For you dog and kid lovers, I want to tell you about a great organization where I volunteer here in Phoenix that you may want to emulate in your cities and towns.

The organization is called “Gabriel’s Angels” (gabrielsangels.org). Gabriel’s Angels provides pet therapy to “abused, neglected and at risk children.”

I visit a place called Youth At Risk twice a month with a Golden Retriever named Sophie and her human companion Michelle.

As we walk in with Sophie, 30 kids who have been instructed to remain sitting on the floor until told they can move, violate the rules and rush forward to hug, pet and brush Sophie. They love these activities as well as brushing Sophie’s teeth which was an interesting day because neither Michelle nor I had ever done that and here we were trying to instruct 30 kids.

Children who are shy, children who are scared, children who are anxious lose all their inhibitions in the loving presence of Sophie.

On May 7th, I participated in a fund raising breakfast for Gabriel’s Angels. There were 1,100 people in attendance, drawn there by their love and commitment to dogs and kids.

I was asked to speak on why I volunteer. In my talk, I noted that maybe, just maybe, if we can make these “at risk” children feel loved, they’ll pass that love on to the world they’ll inherit from us.

The world can certainly use it.

Sophie

From Carol Barkan:

Annie’s body left us today.  Her spirit will always be with us.  She was our beautiful little golden retriever girl.  I picked her out of a litter of golden fluffy puppies over ten years ago.  My friend Alice and I brought her home and told Larry we had a beautiful blonde who wanted to kiss and snuggle with him, then put Annie into his arms.  We all fell in love. 

Annie came to us about the same time we bought the house we live in now.  This house has always had Annie loving, eating, playing, running, brimming with Annie joy.  It seems strangely Anniless.  We miss her so.

Our Annie endured long car trips, hugging, petting, talking, cooing, baby talking and fawning.  She would just look up at us with her big brown eyes as if to say, “Everything is OK.  I’m listening with unconditional love”.  I miss her so.

Annie was known over the entire neighborhood.  Larry got up early each morning with his coffee and Annie.  The two of them greeted all of the neighbors.  She would make a beeline for Don and Sharon’s because if Don was outside, he would give her special treats and love.  She loved to play with Doll, Shooter and Ellen. Other loving playmates included Max, Cooper, Sadie, Francis, Raleigh, Adobe, Ernie, Rocky, Boots, Biscuit, Harley, Mocha, Charlie Brown and, before he moved away, Banjo. She always greeted Chira, Beth, Matt and Emma.  One morning I was walking Annie and neighbors who didn’t know me greeted Annie by name.  Sweet, sweet Annie made a loving impression on everyone she met.  I miss her so.

Since Larry and I did not have children, our Annie inherited some of the love we would have given to our children.  She let us love and slobber over her.  She got special treats and at least two walks a day.  She always had a doggie door and at least three beds.  I guess we went overboard but she willingly complied.  I miss her so.

Thanks for letting me write about Annie.  Those of you who have animal companions you love, I thank you for listening with the unconditional love that they have for us.  I do miss Annie so.  As the poem says, Our Annie crossed the rainbow bridge today.  She joins two other beautiful companions we have had, Sable and Katy.

Her suffering is over.  May she have peace on her new journey.

With love,

Carol   

From Larry Barkan

My wife Carol and I had Annie killed today. We didn’t “put her to sleep” or “put her out of her suffering.” If anything, killing her put us out of our suffering. We watched Annie deteriorate over the last several weeks to the point where she couldn’t walk without falling. It was hard to look at her, seeing how much trouble she had standing and walking. At the end, she couldn’t urinate without falling which means she couldn’t urinate.

Most nights over the last two weeks, we slept fitfully, listening for the sounds of Annie struggling to get up. If she did get up on her own or if we helped her up, she would pace for a few minutes or turn in circles (always to the right) as dogs will do when they’re trying to find a place to lie down comfortably until she collapsed, unable to support her weight. When she slept, we slept.

The vet suspected brain damage. We could have done an MRI but why? At eleven years old, recovery from surgery might have produced even more suffering. So we killed her.

I had two dogs killed before Annie, but today was the first time I stayed in the room for the entire process. On the other two occasions, Carol remained while I went outside and cried. This time my crying was in the room with Annie.

I’m glad I remained. The vet let us spend about 30 minutes with Annie before injecting her with the drugs that would sedate her and then kill her. We said what we needed to say to let her know how much she had meant to us. As she died, with the vet’s stethescope over her heart, listening for the last beat to sound, I whispered my goodbyes, told her I loved her and said I’d see her again. I hope so.

She died peacefully, exhaling one last breath. There was no death rattle. She looked exactly as she did when sleeping soundly. I expected her to open her eyes as I petted her. She didn’t. She never will again.

The vet made an impression of her paw in a round, ceramic dish in which Annie’s name had been stenciled and cut a lock of her hair from her tail. We didn’t take her ashes. I won’t find Annie in a container over our fireplace nor will I find her in a grave. She is now and forever will be in our hearts.

I’ve seen my mother die, arrived at the hospital just after my father died, was present at a friend’s moment of death, and, in the last few years, have had several close friends die. But I never grieved as much as I did for Annie and the two previous dogs we had killed. Perhaps it’s their total innocence and trust including their total trust in letting us choose when they are to die.

I’ve used the word “kill” consciously of course. Partly, I’m using that word to punish myself. In spite of all the therapy and seminars and work on myself that I’ve done, I still harbor a belief that I should suffer for what I did.

The fact is, I don’t know for sure that Annie was suffering. As I noted, I only know that I was. The truth is that it’s a relief to be put out of my suffering and propelled into grief. That’s another thing I want to thank Annie for. She had the compassion to release me.

RIP Annie

About 12 years ago, my wife was in the hospital because her appendix burst. After the surgery, she developed a hernia and a piece of mesh was implanted in her stomach to help the hernia heal. Then she had to be on a blood thinner named Coumadin. Every day, her blood would be drawn until the doctors were sure she was receiving the correct dosage of the drug. Then cancer was discovered in a section of her colon that had been removed during the appendix surgery. Fortunately, the cancer was contained to the section that was removed and Carol is cancer free.

Carol was in the hospital for a total of 12 frustrating days as one medical condition after another erupted like that burst appendix.

This is how I feel about Annie, our 11 year old Golden Retriever. It’s just one damn thing after another. 

If you read previous posts, you know that she had two seizures that are now controlled with Pheno Barbital. She has not had a seizure in over a week.

In the course of checking Annie for the cause of the seizures, the vet discovered that she has a case of Valley Fever, a mysterious illness whose cause is unknown but might be related to the soil here in Arizona. So in addition to the Pheno Barbital, we are now giving Annie a drug for Valley Fever called Fluconazole.

Occasionally, when we suspect she is in pain, we also give her Rimadyl, an anti inflammatory drug similar to Ibuprofen for humans.

Annie walks very slowly, stumbles as though she is going to fall (and, occasionally does) and wanders around the house as though searching for something.

On the bright side, she is very affectionate, wants to be with us more than she has in a while and has a good appetite (for a few weeks, she refused to eat unless we put the food in her hand and, sometimes, not even then).

Oh, and her poops are terrific, meaty, brown and voluminous. For several weeks last month, her poops were tiny if they came at all. Carol and I share this poop information with the same enthusiasm we might use to discuss a celebrity story in People Magazine. How exciting! How thrilling! How mesmerizing! Can you believe it?

Welcome to the wonderful world of the elderly dog. Perhaps you’ve been there. Perhaps you are now.

Carol and I just remind ourselves to love her as she is and as she is not. We laugh because we realize this is also how we’ve stayed married for 37 years. We love each other as we are and as we are not.

Next week, we’re going to be taking care of a friend’s 5-year old Golden Retriever while they are out of town. It will be fun to be with a dog who has the “spark” Annie use to have.

However, another lesson we’ve learned over the course of our marriage is not to compare our marriage to anyone else’s. We’ll try not to compare Sophie, the dog we’ll be taking care of to Annie, although we won’t be able to ignore the differences.  

For those who may be wondering, I wanted to give you the latest on our 11 year old Golden Retriever, Annie.

If you read yesterday’s post, you know that Annie had a seizure the day before and we took her to an emergency clinic.

Yesterday afternoon, Annie had another seizure. This is the first time I was there from beginning to end. Have you ever seen a dog (or anyone) have a seizure? It’s heartbreaking because you’re helpless. You just have to wait it out.

Yesterday was one of those great Sundays when all I had to do was read the paper, catch up on email and wait for the Sunday night HBO shows to come on (have you been watching The Pacific and Treme? Terrific).

Annie had been snoozing peacefully most of the day. I’d walk by her, rub her belly, pat her face, nuzzle my face against her snout and continue on.

I was at my computer when I heard my wife Carol calling (shades of Annie’s first seizure). I knew by Carol’s voice that she wasn’t going to tell me we’d won the lottery.

Annie was on her side, her legs flailing, her mouth open and small gobs of spittle oozing from between her jaws. I sat beside her and stroked her, praying for it to end. I learned later that, during a seizure, the dog is oblivious to everything, so the stroking was more to calm me than her (I also learned never to put your hands near a seizing dog’s mouth. The dog may be involuntarily snapping its jaws and you could get bitten. Annie didn’t do this.).

I started my digital watch to see how long the seizure was lasting, then forgot to look once the seizure ended. It seemed like 10 minutes and was probably closer to 3.

Afterwards, Annie behaved as she did after the seizure Saturday night. You would have thought she drank a bottle of Jack Daniel’s. For one hour (one hour!) we followed her meanderings around the house and kept her from banging into walls and furniture. I recalled pictures of epileptic children wearing football helmets. I now have first hand knowledge of why.

Suddenly, I could see by Annie’s good eye (her right eye has Horner’s disease which causes her eyelid to droop to the point where she can’t see out of it) that she was back among us. You know how you’ll hear descriptions of a light going on when people come out of a coma? Well, that’s what I saw in Annie’s left eye. I could literally see in her eye that she was coming back to full consciousness.

We gave her the 90 mgs of Phenobarbital that the vet at the emergency clinic had told us to give her. Phenobarbital is also given to humans for epilepsy. We called to leave a message with our regular vet to make an appointment as early as we could on Monday. We received a call back (they take calls 24 hours even though they’re not open on the weekends) and got an appointment for 7:40 this morning.

 Annie drank and drank and drank water and spent the next two hours (two hours!) meandering on her own without bumping into anything. We called the emergency clinic and they told us there was really nothing to do but watch her. The danger is that she would have a seizure, come out of it and seizure again. Fortunately, that didn’t happen. However, Annie was still meandering when we went to bed (Carol and I told each other only half jokingly that we should sleep in shifts which would have been better than what did happen. We both stayed up most of the night). 

Annie did not have a seizure during the night. In the morning, I gave her another 90 mgs of Phenobarbital as the vet had prescribed. To my amazement, when I put food in her bowl, she ate it. For the last two weeks, the only way she would eat was if we fed her out of our hand and she wouldn’t always eat even then.

When I took her on a walk, I’m not kidding, she seemed to walk faster than she had been walking before the seizures.

When we got to the vet this morning, he told us that Phenobarbital takes several weeks to build up to a therapeutic dosage, so it’s unlikely the drug had anything to do with Annie’s renewed vigor. I didn’t take the drug but I can tell you that my vigor is really good right now seeing Annie so “perky.”

So what’s next? Annie’s blood work is good, her temperature and white blood count are normal. The vet drew blood to check on Valley Fever (a mysterious disease I still don’t understand even after living for 26 years in Phoenix) and deer ticks (we spend part of the summer in Washington State). We’ll get those results back in 2 days.

If all that’s negative, then we have to decide whether or not to do an MRI because the only possibility left is neurological damage. Besides the fact that it can cost as much as $2,000.00 (there goes the trip to Paris. Maybe Paris, Texas), what would we do if a tumor or some equally horrible thing were found? Annie is 11. We won’t put her through surgery.

If you’re interested, I got good information about seizures and treatments at http://www.canine-epilepsy.net/basics/basics_main.html. It’s long and I skipped some parts, but I did learn that Phenobarbital can cause liver damage over time so Annie will need to have regular blood tests (the article also suggested that liver damage is treatable).

No great lesson to be imparted today except the tried and true: Let’s love each other while we can. Nothing lasts forever.

Thanks for your time and I’d love to read your comments.

For the last six months, our Golden Retriever, Annie, has been getting increasingly lethargic. She sleeps more than ever. She walks slower than ever. She has Horner’s disease which has caused her eye to droop to the point where she can no longer see out of her right eye. She use to sleep in the bedroom with my wife and me and she no longer does so. She won’t eat out of her bowl. We have to put the food in our hands and offer it to her. She didn’t eat at all several days last week. At her last exam, we discovered that her weight had dropped by 15 pounds since January.

We put her on thyroid medication thinking that would perk her up and it did. But while she no longer slept all day long, she would spend many minutes pacing in circles around the living room of our house, lie down for a time and then start pacing again.

We took her to a vet last week and he thinks there may be a neurological issue. He told us to take her off the thyroid medication. Next week, we may have an MRI done to see if we can learn what’s going on although, at 11 years old, we wouldn’t put her through surgery. Perhaps there’s medication she can take.

In the meantime, last night at 10 PM, as we were just falling off to sleep, Annie had a seizure. We didn’t know it was a seizure until the vet at the 24-hour clinic we took her to, told us that’s what it was. We thought she was having a nightmare.

My wife Carol heard thumping in the living room and there was Annie, desperately trying to get up from the tile floor. She kept falling back down. We’d help her up and she’d fall back down.

As we were helping her up, she began walking around the room like a drunk, banging into the walls and furniture.

By the time we got to the clinic 15 minutes away, the seizure was over and Annie was able to walk into the clinic (in fact, the seizure ended just about the time we lifted Annie into the car for the ride to the clinic).

At the clinic, the vet sedated her, drew blood, did a chest X-ray and observed her. All the tests were negative. We’re left with the possibility that her regular vet was right in suspecting neurological damage. We have an appointment with that vet in two days.

Thanks for sticking with this lengthy litany of woes because I have a point I want to make. Once again, Annie has taught me something. She has taught me that, indeed, suffering is optional.

Unlike my wife and me, Annie doesn’t appear to be suffering over any of this. The emergency vet and our regular vet don’t think she’s in pain. As I write this, she is sleeping soundly, apparently unconcerned that another seizure might occur. We took her on a long walk this morning and she was her usual sniffing, peeing, pooping self.

Perhaps she is suffering. She can’t tell me. All I know for sure is that I am. And I’m suffering not because of what’s here in the present. Suffering is rarely in the present.

No, I’m suffering because, suddenly, I’m living into a possible future that won’t include Annie and I’ve been rehearsing what that future may be like. Instead of fully loving Annie now, as she is, my life is tinged with the sadness of that possible future. Doing so, keeps me from enjoying her fully right here and right now. And I’m committed to enjoying her fully because I love her fully.

It made me think of all the other moments I don’t enjoy fully because of thoughts about the future. I was having coffee with a friend and, as we were talking, my mind drifted to some work I had to complete. I ran into a neighbor as I was walking Annie and, as we were conversing, I was thinking about how I had to get home to watch some television show. I was on the phone with my sister and I watched the clock to calculate when it would be okay to end the conversation. As I type this, my mind strays to the to do list on the desk.

There’s a man at my gym that I see every morning. He’s about 70 and always has a smile on his face. One day, he told me he has severe asthma and diabetes that requires him to carefully monitor everything he eats. Yet there he is every morning with a smile on his face and a “HI, how are you?” for everyone.

I asked him how he maintains his positive attitude and he told me that he wakes every morning and repeats several times, “I’m happy, I’m healthy, I’m healing.”

I’ve started doing that. I wonder what Annie’s version of that mantra is. She is my role model. She never seems to choose suffering. I’m committed to doing the same.

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“Getting old isn’t for sissies.” Paul Newman was quoted as saying not long before he died. He wasn’t the first to say that, of course. I’m saying it too and I won’t be the last. Our golden retriever Annie is getting old. At what point will I eliminate the “getting?” When does a dog cross the bridge between “getting” and “old?” I don’t want to admit it for her any more than I want to admit it for myself.

I’ve already written about my strategy for dealing with Annie’s aging. Beginning last year when Annie was nine, people would observe her white face and slow gait and express sympathy that a dog of “only” nine seemed older. I began giving her age as 12 and, instead of sympathy, people complimented her on what great shape she was in for such an “old” dog. I smiled. Annie seemed to smile.

Yesterday, we noticed that Annie’s face was swollen (can you tell from the picture?). Two days before, her vet gave her antibiotics for a cyst that may require an operation. We think the antibiotics are the cause, but we don’t know for sure. Because it was a Sunday, we couldn’t get her vet on the phone, so we called the emergency clinic and they told us to stop the antibiotics and give her Benadryl.

As I write this in my home office, it’s 4 AM and Annie is asleep in the darkness by the bed. I don’t want to wake her to see if the swelling has gone down. Researching possible causes for the swelling is as scary as the swelling. Maybe more so. Possible causes range from a benign insect sting to cancer. I wish Annie could tell us where it hurts or if it hurts. At least a child would cry and we’d know something was wrong. Is something wrong?

Time will tell. Time will tell. In just the past year, two dear friends have died of cancer, one is in remission from breast cancer, one from bladder cancer and still another friend has just completed a round of stem cell replacement therapy for leukemia. Where does it end? That’s the rub. We know where it ends. Life is terminal.

Seeing Annie makes me think of my own mortality. Is consciousness a curse or a blessing? The answer is obviously, “Yes.” Annie doesn’t seem conscious of anything beyond wanting to be comfortable and even then I’m not so sure. She seems to prefer the hard wood floor to the $50.00 cedar bed with a soft, fleece cover that we just bought her (“Fleas can’t live in cedar” the pet store owner told us).

I know for sure that I’m suffering when I see her cyst and her swelling. Whether she’s suffering or not, I can’t tell. Annie just got up. The swelling on her face is down, but now her ears seem swollen. We all know the Serenity Prayer: God grant me the serenity To accept the things I cannot change; Courage to change the things I can; And wisdom to know the difference. No one knows for sure the origins of the prayer. Was it found on the door of a Church in the 1600s? Did the theologian Reinhold Neibuhr write it? Alcoholics Anonymous and other twelve-step programs have adopted it as their “mantra.” Whoever wrote it, I am intimate with only one being who seems to live it.

It’s estimated that four million dogs are euthanized every year…just in the Untied States. That’s about 80 million each week. 213 today. 8 during this next hour.

I want to tell you about a place where this doesn’t happen.

There are many great no kill animal shelters and I encourage you to support as many as you can. I simply want to highlight one very special place.

Years ago, my wife I and started donating to Best Friends Animal Sanctuary (http://www.bestfriends.org) in Kanab, Utah. It’s been such a long time, I don’t recall how we first heard of them, but we did learn that it was a no kill shelter and we wanted to support their efforts. At the time, there weren’t many no kill shelters, at least to our knowledge.

Several years ago, we were vacationing in Couer d’Alene, Idaho. We had driven there from Phoenix. On the way home, we noticed that, with a slight detour, we could visit Best Friends and see it for ourselves.

We had envisioned a place where the animals, though kept alive, spent most of their time in cages with an occasional reprieve to go outside for brief periods. We were in for a shock.

Kanab, Utah  is in the middle of the proverbial “no where.” It is located in Southwestern Utah, about seven miles from the Arizona border. Kanab has 5400 residents. The nearest town of any size is St. George, Utah, 81 miles away with a population of about 125,000. “Isolated” describes the location.

But because of this “isolation,” Best Friends is a place of tranquility and peace, surrounded by ancient looking red rocked hills similar to those found in Sedona, Arizona. We stopped at the Welcome Center where we were greeted warmly and encouraged to tour the place. Since it is spread out over quite a distance, we got in our car and began our drive (today, thanks to the popularity of Best Friends, there are scheduled, guided tours. Call to learn more at (435) 644-2001 ext 4537. Full tours take approximately an hour and a half).

Since you and I are interested primarily in dogs, I’ll skip detailed descriptions of the places we passed and stopped into for a short visit:  “Horse Haven” (a huge pasture where horses run free), “Cat World” (where cats literally live in cat houses and I do mean houses), “Bunny House” (a private hutch for every bunny), “Parrot Garden” (the name describes it), “Wild Friends” (for birds) and The Clinic (as the current web site describes it, “Here, you’ll see lives saved, pregnancies prevented, shots given, and oh yes – have a look at Woolly Bear’s big smile. He’s just had his teeth cleaned!”). Judging from the accompanying picture, “Wooly Bear” looks like a Border Collie.

Finally, at the end of our journey, we approached “Dog Town.”  We knew we were close because we began to hear barking dogs who had, evidently, heard our car approaching. Turning a bend in the road, at least 20 dogs lumbered towards our car, eager to greet us. This was a far cry from the cages in which we had expected dogs to be imprisoned.

One of the people on staff gave us little dog treats to distribute and the dogs eagerly accepted our largesse. We spent the next 15 minutes petting, hugging and receiving the kisses, cuddles and licks from as many of the dogs as we had time for. Visualize the love you receive from your dog(s) and multiply that 20 or 30 fold to approximate our experience of Dog Town. Click  http://video.bestfriends.org/media/p/196.aspx to see a 2-minute video of Dog Town (the picture at the top is one of the dogs at Best Friends).

I don’t think you’ll be surprised to learn that Best Friends is located in what’s called Angel Canyon.  What a great name for a great place that I’m delighted to tell you about.

Thanks for caring.

I’m sure you’ve seen the refrigerator magnet, card, poster, picture, etc. that proclaims, “I hope to be the kind of person my dog thinks I am.” Actually, I’d settle for being the kind of “person” I think my dog is.

Now I know that for some people (not you and me, but some) dogs aren’t people. Whenever I suggest that Annie is a person with fur, my wife admonishes me to not bring Annie down to my level. And, of course, she’s right. Dogs are so much better than I am.

I wish I could emulate the unconditional love with others in my life that Annie gives me and that I give her (during those moments when I’m not competing with peanut butter and other food stuffs). Annie can do anything, be anyway she wants and I will still love her. Not true for the people in my life. Not true for the way I feel about myself.

I see Annie’s apparent lack of jealousy and wish that I could live up to her standards (I’d be shocked if a talking Annie would say, “Oh look. That Terrier has more toys than I do”). I’m jealous of anyone richer, smarter and better looking than I am. 

I see Annie’s innate authenticity (she seems incapable of pretending to be something that she’s not), but I still pretend to like people more than I do, to be friendlier than I feel and to be more content than I am.

I observe Annie’s willingness to share her toys (or, at least, to not fight when our neighbor dogs run off with her latest ball or chew toy), but I find myself reluctant to share my car, house and money with anyone, especially as the economy worsens.

I notice Annie waiting patiently to go for a walk, get fed or be let into the front door  (when she doesn’t use her dog door in the back), but I get irritated when people drive below the speed limit, when there’s a car in front of me at the bank drive up window or when my computer doesn’t boot up as fast as I just know it should.

And, most of all, I wish I had the blissful peace of acceptance of whatever life offers that Annie seems to have. She doesn’t complain about her sore leg and aching joints. She doesn’t seem to wish she were younger and able to run with the dogs in the park. She doesn’t fight over territory when neighbor dogs appropriate her bed on our porch. She doesn’t moan during the 30-hour drive between Arizona and Washington State that we do twice a year nor does she complain because most of the cargo area where she is riding is taken up with luggage.  

Annie just seems grateful or at least accepting of being alive. I’m just grateful for Annie.

In the winter, we live in Tempe, Arizona but during the summers, we stay near Olympia, Washington about 15 miles from a little town called Yelm (if you’re interested, find Olympia on the map and look to the southeast. We’re about 50 miles from Mount Ranier National Park).

It takes us almost 30 hours to drive to Yelm. Both Carol and I hate the drive which we do in two, long days. We endure the drive for Annie’s sake. We’ve heard horror stories about dogs in airplane cargo compartments. Additionally, we fear that the extreme Arizona heat would kill Annie if the plane she was on was delayed on the tarmac.

Recently, we heard of an airline whose sole passengers are dogs and cats (http://petairways.com). The pets fly in the passenger compartment. All the seats have been removed and the dogs have “flight attendants” who ensure the animals have water in their kennels and are content. If the airline ever flies from Tempe to Seattle, Annie will be on it.  

In Tempe, our house is surrounded by walls and, although Annie has a dog door and can enter and leave whenever she wants, she has no access to the street or the companionship of other dogs. Of course, in the city of Tempe, this has some benefits. The walls prevent Annie from running into the street or interacting with a dog that might not be friendly (Katy, a dog we once had, was viciously attacked by another dog one evening while I was walking her. I’m not sure who was more traumatized, me or Katy). We take Annie to the dog park as much as I can so that she can get animal companionship.

Our house near Yelm on the other hand, is surrounded by two and a half acres of grass, trees and garden. We open the door in the morning to let Annie out (she also has a dog door if she chooses) and she stays out as long as she wants. Fortunately, she never leaves the property unless she is accompanying us on her two daily walks.

Additionally, almost as soon as we open the door, our neighbor’s five dogs (you can see the pictures below) come bounding over (it helps that my wife gives them treats whenever they show up) and, sometimes, stay all day. These five dogs are all males and we think of them as Annie’s boyfriends (no sex, please. Annie has been neutered). It’s comical to watch the dogs settle into their respective places.

Our cabin is small, about 700 square feet, with a porch outside the front door that is only about five feet long and perhaps four feet wide with three wooden steps leading to a concrete footer below.

Harley, a male, black Lab, typically lies on the dog bed that we leave on the porch with Boots, a black Chihuahua who weighs no more than three pounds, curled up beside her.

Boots torments Harley, jumping on him and grabbing at his ears. Harley thrashes his head from side to side in an attempt to fend off Boots and, occasionally nips at Boots to tell him “That’s enough.” Boots, however, only stops the torment when he’s good and ready. 

Annie lies next to these two on the porch, as close to the bed as possible because there’s no room for her on the bed. Even though it’s Annie’s bed, you know how generous and docile Goldens are, so Annie cedes her bed to Harley and Boots without complaint. Annie weighs 75 pounds (we suffer over trying to limit her food), so part of her invariably lies in space hanging over the steps.

Carol, my wife, will occasionally shoo Boots and Harley off the bed and invite Annie to lie there but, when Carol opens the door to do this, Annie often comes inside and crawls under the small, wooden coffee table in our combination living room, dining room and kitchen (I told you it was small. There are two other rooms, a bedroom and a laundry room. The laundry room doubles as my “office” where I’m typing this). When Annie comes inside, Boots and Harley resume their accustomed places on the dog bed.

Mocha, who looks like a pit bull but has the disposition of a Golden, lies on the concrete footer at the bottom of the porch steps.  Mocha had been owned by a teenager at the other end of the ½ mile long dirt road that runs beside our property. The teenager let Mocha run loose and he invariably showed up at our doorstep (as mentioned in an earlier post, my wife feeds strays. Strange how they keep showing up at our door).

Last year, the teenager was killed when his car turned over as he raced with another car down this dirt road. His mother put up one of those roadside shrines with a cross and bouquet of flowers. When his mother moved away, our neighbors, Chuck and Pam, mom and pop to the five dogs, adopted him.

Charlie Brown, a white Cocker Spaniel, usually lies in the grass just beyond Mocha. He is an itinerant visitor, sometimes showing up to stay all day, sometimes coming and going and, sometimes, not appearing at all for several days.

Unlike the other dogs, Charlie has figured out how to get into the dog door after watching Annie disappear into it. The dog door is in the laundry room at the back of the house, embedded in a wooden door that leads to a back porch that is even smaller than the one in front. We’ll often hear the slap of the dog door as we are settling down to sleep because Annie likes to spend her nights on this back porch.

We occasionally find Charlie trapped in our house. We have to let him out the front door because, while he has learned how to get in the dog door, he hasn’t learned how to let himself out. We’re waiting for the day we come home to find that all five dogs have mastered the art of dog door egress.

The final dog of the fantastic five is Snoopy, aka “The Evil One.” He is an adorable brown Cocker Spaniel with ears almost as large as his body. We’ve dubbed him with that moniker because one day, out of the blue, he attacked Boots with what looked to us like evil intent. I don’t know if Boots had done something to annoy Snoopy or if Snoopy simply snapped, but we were shocked. Our neighbor, Chuck, had to kick at Snoopy to get him off Boots (don’t worry. His kick didn’t connect and Snoopy did let go). There’s been no more trouble between Boots and Snoopy since that day…at least not in our presence.

By the way, if you’re looking for Snoopy in this menagerie, you’ll find him pressed up against the glass of our front door, looking in, hoping to see Carol preparing some treats.

While Annie pretty much ignores them, we believe she enjoys the company of other dogs so we’re happy and, we believe, so is Annie. 

Annie’s Boy Friends:

Boots is in the top picture, Charley Brown is in the middle and  Snoopy, Mocha and Harley (left to right) are in bottom picture

I love dogs, less so cats. I had severe allergic reactions to cats when I was a kid and that has left me leery of interacting with them. This blog is about dogs. I’ll feature Golden Retrievers because my wife Carol and I currently happen to share a home with one.

The great thing about dogs is that, unlike me, they give to give rather than give to get.  I will withhold love when angry and sometimes only express appreciation when receiving something (a gift, money, a hug). Dogs I have lived with have seemed genuinely excited when I come home. 

Okay, not our current dog, Annie (I picked the name simply because I thought it was cute). Annie is a Golden and she’s the third dog who has shared our home in our 36 years of marriage. Carol and I don’t have any children so, like many other people (whether childless or not), our dogs have been our children.

Annie is 10 years old and rarely shows excitement about anything these days. Most of her time is spent lying outside the house or inside the house. When I come home, she opens her eyes, looks up from her prone position and follows me as I walk over to her, kneel down and stroke her fur. I love to nuzzle my face against her body, inhale her aroma and kiss her face. She doesn’t move during any of these ministrations. She tolerates me. I love her.

Annie’s face has turned white and her left hip is giving her trouble. Once she starts walking she’s fine, but slow. However, when she first gets up, she does so carefully and with obvious difficulty.

Annie has been experiencing this hip problem for about a year and her face started turning white two years earlier when she was eight. Walking Annie around our neighborhood in Tempe, Arizona was an ordeal for me. Passersby would ask Annie’s age and I would say, “8.”  They would give me a sympathetic look and express their concern that such a young dog would have a white face and a limp. I felt terrible and would dread that, “How old is she?” question.

After enduring this painful experience for several months, I hit on a solution. When I was asked Annie’s age, I would lie and say, “12.” Almost immediately, people would express their delight that such an old dog was walking so well. This caused me, if not Annie, to feel much better.

I can’t quite bring myself to adopt the same policy. I’m 61 and dye my hair in an attempt to look younger (friends tell me it works but, then again, they’re friends). I had enough angst when, at the age of 55, I asked for a senior ticket for the first time at a movie theatre (this was in Portland where the senior designation starts at 55). My wife encouraged me to do so and I was in despair when the teenager selling the tickets didn’t hesitate for a moment before giving me the ticket. He could at least have had the decency to ask to see my id.

As I’ve said, Annie is the third dog who has shared our home.  We put Sable, our first dog, a sheperd/collie mix (he had been abandoned in the neighborhood where I taught high school so we were never sure of his breed) “to sleep” (I hate that euphemism. The fact is we killed her, even though it was a mercy killing since she could no longer walk after 14 years). Our second dog, Katy, (abandoned at a rest stop on the highway and brought to us by a friend who found her) was put down after a stroke left her almost paralyzed. Katy, another shepherd/collie mix (we think) had loved us for eight years.  

My wife brought Annie home when she was only about nine weeks old. I came home from a business trip and, as I drove into the garage, I noticed a piece of white poster board pinned to the door leading from the garage into the house. I got out of the car and read what was on the poster board: “Close your eyes, put out your arms and a beautiful blond will give you a kiss.”

My wife is blond, so I assumed this was her creative way of welcoming me home. From behind the door, I heard Carol asking, “Are your eyes closed?”

I closed my eyes, the door opened and, the next thing I felt was a small bundle of fur being placed in my arms. I eyed this tiny package suspiciously as she did me. I’ve never owned a puppy and, therefore, never had to go through training a dog to “do its business” outside. Both Sable and Katy had come to us when they were about two years old, well past the house wetting stage. In fact, both dogs knew how to “sit” and “stay” when we got them.
 
There’s more to come in the adventures of Annie (the chewing of a complete room of carpeting, the competition for Annie’s love between me and a jar of peanut butter. You know, standard stuff) but I’ll stop here and carry on in another posting. I’d love to hear your stories.

Thanks for visiting and allowing me to share the love.