Welcoming an Old Dog

Tajji guarding pumpkins

My husband, fellow writer Dave Trowbridge, and I have languished in the condition known as Dog Withdrawal. Our wonderful old German Shepherd Dog, Oka, died last April from leukemia at the august age of 12 ½ (GSDs typically live 9-12 years), and the lively puppy who bounced into our lives later that spring went to find a new home (on a ranch owned by rodeo ropers) when I was out of the state for almost two months, caring for a dying friend. After that, we decided to give ourselves time to properly grieve both losses, an act of faith that the universe would present us with the right dog at the right time.

The way this works is you have to give the universe a helping hand from time to time. So both of us spoke of the “German Shepherd Dog-sized hole” in our lives. As it happened, a musician (French horn) in two of the bands Dave plays in (bass and soprano clarinet) is married to a blind man whose seeing eye dog was nearing retirement age. Seeing eye work is strenuous for dogs, both physically and mentally. It requires constant alertness, lightning reflexes, and the strength and speed to instantly pull an owner out of harm’s way. After some discussion, they brought their dog over for a visit. We got to meet Tajji (which means “my crown” in Arabic, her owner being Egyptian), a lovely, sweet-tempered German Shepherd Dog. She’s 10 years old and in good shape for her age with beautiful, strong conformation. Coincidentally, she is a sable (sometimes called “gray” or “Grau”) like Oka. In fact, except for the difference in their sizes, she looks like a feminine version of him.

Clear Vision

Recently I’ve been having trouble with my contact lenses. I’ve worn them so long – over 50 years –

that most of the time I don’t even think about how different the world looks when my vision isn’t corrected. Like many people, I’m extremely near-sighted, and I also have astigmatism. So what I see before I put my lenses in is not only generally blurred, but consists of overlapping images of different sharpness. My hard contact lenses (Rigid Gas Permeable) deal nicely with these problems. For decades, I waltzed through life without having to wrestle with how clearly I can see.

I’d heard about the importance of looking away, blinking, or even using lubricant eye drops while working for long hours at the computer. Apparently we don’t blink as often as we normally do when we’re staring that the screen. That “tired eyes” sensation is not due to fatigue but to dryness. In my case, this was made worse by the natural drying-out of eyes with age (and the hormonal changes of menopause), and made even more worse by the number of hours I normally wear my lenses. Wearing them daily – washing my hands and putting them in every morning; washing my hands, cleaning them, and leaving them to soak every night – had become so much a part of each routine, I never thought about it. That’s one of the good things about habit – I reliably got my teeth flossed and brushed, my night time medications taken, and all the other daily self-care things. The down side of such habits is that they’re hard to break or to modify. So when my optometrist advised me to take them out for a couple of hours in the middle of the day, I blithely and optimistically agreed. I set out to do so with all the good intentions in the world. The problem was that there was no time in my daily routine that I could easily and automatically add this contacts-lens-break.

The other problem, perhaps even more of an obstacle, was that although I do have a pair of back-up spectacles (I’m wearing them now), the prescription is old and my vision has changed, so they don’t give me good correction. In addition, the lenses are so thick, they distort objects, the most disorienting being the keyboard of my piano, which appears to be bowl-shaped! So, naturally, all my good intentions went by the wayside.

A Very Special Dedication

One of the true pleasures of this writing life is encouraging younger writers. Sometimes they are

younger in the sense of career development, not years. Sometimes it's both, but the difference is more of life experience and craft technique -- high school and college students, for example. Yes, they're young enough to be my children (as you can see from the gray hairs in my pic), but they have all or most of their formal education behind them. Someone else taught them how to read and write a reasonably coherent sentence, as well as the foundations Western history and civilization, hopefully a second or third language, and basic math and science, not to mention the arts.

Every once in a while, life hands me a treasure in the form a child brimming with curiosity and dreams. I don't want to take the place of parent or teacher, but one thing I can do is let that child know they can become a writer (or an artist, or a musician, or a dancer). I can show them a book with my name on the cover and say, "You can do this, too."

Sometimes, kidlet rolls eyes in disbelief, but sometimes...sometimes I see the "penny drop." The spark ignite.

I've had the privilege of encouraging two children of a dear friend, also a writer. I can't in any way claim credit for how great these kids are turning out -- that's all their parents' doing. But I did just get this note that brought tears to my eyes:

Dear Deborah, 
I am writing poems for Young Authors, and I am dedicating my book to you, because I think you are very special to me.

There is indeed hope. The future is in good hands. 

The painting is by Swiss artist Albert Anker (1831-1910)

Mystery Critter Drama Continues...

Today's update: there is still something scrabbling up there above our bedroom. Dave has advanced the theory there were two squirrels, looking for a nesting site. We're still on schedule for the pest control folks...

Stay tuned.

Mystery Critter Revealed!

Today's check on the humane trap revealed the culprit:

The fluffy stuff is the insulation he (or she, I can't tell) clawed up. It was extremely annoyed at being confined. The moment we released it, it scooted up the nearest tree, one of our beautiful old California oaks, flipping its tail and chittering its opinion of our hospitality "in our general direction."

As you can see, the squirrel suffered no visible ill effects from incarceration. We are still in the dark about how it managed to get in the attic space, so we're keeping our "free inspection" with the pest control people tomorrow.

The squirrel population around here goes in cycles, in part dependent on how happy the oak trees are, and therefore how productive of acorns. When there's a bumper crop, the next year there's a population explosion. They have plenty of natural predators, everything from great horned owls to bobcats to coyotes and cats. And automobiles. I kid you not; I've hit one that made it to safety and then reversed course in a stellar Darwin Award performance.