Sept. 2021 Piper Update

 

The big golden girl is doing well.  For her age and considering the Atypical Addison’s, she’s great.  She’s gotten wise to the little boys, she doesn’t want to go out with Tripp when he’s in “momma’s boy” mode.  She wants her tail to herself.  He still loves to grab it and hang on when they go out.  To him, she’s still his momma.  I tell her she raised a brat.

Tyson just wants to play.  Sometimes Piper will play with him.  Tripp gets jealous if he’s out there, but if it’s just Piper and Tyson, they will play a little.

Being on prednisone is the perfect excuse for her to forget her manners and counter-surf and garbage-pick for anything remotely edible.  I let them in last evening and as I turned to follow them into the house, I see Piper already up on her hind end checking out the counter.  I yelled, she dropped down.  There was No Food on the counter. 

Now, when I go out she has to go in “her” room, where her crate is.  I don’t make her stay in her crate, but I do put the gate up to keep her in the room.  I can’t trust her AT ALL, which is a shame.  There was a time not so long ago that I could put a steak on the counter and she wouldn’t touch it.  That time is GONE.  I can’t be angry with her, she’s always hungry and I really have to watch her weight.  Her shoulders aren’t 100% and with the Addison’s she doesn’t need any other issues. 

She uses a “klimb” I built for Tripp’s agility training to get up on the bed now.  She comes up in the evening and again in the morning along with everyone else.  I love it when she wants to cuddle.

The places where her fur was shaved have not recovered.  I'm wondering if her beautiful coat will ever grow back.  Appearance does not matter, but those areas will be cold in the winter, and I have to be careful of sunburn in the summer.  She continues to take melatonin in hopes that it will help.

 

 

Generations

A generation has passed. Twenty years. The day we lost our invulnerability. Oh, we never really had that, but with oceans east and west, we considered ourselves… safe. 

How wrong we were. 

If you’re over 25, you know in your soul what I mean. If you’re younger, you’ve lived with it all your lives and it’s “normal.” 

I don’t ask “where were you” or “what were you doing” on 9-11. Because courtesy requires that I listen to the answers, when what I really want to do is tell my story. How I thought sure at first it was a small plane and an accident. How horrible it was to be so damn wrong. 

No, I remember the voice-mail my Dad left me, while our manager had us in a conference room pretending to work as the rest of the company went home. The rumors of further planes aimed at the Sears Tower in Chicago, the Needle in Seattle, the Arch in St. Louis and our own CityPlace in Hartford. 

Thank God these were rumors, reality was so Gadawful. 

Remember September 12. It was beautiful. No one was white or black, democrat or republican, none of that mattered. We were all Americans. Proud, wounded americans. 

We sang together, our unofficial national anthem, God Bless America; it was our prayer. We smiled at one another, waved with our whole hands and hearts and waved our flags unapologetically. 

I hoped that this togetherness would last. That it would not fade back into the political and racial division we’ve long endured. Maybe now America would be an amalgam of all the world, humanity joined together for the best of all us. 

Hope springs eternal. 

Please Be Kind. 

September 11, 2021