Rohan-butterfly and Daddy-butterfly."

"That would be so nice, Luca. We would all be happy."

"But mommy, can I see Piggy there?"

"You can see anyone or anything you want to see, buddy."

"I think Piggy will be there. And that girl. The one who the mean man killed. But they aren't butterflies, Mommy. They are a girl and Piggy, but Piggy can go live with her now."

Choking back hot tears, I asked for more of the story. I guess I wanted to know why she thought that could happen. I guess I still didn't think she could possibly understand.

"They aren't here anymore, but where the butterfly tree is, they can be together. I want Piggy to be with her."

My girl. If she reminds anyone of me, that is the biggest honor I could wish for.

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I know that 2010 was a test for many. I know 2011 started off on perhaps the wrong foot. I also know without needing a sure sign that 2011 will be good.

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I stepped on the scale today, expecting to be where I was last week after a weekend of carbs and sweets and ass-sitting in a car. I was happily surprised to see I was down 1.5 pounds. It's a small step toward where I want to be, but I am grateful for small steps. I am grateful for daughters with wise old souls and sons with infectious smiles. I am grateful for friends and for challenging work and for love. I am grateful to be married to a man I still call my best friend after nearly 14 years.

What Happened Was This.

It's time for something a little less heavy on here. Or so I want to say, but the truth is this: I want to post about my weight loss efforts of the past few weeks but there's not really much to say. I've been following WW. I've dropped about 2 pounds in the past 3 weeks. And this week I was on track to have a really good loss. I was in the zone counting points, packing breakfast and lunch, and keeping my portions well under control. I was (admittedly, though I know I'm not supposed to) peeking in on my numbers every morning and on track for a 2+ pound weight loss this week. I felt like I'd hit my stride.

And then, I had to put my dog to sleep. And I wasn't hungry anymore, but I really really wanted to drown my sorrows in ice cream. So I gave myself permission to because, dammit, it's not every day you say goodbye to one of your best friends. Thank the universe it's not too....for more reasons than the ice cream's calories.

And then, the very next morning while my eyes were still puffy and red from crying myself to sleep the night before, I went to the dentist, where I was put under, had a crown removed and a post drilled into my jaw because a root canal was failing and hurting, and then had another tooth removed. Surgically. I was ordered not to eat for 12 hours before that, meaning my last meal had been that bowl of sorrowful ice cream. And then I was sent home with care instructions that went like this: "Eat soft foods for the next week until your follow up appointment. Do not eat salty, spicy, or heavily seasoned foods. Some good foods to eat include: pasta with butter, ice cream, pudding, smoothies (no straw), and mashed potatoes."  Right. Pudding. Ice cream. Fruit smoothies (but no fruit with seeds like a strawberry...). Sounds....healthy?

So for this week's WI I was only down 0.6. Not even a pound when I'd been on track to lose 2+. I was disappointed, sure, but a loss is a loss and given the fact I've lived through some emotional and physical pain this week unrivaled by any other week in recent memory, I am going to accept it and move on.

My plan this week still involves soft foods, but I'm going to try for more salads, maybe some tortilla roll-ups, and lots of soft fruits like watermelon and grapes.

Purple Flower Planting.

A post script to my post Purple Flowers, in pictures. And a bonus at the bottom: our first tomato bursting through the soil to show already the cycle of buried and born. Thank you, mother nature, for that sweet glimpse of your orchestrated perfection on this warm May morning.

Purple Flowers.

A story of love, but a sad one nonetheless.

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When I was 20, I got a job working for a veterinarian. I was in community college and pretty sure I might want to be a vet when I grew up, so I decided working for one would be a good way to get my feet wet, so to speak. The vet who owned the practice was sort of a blow hard. I was a receptionist by title, though I was often invited into the backroom to help the techs, and once he publically yelled at me for 'talking to clients too much'. Yes. Apparently I, the receptionist, was too friendly.

But blowhard though he was, he had a soft spot for strays, and it's to this crack in his armor that I owe one of the greatest joys of my life to date:

Miss Piggy.

She was there one day when I got into work, whimpering and leaping at the front of the kennel run as I walked by. When I tentatively opened the cage door to reach in a hand, she wiggled over to me, so excited she half-rolled onto her side as she frantically licked my outstretched palm. The love was instantaneous. All I had to do was convince Darrick and find a way to get around the pesky 'no pets' policy at the apartment complex where we lived. Convincing him ended up being the easy part, as the second he met her he met her great and joyous spirit and a face he could not say no to. Those were the days before the world went digital, so I don't have pictures of how she looked when we brought her home, but she appeared to have been 'on the streets' for some time. She was thin and dry, her skin hanging from a peaked spine and her paws licked and rubbed raw. And she was exuberant, for sure, but beneath that spirit lay a dog who was broken and easily intimidated. The first time Darrick waved his arms around her (not AT her...not even AT me...just waved them in excitement), she cowered and peed on the floor. But she also had the heart of a lion. Several weeks after bringing her home, we were in the process of moving to a new complex. The first night, Darrick stayed in the new place and I stayed in the old and Piggy stayed with me, standing sentinel most of the night between the mattress on the floor and the apartment door.

In addition to guarding the door, she also had a penchant for jumping and climbing, and would often be found at ease atop our patio set. We chalked it up to Short Dog Complex and the need to survey the land from a better vantage point.

In the beginning, she was a dog broken down by life, weak and tired but with a soul that begged for love. And love her we did: rubbing behind her velveteen ears, taking her on walks and feeding her treats and letting her sleep in our room first and eventually in bed between my toes and his. She was ever eager to please, lerning quickly to roll onto her back and be held like a baby until she was lulled into sleep (an exercise in both dominance and trust for a dog who had no compass for the human world), standing atop a table to be used as a model for a friend and I who took animal anatomy classes together, and learning how to show love gently by 'cobbing' things she loved rather than biting down in joy. More than once she attempted to leap to 'freedom' (from a moving car's window...and a 3rd floor balcony to name a few). And more than a dozen times - many more - she high-jumped over our 6 foot wall and roamed the neighborhood befriending everyone she met. We were famous on the street when we bought our first home because of her. Everyone knew her and the kids would come to our house on Halloween saying, "Can we see Piggy????" instead of "Trick or treat!". And she ate it up. She never lost her urge to run for freedom, though we could never quite understand from what she was trying to get free. But she did bond to us as dog will to master, learning first to like us, then to love us, then to trust us. It was a testament to the power of the human-dog bond.

When we were expecing Luca, fears and concerns bubbled to the surface. Not knowing Piggy's history nor how she would act around children, we worried over how she would respond to the newest member of our family. The night Luca was born, Darrick rushed home with receiving blankets fragrant with her new-baby smell, to acclimate the dogs to this sweet puff of baby girl before they met her in the flesh. I was told she sniffed and ignored, and I didn't know if this was a good sign or a sign of trouble to come. And it took a few days once Luca was home for the disgusted curiosity to wear off and for Piggy to stop looking at her as if to say Who are you, tiny critter that sounds like prey? Why are you here? When are you leaving? In time, she grew not only comfortable with Luca, but present and protective of her. Much like how she had stood guard at the apartment door for me on one of our first nights together, she could often be found sleeping on the couch beside us or barricading the tile between where Luca rolled on a blanket and where the front door, and all the wild world beyond it, lay in wait.

And so it began, this last leg of Piggy's journey. Coincidence or not, after Luca was born, Piggy never once tried to escape our yard. This dog who would dig through irrigation tunnels, scale wood and block fences alike, and attempt a leap from a 3rd story or a car heading down the highway at 65 mph, became grounded. Perhaps Luca was the love of her doggy life. That I won't ever know. But I do know this: once Luca entered the family, Piggy never tried to leave it. She would stand ever calm and patient as Luca scaled her body and pulled at her ears and jabbed her eyes with little baby fingers. She allowed Luca to steal food straight from her bowl and to hug her with fervor and to even claim the warm spot in the middle of our King sized bed. She would kiss Luca's face when she cried and lay at her feet on the couch when Luca was sick. And she never once, not even when things started to slip for her, turned a mean eye or bared a single tooth toward her.

And when Rohan was born, there was no adjustment period to be had. Just acceptance, as though she had been waiting for him to come along and join his sister this whole time and wasn't it fantastic how now he was here?!?! Much like his sister, Rohan was drawn to her soft face and ears and quite often dug a fat baby finger into her mouth, and she sat still and calm, ever the patient lover of these children we'd welcomed into her family. But Rohan was drawn more, it seemed, to Ruby - and she to him. And so Luca and Piggy remained best friends forever.

And so as Luca grew up, Piggy grew older. And her patience and her joy of life never waned.

In March of this year, we celebrated Rohan's first birthday. Piggy stole food from the plates of our friends, but more than anything, she lay in the warm sun on a carpet of green grass and, I believe, soaked up the laughter and love of the little ones surrounding her. By Luca's birthday, May 7th, things had shifted drastically. Reminiscent of her appearance when we'd first taken her into our hearts 12 years earlier, her skin was sagging from a spine and ribs that struggled to support her. Her muscles had begun to atrophy. She was regularly having accidents in the house. She smelled like sick. She had stopped running out the back door and skittering across the patio with the morning sun, and instead had to be coaxed to stand and drowsily pick her way to the back door, over the step, and out to a spot in the yard where she would soon be found lying down snoozing in the warm spring sunshine.

On one of those days, very close to Luca's 3rd birthday, I woke to find her lying on the floor beside my bed and I was surprised at the realization that this, her favorite spot to sleep as she'd aged, had been vacant for some time now. She had stopped venturing upstairs at night, favoring the couch or the recliner or a blanket on the floor.

The next morning, I woke suprised to feel her warm bag-of-bones body up snug against my feet. I woke to feel her ribcage rise and fall, and I started to cry. I knew it was no accident that she was returning to sleep by me, her primary master, at this season in her life. She was telling me she was getting ready to leave....telling me she knew her time was coming soon.

I heard her say this to me, and I was not ready. I needed more time. Time to celebrate Luca without taking away her best friend. Time to make sure we cuddled Piggy on the floor and fed her whatever she wanted to eat. Time to sit beside her, absently rubbing the softest fur ever, found only on her forehead and ears and paws, and reflect on 12 fabulous years.

She gave me, all of us really, that time. And while we figured out how to say goodbye to a part of the family, to our first ever 'baby', she slept in a corner on the floor, curled atop one of Luca's blankets and licking her worn paws. Her vision and hearing began to fail, and in a freefall descent she started eating almost nothing and drinking very little. She appeared disoriented when she was asked to go outside, taking a moment to stand and gain equilibrium. She would come to me, from time to time as I sat on the floor playing with the kids, and look at me from mere inches away. She would rest her head atop my thigh and allow me the luxury of absent-mindedly running my hands across her smooth cheeks and over her chest where I could feel the labored breathing and rapidly beating heart. It was like the wings of a hummingbird...almost without weight and faster than I could understand.

In healthier days

And then one day, as I drove home from work, I got a call from Darrick. "I just want to warn you," he said with a sad gentleness in his voice, "that she's much worse today. I think it may be time and I want you to prepare for that however you can. If you can." By the time I got home that night, it had been two days of her refusing all food and water. She had been carried outside and back in by me that morning, and Darrick had carried her out so that she might enjoy the sun that evening. He had gone back in to tend to the kids, leaving her in the soft grass with warm winds caressing her old tired body, when the sprinklers had come on. And she had stayed there, only finally raising her head and, after three attempts, standing to move out of the water's spray. She hates sprinklers.

When I got home, Luca asked if I wanted to see her. So together we walked into the yard and immediately I sensed her need for space. Luca walked over near her, and Piggy walked away. Luca followed, and Piggy turned and went another way. Not once, not even when Luca and Rohan were very tiny and screamed like shrill alarms at all hours of night and day, and not even when their infant hands and toddler bodies pressed and climbed and poked and jabbed, did Piggy ever walk away from her kids.

And that, more than any moment leading up to it or following, was when I knew without a doubt she was ready to say goodbye. She was separating from the pack. And so I sent Luca inside we left Piggy alone for a bit, to have her space in the sun and the breeze and the songs of birds. And I went back out in a few momoents to find her lying in the wet grass, her fur soaked and cold, her eyes wide open but no longer seeing. She was alive, but she was not longer living as a dog should be able to live.

I wrapped her in a red blanket - the same one of Luca's she had been sleeping curled in on the floor for almost 3 weeks now, and carried her inside. I laid her on her side and she did not attempt to move or get up. As my mom made her way over to watch the kids, Darrick took them outside to dig a hole. Angry at the world and sad, I threw something and then sat next to her, stroking her face, and cried.

I was able to hold her as the vet helped ease her transition from this world to whatever the universe holds for her beautiful, amazing, loving soul next. I help her and felt her heart beat and then stop. Is the absence of a heartbeat even something you can feel....or was that my own heart breaking just a little which I felt instead? Either way, we two were there for her in her last moments as we were there together for her in so many moments before. Good ones and bad ones and angry and happy and sad and funny ones. She was just a dog to some, I'm sure, but to us she was family.

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Post Script: Miss Piggy was sent home with us to be buried in the soil outside our home. The home we lived in when she first met Luca. The home in which Rohan was born. When Luca and Rohan went out to help prepare the earthly burial spot, Darrick explained to Luca that Piggy would be laid to rest here. She asked why, and unsure how to answer her he said, "All things die, Luca. Not you or me or Rohan or mommy. Not for a long time. But Piggy lived a very long time. And so it's her time to die, and someday the trees and the flowers and the birds will die too. And they will all go back to the earth to help other things grow. Piggy will help this tree under which she is being buried grow bigger and make more shade." She smiled, looked at me, and said, "Did you hear, Mama? Piggy will make shade for you, and for Dada, and for Rohan and for me!" For someone who was unsure to answer, I think he did so beautifully, and perfectly as well.

That night after we returned home, Darrick took Piggy around back to bury her and I went inside to where my mom was getting Luca ready for bed. We read her a book, The Tenth Good Thing About Barney , and talked about how now that Piggy is gone she will go back to the earth to help other things grow. Luca laughed at some parts as kids will do when they are uncomfortable and don't know how to respond, and she looked very serious about others. I went to bed unsure she understood.

In the morning, she asked me if she could see where Piggy went. She looked at the ground, then looked up at me and said, "Piggy can help the trees grow now, Mama! We need to plant her some purple flowers!" I told her I thought that was a splendid idea, and so purple flowers it will be.