drip, drip

March weather, March head cold, March mud. I think that would highlight the main elements of this day.

I went to bed sniffing, I woke up with a nasal waterfall. I called off childcare for the day because the idea of riding back and forth in the car felt like an effort, the kind you'd expand on scaling a steep mountain. 

The dogs did not wake me -- I woke them, honking away into a tissue. Fine, I wasn't going to go back to sleep anyway.

And of course, the weather has to be dull and drizzly. And of course the pups took a while. Twice I had to dislodge bones from the mouths of babes because either an animal had died yesterday and left behind skeletal remains, or a workman had been eating something that had thick shreds of bones, tossed onto the grass, or someone had left them on the curb deliberately to choke my dogs. Given their barking tendencies, I'm imagining the worst. 

I really looked forward to my morning coffee. Warm liquid heaven!

And then I did drive the pooches to doggie daycare, feeling so very thankful for the daycare services and for the fact that my cold is at its worst (I hope) on days that they're open. Weekend colds on a wet day would be my idea of hell right now. (Yes, I did imagine that I would be sick and that the dogs would still need their exercise, and yes I realized that this would be unpleasant, but of course every great idea has its unpleasant side.)

I just wanted to come home then, but I remembered to stop at Steffi's House to take some photos of grass markings (where cables were buried). In case I ever want to dig, I want to know where danger lurks. The fence guys had had it properly marked, I am simply riding in on their coattails. 

To properly photograph all the markings, I allowed myself to step onto the adjacent construction site. That was one muddy place! My shoes were caked with wet clay. I scraped some of it off with my bare hand, then finished the job in the kitchen sink. So now I have wet shoes for the rest of the day. Who cares, I do not want to go outside anyway!

The owner of Sally's House came over to replace a filter in the fridge. I was happy to be here -- I could press him for information that the management company refuses to provide. I asked if he intends to sell it or rent it after I moved out. He tells me it will be up for rent. I hint that he could have it a tad earlier. He  asks if maybe I could stay on. I'm looking for renters like you. Clearly he has not met my wild dogs. 

I do fit in one productive task: I frame and put up a poster I had purchased in St Paul de Vance. There are many, many walls in this house that could use art, but the kids play area (aka Sadey's prison) was especially bare. And I do have a sentimental feeling about my January trip to France. The poster is an acknowledgement that it was a good trip. Worth remembering.

 

 

I stay home until it's time to pick up the dogs. And from there -- home again, of course. Little ones (I speak with affection rather than accuracy), don't ask me for long walks tonight, okay?   

They say dogs can intuit what you need. I'll let you know tomorrow how good they were at this!

with so much love... 

fenced in

I like keeping busy -- really I do. Just not too busy. I'm working on that one! (Thus far unsuccessfully.) But of course, three moves in one year are bound to create headaches and mine have been plentiful. Of the metaphorical kind. I'm not prone to real headaches. Thank God. Well, except when my brain exploded 30 years ago. But I digress.

Wednesdays are supposed to be my loose days where I can do everything by my own schedule. The problem is that the list of things to accomplish on this day is far too long, leaving me with too little time to, say, go out with Ed for a walk. Once again I call him and say -- not today, I just can't. Here I am, living a five minute bike ride away from the farmette and I cannot fit in a walk. What kind of person am I anyway? (Obviously I am a person who doesn't know how to moderate her commitments.)

The morning walk is reasonably good today. There's a chill in the air and a haze has dimmed the brightness of the sun a bit, but still, I like this pre-spring weather. So Henry, how about reining it in with the barking, so that I can enjoy the peacefulness of the early morning? Yes yes, I know, you're working on it!

 

And yes, Sadey, you're working on the pulling, right? I appreciate your efforts. 

Ed sent me a link to a Nova that posits the idea that dogs can use language to communicate with us. Not their language, our language. Press buttons with words that they want to convey.  Maybe "want walk outside" or "I would love a trip to the beach" (in fewer words of course). My dogs aren't in that league yet. They use their bodies to tell me, or each other, what's missing in their lives and how I could make it better. Maybe that's a good thing. Given the chance, I'm sure Henry would press buttons "I want to be outside, off leash, or, in the alternative, next to you without Sadey on your other side" all the time. I'd have to say "not now" too often. This way he keeps hoping and I feign ignorance.

Breakfast, with flowers that only March and April can brag about.

I take my pooches do daycare and then plunge into the essentials, which today includes trimming bushes at Steffi's House. So long as they're finishing the fence building there, I can work away without disturbing the guy who is living there now. 

I finish my work, the fence people finish theirs. Henry and Sadey -- it's not big, but this is your summer playground! Just dont bark at the neighbors and turn me into the neighborhood pariah please!  

I pick up my pooches and then hunker down with a cold. Unfortunate, isn't it? Who wants to be sniffling away when spring is just around the corner! I cancel my drop-in visit with Ed and pick up the dogs and reheat a big cup of chili. Maybe it'll be a quick one -- many tissues and pfft! Gone!. One can hope.

with so much love... 

adjustments

If you read through rescue adoption materials, you'll come across timelines for when you can expect your dog to feel "at home." No longer worried about the possibility of loss. No, it's not several weeks into the game. It's several months. I see this in Henry: he may be frantic about strangers outside, but he is calm as anything at home. He knows his routines, he knows my routines. He knows key words. Despite the changes in housing, he is not unsettled. Sure, Sadey can still rattle him, and yes, he worries about me shifting my priorities, but at the gut level -- he's secure in our little bubble. 

Sadey, on the other hand, can fool you still. She seemed happy from day one, but I do think her tendency to pant is easily mistaken for a smile of joy. (In the same way that Henry's mournful eyes can be mistaken for sadness.) Sadey is not super reactive, but I can hear her whining when I take Henry out for a walk. And she absolutely needs to move with me in the course of the day. There's still that thought that I may disappear.

 

I tweak things a little to make for an even smoother morning. I'm back to giving Henry a stream of treats on our morning walk.

This is the one important thing I learned from the dog trainer: we are so used to rewarding our dogs for good behavior, that we fall into the habit of withholding treats when our dog does something we dont like. My way of handling Henry's barking and lunging at strangers was to first calm him down through redirection and then reward that with a treat -- "good calm Henry!" -- were my words of choice. But Chelse (the dog behaviorist) suggested that Henry is feeling total fear and anxiety at the sight of strangers and my job is to change his associations: give treats at the first sight of a stranger and make that a good experience. Stranger out there? Great! I get a special treat! -- is what we want him to think. It's not unlike my teaching him to pay attention on leash to me, by constantly feeding him treats as he walks by my side. I used to do that at the Edge to keep him from focusing on the holy terror of someone emerging from an apartment unit or the death trap, aka the elevator. Now I started doing it at the sight of other people across the street, or walking their own dog.

Sadey -- well, yes, I need to start in on her leash behaviors, but I'm going slowly here, because I know she is not yet comfortable with the idea that a leash means potty time.

No tweaks needed for our breakfasts! She knows she is fed in the other room and that she has to sit before I put the dish down. Henry is fabulous at sit-stay and I continue to do this with him before every meal. And my own breakfast? Oh, it's perfection itself!

And then we all rest. On the couch. I have found a way to accommodate both dogs!

 

 

It's true that I cannot move much once seated. If I get up, Sadey will get up, disturbing the whole balance. But over time, I managed to keep her in her place for a quick few steps to set up my camera. It may not mean much to you, the reader, but I count this as a success: to keep Sadey in place, to make room for Henry, to have us all relax, together. And to capture it all in a photo.

 

I drop off the dogs at doggie daycare, pick up groceries, return home and strategize. I have some planning to do: for late March, for mid June, for early July. Those may seem like far off dates, but the fact is, I haven't had a minute for any of it all winter long. What makes me think that I can put it off to some later date when I will be less busy? If I am indeed less busy, it doesn't take long for me to fill the hours with new projects.  So I start in on my planning and before long it's time to go get the kids.

(it's "wear something with writing on it" day in school)

It's Sparrow's turn to select a treat place. Hubbard Avenue Diner, for their pie!

Off then to Sally's house, and toward evening we backtrack: to drop off the kids at home, to pick up the dogs at daycare. To plug my ears with noise cancelling ear plugs for when Henry decides that the stranger walking along the sidewalk is there to destroy us all.

At home, dogs eat, I eat, I claim the middle of the couch, Sadey is on my left...

... Henry is on my right.

With kids, you adjust your mindset all the time. Every year, no, every week, something new comes up and with it comes an even better (though never perfect) understanding of what fuels them. Maybe it's that way with dogs too? Sadey just heard a beep on the TV. She wakes up startled, sits up quickly, ready to face the enemy. Henry doesn't bat an eye. It's so easy to accept Sadey as your velcro dog who never misses a chance to wiggle in for a cuddle. But she is also a scared little pup. That fear didn't go away. Yet. She may not bark as much, but she is perhaps even more sensitive to the very real dangers that she faced on the streets of Houston.

 

Did you see the Blood Moon today?  Shining brightly here, over our still frozen Wisconsin landscape...

with so much love... 

 

oh, my pups!

It's the perfect wake-up. Henry first, then Sadey, by my bed, wagging, licking, putting on a happy welcome to the morning at 6:45. 

As always, I have trepidations about taking Henry out. It's either going to be a perfect, calm, ten minute stroll through the neighborhood, or someone will emerge from somewhere and his hair will stand up and the barking and pulling will begin. I will redirect and he will quiet down, but still, I give a nervous glance in all directions, hoping that today peace will prevail. And it does. We see no one. Henry is calm.

Next comes Sadey the pull dog. With her, the challenge is in teaching her to hang back with me. We are nowhere near that skill level! The second challenge is to get her to do her stuff. Usually we are at least in part successful.

And then comes the best part of the morning -- I feed them, I prepare fruits for the kids, I sit down to my own breakfast, with book in hand. 

 

 

 

The dogs know to leave me alone now. They rest and I keep on reading until the construction activity outside heats up to such an extent that the two hounds are off and woofing away at the window. Okay, pups. Let's head to doggie daycare. 

It's not a hard trip at all, though I am now mindful of the fact that the peace in the backseat is not altogether a perfect peace. This weekend, as I was tidying the car, I noticed that someone -- most likely Henry -- chewed up the passenger seat belt. To shreds. How much will that one cost me, Henry? I am sure going to take it out of your allowance! Sigh...

I have a 10 a.m. meeting with the fence people putting up a fence at Steffi's House, where I am not yet living, but will move to this summer. I look at the area about to be fenced -- just a portion of the side yard, right by the construction taking place next door.

It's such a small space that I can hardly regard it as the dogs' future playground. Convenient for potty breaks, but not in any way adequate for my two high energy pooches who need to run! Still, let's not make light of the convenience factor: it will be super nice to just let them out.

I then have my first consult with the dog trainer who specializes in working with reactivity issues in dogs. I went over the trouble spots with her and she reflected on how I might proceed. Honestly, she did not say a lot that I did not already know, but we did schedule a meeting with the dogs to go over some of the behavioral bits that I may want to emphasize That's one component. Another is calming meds for Henry. If it wouldn't have been rude to do so, I'm sure she would have laughed heartily at the pickle I find myself in: two large barking dogs, both high energy, both tightly strung, both the same crazy adolescent age. You could not ask for a greater challenge! Still, she remains optimistic! That, of course, is her job.

Ed comes over for lunch. Well, I eat my granola bars while he exhales. 

 

 

Nice and quiet here right now -- he tells me. What he means is "it's very pleasant without having Sadey bark nonstop at me." True, she chose to greet him with suspicion, but she wasn't hostile and began to warm up to him in the course of the evening. I retort -- she'd bark less if you were here with her more; it's not as if I can bring them over to the farmhouse because of your cats... From him -- true, it would disturb them... You might think that we'd whittled down our areas of divergence to this: which pets have a right to their behaviors at which location!

In the afternoon I pick up the two big kids -- first Sparrow, then Snowdrop.

And we go to Sally's House.

(reading a letter from their cousin)

Then, more shuttling -- to his Taekwondo, and finally -- to pick up my dogs.  

My troubled, loving, beautiful dogs. Besieged by life. At home, I feed them, I feed me, we share the couch -- Sadey to my left, Henry to my right. This is such progress! Henry has sulked on the floor as Sadey hopped on to join me each night. Tomorrow, one will pull too hard again, one will bark his head off at a pedestrian two miles away. But what stays with me is the warmth of this moment. Him and her, trusting, hoping that when they wake up, nothing will change. We'll still be here, together, my two dogs and me.

with so much love... 

... and back again

Last night, Primrose asked me if I liked having crazy Sadey around. (I had described how I left two chocolates in the rear corner of the counter in the evening and later the next day I noticed that there was only one. Chocolate, in case you don't know, is a real poison for dogs. Just one example of the vigilance required!) I told her the truth: adding Henry, then Sadey to my home has added a lot of work for me. The day is often more difficult because of them. But, tell me one thing in life that feels rewarding and great that is not difficult! I love having the two pooches, despite the hardships that came with adopting two rescue dogs that are active, often fearful, and yes -- sometimes nuts! 

Nevertheless, it was nice to wake up and not rush out in the cold weather to be dragged by a forceful dog who doesn't know how to walk on a leash! You appreciate such small luxuries when they aren't part of your everyday!

I look outside. I lived in New York, Manhattan no less, for nearly ten years of my life so I should not be surprised by these stacked homes, one on top of another, next to more structures with equally stacked homes and yet, when I see them now, it seems so overwhelming...

 

 

 

I Uber over to the young family's home in time for breakfast. They sweetly waited for me, even though I dont get there until after 9 -- hours, I'm sure, after their get up and get moving time!

My focus is on the girls: they play with their mice... 

 

 

 

... and I fit in another Uno game (or two) with Primrose -- we're now up to 8 wins to the girl, 4 for me!

 

 

 

And then it's time to head out to lunch.

My daughter wants to try out a place where she can reliably get pierogi for a future school event. A friend of Polish background recommended Jolly Inn -- apparently an institution in Chicago's Polish community. 

The place is large and it serves an all-you-can-eat buffet of Polish foods. Three types of pierogi, sure, but these are just a small fraction of everything there. Meats that I did not even examine. Potatoes prepared variously, many types of cabbage -- both in raw salad form and in the traditional hunters stew. Fish, barley and mushroom soup, chicken noodle soup, blintzes, fried apple pancakes, potato pancakes, kielbasa, you name it, they have it. Here's just a small sample:

(bigos -- a cabbage stew -- not just one)

(pierogi -- potato, cabbage and mushroom, meat)

(salads: cabbage, beets, cucumbers...)

(kids' interest in the dessert selection? high.)

(my plate)

 

The staff all speak Polish and that's the language of choice as you enter. Our waitress is young: she came to Chicago just a couple of years ago, to visit her grandfather (the rest of the family is back in Poland). She liked it, she stayed. But many of the others are Polish only by virtue of having Polish-American parents. Yet they all speak Polish perfectly and of course I got chastised for never teaching my own kids Polish. (Notably, both daughters are doing online lessons in the language.)

The food? Well, it's old Poland. Stuff that was prepared in many kitchens when I was growing up (if there were meats available in the store -- not at all a given). It was so very strange for me to be immersed in it all again, with this very American family of mine. Yes, my daughter has been to Poland with me. Twice in fact. But it was to visit almost as a tourist. I'd kept my Polishness to myself most of the time. And now here we are...

(she liked the jello dessert)

 

 

(they both liked the applesauce...) 

 

It was, as always, so very sad to leave them all. The drive back is in a way easier, because I lose myself in processing the beautiful weekend. The hours just fly. [And at home, I quickly book my next Chicago trip. Not until April but hey, that's next month because today we start in on March. The month of spring!]

 

I drop off my bags and drive to Camp K9 to pick up the two pooches. How were they? I suppose you could break up the answer to a before and after. Their report card was great! Ate a lot, "sweet and loving," played well, shared a kennel without issue. But though they had time on Saturday at the Camp "daycare," meaning play time with other dogs, today they only had 20 minutes of doggie frolic. Hmmm... that wont be enough for them. I do understand that Sunday does not offer hours of "daycare"  play, but still, I'm going to have two wild dogs at home if they spent the day basically in the kennel. 

Should I take them to the dog park? 

The obvious answer is "no, I should not." Henry still barks at some people, up close and personal. Aren't I inviting trouble? 

 I drive past our nearby park. At sunset time, there aren't many people giving their pooches a good run. And the entryway is free of scary people. It would be so good for them...

And it is good for them. They run crazily, chasing mostly each other, playing with the gusto of two dogs with too much energy. 

Nonetheless, it wasn't the best idea I ever had. My pooches were too wound up, too thrilled with their freedom, too hyper. Henry found his barking targets and he added jumps to the mix. The people were understanding, but I was mortified. The dog park needs to hit a pause button. Such a shame...

 

 

On the upside, the pups had their exercise. After a raucous homecoming, a supper finished in five seconds, a few minutes chewing in separate quarters, they found their comfortable spots and settled down to a nice quiet rest. And I did too. Eventually. 

 

 

 

 

Tomorrow, I get serious about dog training. Spring resolutions! Because really, we're starting the season of new ideas and great transformations!

with so much love... 

 

to Chicago

Winter is a tough time for meetups with my Chicago younger daughter and her family. It's tough for them for all the obvious work/school/activities reasons and it's tough for me because at the end of a busy week, I do not find the drive there and back to be as easy as it once was. I've made that trip to the city hundreds of times since I moved to the greater Madison area in 1979. It's not at all a hard route to drive, it's more that I am less patient with the monotony of highway driving. It's more tiring than a hike up a steep mountain. Okay, perhaps not that, but in the winter it always seems strenuous. 

And yet, if I want to see the grandgirls going about the business of growing up, driving down is the easiest way to do this. It's been a couple of months since I've traveled there and I almost postponed my trip yet again. It's not the ideal time to put Henry and Sadey in a kennel. She is so new to life up here with me that I hate to throw this on her, though honestly, I don't think one night at Camp K9 is going to make her or break her. And I haven't yet celebrated my daughter's birthday (which was actually in January) yet! I told Ed to mind the house. A nice place to hang out, I should think!

And after the usual doggie wake up, after the walk...

 

And breakfast of course - theirs and mine...

After a few last barks at the neighborhood dogs...

I load the car with my tote, with very late birthday gifts, a bag of foods for the campers, and of course, the campers themselves.

I'm thinking. -- there's no way I'll get through the drop-off at the kennel without a fuss. I'm prepared for the struggle to get them inside. 

But there is no struggle! Is it because of Sadey being there at his side that, despite a slight tremor, Henry gallantly walks inside? What a relief!

 

The plan is for me to get to Chicago in time for lunch. Light traffic helps!

 

 

Thinking Polish thoughts, my daughter fixes a noodles with strawberries dish that has Polishness written all over it. Literally -- makaron z truskawkami. Juniper helps put it all together.

Primrose comes back from dance class in time to join us and to share in the desserts from Mindy's.

 

 

 

 

 

And then it's a laid back hangout time -- the best of the best for me. Six games of Uno with Primrose, all of which I lost, not for lack of trying. Summer planning. Dog stories, recalled. Lovely moments that make the trips here so very worthwhile!

 

We go to eat dinner at one of the neighborhood favorites -- Bar Parisienne.  Such good food! Such a fine evening!

I'm tempted to linger at their home afterwards. Primrose is practicing her piano, Juniper is in a playful mood, but I am tired enough that I resist the temptation. It didn't help that last night, my pooches raised a ruckus at 12:30 a.m. because the neighbors decided to let their dog out for a post midnight run outside. Time for me to retreat to my room at the downtown hotel, where for once I dont even have a great view to distract me. A few minutes on the computer, a few more with my book, and I'm out. That's the hope!

with so much love...