About my Dog

We've had our Cheyenne dog for ten years and she's eleven years old. We adopted her from the Humane Society. I always assumed that she is a mixed breed but really could not figure out what breeds she is, other than some hound. I never really tried to find out either. This lack of curiosity is odd in me. I call her my big red dog.

We actually found her in Petsmart and by accident. The Humane Society will showcase dogs there. We went in just to browse, found her, and fell in love with her. All they knew about her was that she lost her home because she "didn't get along with other pets."

We went home that day and got our Maggie dog, brought her back to meet Chey, and they loved each other from that moment! We adopted Chey.

The thing was, she had this evil, nasty, cat fixation. She

wanted to annihilate my cats. Our Fluffy cat got her trained, but it took about five years to accomplish. We have the Invisible Fence in

the house to create dog-free zones. Fluff had the physics figured out so she could move through the dog zones back to the safe zones before the dog could reach her, or she'd sit just beyond the dog's reach and appear impassive. She got the dog trained.

Cheyenne, otherwise, is fabulous and, whoever had her for her first year trained her beautifully.

When we adopted our cat Spike in March of 2008, I thought Chey would be fine, but she reverted to her old cat ways and he had to get her trained too. He, too, figured out about the indoor Invisible Fence, utilized the safe zones, and that desensitization took only about five days. Spike is so loving, he will rub up against Chey and Chey gets a really puzzled look about it.

So anyway, I was at - you guessed it - Petsmart last night and was browsing calendars. There is one of a breed of dog called Rhodesian Ridgeback, and dang! but that looks like my dog Chey! Although, I think she is still mixed with something else.

Then I found a book on lots of dog breeds and looked up the Rhodesian Ridgeback. It's a hunting hound dog from Rhodesia that was bred as a guard dog and used to hunt lions!!!! Good grief! The description of the breed's temperament is my Chey to a tee: intelligent, obstinate, requires excellent training, needs lots of exercise, prefers to sleep on the couch.

This dog is so even-tempered and well-mannered that, when people meet her, they want a dog. She's like the LL Bean dog. I cannot imagine her guarding or protecting us, she is so gentle. When I am home, the dogs and the cats are glued to me. I stumble over this dog about three times a week. I have actually fallen on this dog, sat on her, stumbled into her. She has never made an aggressive move in the ten years I have known her.

Also, I have always suspected that she is smarter than I am and that she owns me.

So I am amazed to find out her breed and her heritage and I think it's pretty cool. Those are actually links to two different web sites on the breed. The first is to the AKC web site, but there is only a drawing of the dog and one small photo. The other link is to Wikipedia, with more photos to compare to my dog.

911 Reflections

My first-born child turned 20 on the 10th. I am glad it wasn't the 11th in light of what was to come in 2001.

Television has always taken great effort for me, I cannot seem to remember the schedule for shows that I like and I just don't tune in. This disinterest deepened after 09/11/2001 until when probably around the first of October of that year, I stopped watching TV news and Oprah Winfrey. I had just seen those images too many times.

I notice this morning on Facebook lots of links from my contacts for video and whatnot of that day. Not for me.

Wait! This is not the blog I had composed in my head yesterday. Yesterday, 09/11/2009, I had two job interviews. After my usual daily bit of excessive bathing and grooming, I was left with a lot of time to flollop about the house trying not to get dirty or mussed or to dump my coffee on myself while I waited to leave for the first interview. It was easy to think back on some other 09/11's.

The one in 1989 was the morning that dawned as my first day as a mother. It is a day I know for certain that my life changed significantly. I knew it was a momentous day and I embraced it and this newborn daughter, who seemed as if she must have always existed for me. Suddenly I could no longer remember my life without her. How does that happen!

I know for certain that day that my brothers Tim and Dave trooped in together with my father to see us. They felt delightedly conspiratorial because I was in a sort of ICU and they felt that they had snuck in. I was back in labor and delivery for "intensive care" because of a precipitous immediate postpartum interval. In fact, I had experienced the longest night of my life at the hands of a mean and rough nurse, with my focal preoccupation that of cheering on the wee hours of the morning, minute-by-minute, awaiting the change of shift at 7 a.m. Of that gleeful and silly trio that trooped in that morning, only Tim remains in material form for me now.

These things passed in my thoughts yesterday as I awaited departure for the first interview. I decided it was a good day for two job interviews. As a particular date that we ought to wipe off the calendar forever, just to hop from September 10 to September 12, like the 13th floor of many high rise buildings, why not look at it as a day of great opportunity? So I did.

"A Brief History of Time" By Stephen W. Hawking

Tam recommended this book as a very readable, layman's, explanation of some of this century's theoretical physics. Maureen's Joe was askance; he is a Hawking fan and assured me that "A Brief History of Time" is not the layman's version, but that "The Universe in a Nutshell" is the one. Joe's comments came at a good time, as I walked in to the kitchen to ask Maureen to explain one of the diagrams.

Actually, I brought this book along on the kayak trip to Vermont. That was the trip in which I could not keep up with Tam paddling, although she would announce that she was going to "take it easy" and so forth. And I veritably trotted up Mount Ascutney behind her! Alak! The kids reminded me that she was a physics major before going over to the Dark Side (english!). Good thing she's so lovable!

Even so, Hawking is a delight.

I had actually made a foray into Brian Greene's "The Elegant Universe" a couple summers ago, and read a biography on Einstein last summer. But I do actually think the Hawking rendition of relativity and quantum mechanics is the . . . er . . . most cohesive, or shall I say, friendly.

There are moments when I feel as if it's all hocus pocus, and that these people are proving their hocus pocus with more hocus pocus. Then again, people such as Einstein, and Hawking, come along who are not only very credible, but reassuring. I mean, these things in science - all of it - blow my mind. But if you have someone sensible who seems to understand it, I guess our world really is marvelous.

Anyway, after such a reading, the night sky, resplendent in stars, is even more awesome.

Don't Try This at Home!

This summer I have taken to my bicycle once again, in a desire to give my knees a break from running. Spending the Kayak Weekend with Tam, I learned all about a bike trek she will undertake next spring along a route from Philadelphia to Washington, D.C. This intrigues me and I have a notion to set about to do the same on my own. Thus I have begun to take stock of myself and my bicycle with an eye to readying both.

My first line of inquiry was into toe clips. Toe clips are attached to the pedals and serve to hold the foot in place on the pedal to provide the ability to pull the pedal up as well as push it down for hill work. Hence, pedaling is easier.

I had been in the stores looking for toe clips for my bike and was not liking what I was finding. For quite a bit of money specially-made pedal and shoes are available that are made to hook up to each other. This set-up has a safety release, like ski bindings, to release the foot in case of a fall. The others do not.

Then one night last week Mark said, "I have a set of toe clips!" like a light bulb went off. And he found them! They're brand new and 30 years old and he managed to locate them amongst all his treasures! This is a simple aluminum "basket" that the front of the foot slides into. When you fall, you have to remember to slide your foot out so you can brace your fall. :>) Mark put them on for me that evening.

The next morning off I went on my maiden run with the toe clips. Getting the first foot in was easy because you do it while you're standing still. Getting the 2nd one in takes . . . skill. Oiy!!! It's all uphill out of my driveway in the direction I am going. The basket is heavier than the pedal, so it wants to hang upside down and scrape the road on the downstroke. Meanwhile, as if pedaling up Keegan Road is not enough, I was pedaling right-footed while trying to catch and hold with the left pedal toe clip. I almost knocked myself over. Finally, after much flubbing around, I was in two-footed.

There are spots where I stop to catch my breath, but not this day! No siree! I was hoping for a green light at the busy intersection of South Street and Route 6 and stopping would necessitate dropping the toe clips, and then starting up again - with onlookers! Red light! Full stop. Drop toe clips. But, a little smoother start this time.

So up and down and up and down for several miles, then I was way up with a gorgeous view, then a little dip, picked up momentum and another big, long, up . . . street sweeper! at the bottom of the big long up! One-way traffic and someone directing it, stopping me and letting oncoming cars through!!! Mr. Traffic Man! My toe clips! My momentum! So, I slowed to a crawl but did not stop, then big smile between traffic man and me and I began my big up. Oy!

And somewhere along my trip I became adept at picking up the 2nd toe clip, just got the hang of it. Glorious ride!

Then there were a few days off because I was away at Cape Cod and now I am loathe to summon the nerve to go out again and have more toe clip adventures! I must get brave again!

Kayak-a-yak

This past weekend I went kayaking on the Connecticut River in Vermont with Pam and Tam. Mark was really insistent that I have this experience, to mirror the trip he has undertaken now for several years. His mode of flotation has evolved over the summers, from canoe to pontoon boat to kayak. This year he sailed his hand-crafted 16 foot beauty (see photo below). As for me, I went out in the Blast.

We based ourselves at Wilgus State Park in Ascutney,

Vermont. This is a beautiful campground with wonderful amenities. On Day One we took the truck laden with the kayaks about 12 miles north to Sumner Falls, where we put in. Due to our amazing paddling skills, we arrived at Wilgus three hours later. Some might argue that the current favored us exceptionally well.

On Day Two we paddled from Wilgus about ten miles south to Hoyt's Landing, where we had parked the truck. This was about 3 and a half hours of paddling, but we took a break every hour just to hang around.

For me there were two highlights of my experience on the water, if I do not count my

extremely tired, weak, little shoulders. One highlight is all the amazing birds to see along the riverbank and skimming along just above the surface of the river. I may become a birder yet. The other was the Path of Life Garden. Someone had taken a field along the Connecticut River and placed all sorts of contemplative areas and sculptures all around, but that web site will describe it much better. It was a hands-on, interactive, experience offered in a take-what-you-want-from-it sort of way. We lunched in a tee-pee.

After doing an astoundingly thorough job of securing the kayaks in to the truck at Hoyt's Landing for the ride back to Wilgus, some of us were loathe to take the boats off the truck for an excursion on Day Three. But anyway, Pam found herself nursing a headache.

Meanwhile, and not to be callous towards Pam, but she encouraged us anyway, Tam and I climbed Mount Ascutney. My poor, weak, little shoulders were happy because my legs are much more highly developed than they are.

Each of the three days was good for the soul.

"Moonwalk" by Michael Jackson

Pop culture circa 1982 (ish) existed only in my periphery. That was the year Michael Jackson released "Thriller." As revealed in an earlier post, I was pretty much out in the barn. But that was the year I graduated from high school.

My fascination with his dance has somehow been piqued since his untimely death this June. Again, I reference my very first post on this blog. It was the famous Moonwalk that I was searching on You Tube, wondering weather my mother ever secretly attempted it while I was in school, or out in the barn. That lead to my discovery of Jackson's autobiography, "Moonwalk," written in 1988 when Jackson was 29 years old. I have it on interlibrary loan and just completed it.

Jackie Onassis worked for Doubleday when she coaxed Jackson into penning his autobiography, and I am so grateful that she did!

This book is a quick read, although I savored it over several days. It is chock full of photographs of not only Michael but lots of interesting people. His voice in telling his story in print has a child-like quality in the awe and wonder he shares about his early life, the things and people he saw, places he went, and, ultimately, the successes. I realized that this "voice" was going to remain unchanged as he progressed in the chronology of the story of his life. That is the quintessential Michael Jackson, at least the one presented publicly.

He answers all the big questions and is wholly credible. The book pre-dates the sensational child molestation cases.

Additionally, he talks about the making of each of his music videos, which he calls "films" and the debut of the Moonwalk as he performed "Billie Jean" at the Motown 25: Yesterday, Today, and Forever on March 25, 1983.

I enjoyed the time I spent with Michael Jackson while I read his autobiography. I am loathe to part yet with the book, but I'll dutifully return it to the library.

"Lakota Woman" by Mary Crow Dog

"Lakota Woman," the autobiography of Mary Crow Dog, was published in 1990. She now goes by the name of Mary Brave Bird. I would provide a link to help you get more information about her, but there are so many web sites that result in a search on her name, I'll leave it to you to wander on your own.

This book found me on a table of free books being given away in the Psychology Building at UConn at Storrs last week. I am so glad it did. This author has completely won my heart.

Mary's story in this book traces her involvement in Native Americans' civil rights movement in the 1970's. She lived on the Rosebud Reservation in South Dakota.

I find I have been stupid all my life, or more so than I originally thought. She reveals the racism of the American people in all of its ugly and violent manifestations. In her story, the reader grows along with her as she sheds off an ambivalent, nomadic, and wild youth and finds purpose in asserting a gentle strength in the AIM, American Indian Movement. The gentle strength was something she was not aware of possessing. Her marriage to the medicine man Leonard Crow Dog brought both joys and sorrows, as they endured together his incarceration for, I think, two years, as a political prisoner. She is frank in her discussion of her perceived shortcomings yet she steadily progresses on a journey of physical, emotional, and spiritual maturity.

Mary wrote extensively in this book about Native American Spirituality, a counterpoint to every misconception, misrepresentation, and basic falsehood that has been part of American culture in my own lifetime and for a long time before that.

Thanks to Mary and her autobiography, I think I will listen more closely to this universe, consider greater possibilities, and celebrate my ancestors more as well as, and perhaps especially, hers.

Most important, though, is that injustice is still here today. I don't think we will ever shake it off.

Thank you Mary Brave Bird for telling your story.

MJ

My relationship with the Waterbury Republican American newspaper is dysfunctional and based purely on morbid fascination. Its marketing department is clearly oblivious to the fact that the only reason I subscribe is for the Obituaries. The index (list of newly dead) had, at one time, been conveniently placed on the bottom of Page One of the Local section, which could be easily thumbed. It is now relegated to inside the bottom of Page Two of the Local section, necessitating greater dexterity and determination and risking distraction.

So, yes, morbid fascination: the inside back of the front section, the Editorial Page. Please forgive me.

On those pages award winning writer Tracey O’Shaughnessey smirks out smilingly at us, Thesaurus in hand, to mow us down with a rocket launcher when a squirt gun would do.

Most recently she imperiously chided readers grieving the death of Michael Jackson. Her sentiments have been echoed by letter writers since. To be fair, it was the media frenzy over MJ’s death and particularly coverage of the public memorial that had her head bobbling. Even so, she is securely entrenched in the media faction herself and, as an editorialist, should remember this.

First, I would like to state the obvious, however elusively simplistic it may seem: you may turn The Media off. Second, I would like to weigh in on MJ myself.

In the 1970’s when my age was still in the single digits until mid-decade, we were one of the last families I knew to get a TV. Then, we only received channels 3, 8, and 20, depending on the weather. Furthermore, it mostly got Lawrence Welk, whereupon I preferred to be outdoors on my bike.

Michael Jackson’s star reached its zenith in the 1980’s. Sometime in that decade my father had gone nuts and bought a Curtis Mathis colored television set and we had cable TV. My only devotion to the Curtis Mathis was for the purpose of following Pittsburgh Steelers football. Otherwise, I was impervious to its charms. I had a horse to beguile me outdoors and to transport me body, mind, and spirit, to greater realms.

Thus it is only lately that I view those music videos on You Tube with any great attention. If you missed the ’80’s or somehow forgot, music videos mostly consisted of watching a film of the singer singing and the band playing. Michael Jackson’s videos tell stories.

His kinesthetic brilliance is the thing that bedazzles me. My mother has been dead now since 1989 and my father since 1995. I still think about each of them daily. My mother was a ballet dancer and the ironic thing is that I staunchly refused to take up ballet as a young person and am now drawn to it, or perhaps, to her, through it. I have developed an appreciation for her funky artistic genius as expressed with her body. And I wonder, did she ever view “Thriller” or “Beat It?” Did she behold The Moonwalk?

MJ was so attuned to his ability to communicate through dance and music, every inch of his body was used with precision. I love the attitude of the head and heck, the facial expressions, the fluidity of the shoulders, the disconnect through the hips, and oh! the footwork! Then the lineup of dancers equally precise, attitudinal

, and expressive.

My mother would have related to the development of the choreography, the selection and making of costumes, the set, the story. Watching those videos evokes my mother for me.

How dare anyone opine on how another should grieve, or react to loss or tragedy! The Media was the undoing of MJ, Princess Diana, and so many. I think these people who write editorials and letters are really bemoaning what The Media has UNdone, like me. But they question our fascination with celebrities while we miss the casualty count in the Iraq War. Shame on me for missing the casualty count, for sure, but MJ has helped me unwrap some of the sweet mystery of my mother’s beautiful art and passion.