Quality time with my dog.

It’s hard to explain quality time with your dog if you aren’t an animal lover, but I will attempt to share. As way of explanation, I am a dog person. I like cats a lot, especially ones that act like dogs, but I love dogs. They are pure and simple and wear the range of emotions right on their faces. There is no hiding what a dog feels. I turn to absolute mush around a dog. And dogs love me. They feel my unabashed joy when I am around them and look right into my dog-lovers soul. I don’t trust people my dogs instinctively don’t like. You can not be a dog person, and a dog will still like you. Mike is a good example. He is definitely not a dog person. He likes them okay, I mean he can take em or leave em, but my dogs adore him. They won’t leave him alone and it’s always been like that. Dogs just know a persons heart.

Anyway back to the quality time with the dog.

Red wine and steroids don’t mix. Yeah, sounds like a good combo, I know, but the truth be told, it’s hard to sleep on red wine and steroids. Which is where the quality time comes in. I was real tired when I got home last night from a fabulous Foundation dinner at Anthony’s Events Center. I was on my last day of steroids for the week, had finished painting my room (which looks AMAZING!), and had a great time socializing and sharing shoe stories and a few glasses of some nice Syrah. My daughter is out of town and Sophie just can’t sleep by herself, and we KNOW Kyra always sleeps with me, so not long after coming home the dogs and I climbed into bed and I was soon fast asleep in an alcohol induced haze. Well, unfortunately, alcohol turns to sugar, which we all know, but fail to acknowledge when drinking. So about 3am, I’m wide awake. I try to get back to sleep, I really do, but the sugar is coursing through my veins along with 5 days of steroid usage and there is just no sleeping. I could take ½ an ambien or something, but then I’m out for the next 5-6 hours and I just didn’t feel like being comfortably numb for that long. That would be a waste of a great Sunday morning. So I turned on the light and surveyed my domain and there is the kitty, Betsy, right next to my head and Sophie and Kyra at my feet.

I would like to make it clear right here that Kyra is my dog. Peyton talked me into getting her 7 years ago, with all the promise of a 10 year old who is going to take care of a dog…needless to say, she became my dog. Especially when I was diagnosed with cancer four years ago. Kyra went from sleeping with Peyton to never leaving my side and its been like that ever since. She is my companion and protector. I have no doubt in the world that Kyra would fight to the death to protect me and anyone in my family.

So…I’m awake and surveying the domain and Kyra noticed that perhaps, Sophie might be a little closer to me than she is. Kyra is the alpha, I am her mommy, she has to be the closest. So she dog crawls up the bed until she is right next to me with her head on my shoulder and those chocolate brown eyes looking right into mine. If you’ve never seen my dog, she is a black lab/Rottweiler with a beautiful black face complete with expressive brown rottie spots above her eyes. And when she looks at me, yeah, I’m mush. So, I wrapped my arm around her, let her lay on my shoulder and there we stayed for the next 45 minutes. Just me and my dog, talking, her listening raptly, about how I feel, my fears, my hopes, my dreams of recovery and my appreciation for her never leaving my side, yet again. That’s the other thing I love about dogs. They are non-judgmental, listen without comment and are always there when you need them. And I need Kyra. I’d be just lost without her. She walked this road with me all those years ago and she is walking it again, faithfully, with no hesitation.

By about 4am we decided to just go ahead and get up and have coffee and treats in front of the fireplace. Sophie and Betsy got to join into our little middle of the night party and we moved to the living room, where I sit now, sharing with you. My friends out there in cyberspace.

I hear about a lot of people reading this blog and I hope that I continue to make it interesting, inspiring, enjoyable and informative. I found out last night that there are those of you that are battling your own cancers and have been referred to my blog. Well to you, rock on. I know its hard. I know the war that is being raged can be completely overwhelming and at times you swear that you can feel hopelessness and even death knocking quietly at the door. Don’t answer that door. Remember that death is there for all of us, not just those of us with cancer. I mean, the only thing that is certain about life is that it ends in death. Everything else is just the journey between the two. So when you feel the cold tendrils of that despair creeping down your back, remember, this is your journey and you can choose to make it whatever journey you want. You can live it in sadness or you can live it in hope. There may be no cure for your cancer (there isn’t for mine) but that’s okay. There is also no cure for diabetes and heart disease and yet people with those diseases live very long and enjoyable lives, if they choose. Choose to live with abandon. Choose to live with pure, unadulterated joy. Choose to live with your hopes and dreams still alive, well and kickin’. Don’t let go of them for one instant. Hold on to them as tightly as a mother with her baby child, with all that passion for the future and the beauty that it holds. This life, this journey, its worth living. Live hard and live good.

Paraphrasing (or butchering) this well known quote - I don’t want to finish this game of life in a perfect well kept body after a perfectly well manicured life. I want to be running the bases with wild abandon and then sliding into home, barely under the catcher’s mitt in a well worn body, sweaty and full of joy, saying, oh yeah, what a ride!

Lets play ball!