Daisy!!

Daisy checks out the marina scene before she spies the camera.












Poor sweet photogenic Daisy. I found her online at Petfinder.com a year ago January. It said she was "calm, gentle, good with other dogs".........


John tries to set up a group photo....















(HAHAHAHAHA) and not recommended for kids or cats, since they didn't know about that.
The first thing she did when we met her, at a foster home in Detroit, was say to Frankie, "I adore you", and to John, "Let's go home now."
So, we did. She didn't peep at all on the four hour drive, or indeed, even move. As it turns out, she was terrified. When we got home though, she walked in the house, saw Sophie the cat, went up and touched noses and that was that re: cats.
With kids, well, a two year old once sat on her in the studio and she wagged her tail- she LOVES all people-and has mastered Frankie's heavy head lean into the human leg trick, guaranteed to win over everyone.
But DOGS? WTF?
After she bit the ear (and drew mucho blood) of a neighbour's (admittedly nasty, badly behaved aggressive, uncontrolled- bites small kids- schnauzer) TWICE, and began growling, and then going ballistic at random passing dogs-on-leash on walks, we began to, um, reassess the "good with other dogs" part. The way it stands now:
She must be leashed at ALL times- she may like, or hate, a dog and will attack with no warning, or not, as she sees fit- she might, instead wag her tail and want to play- it is all hit and miss, to the human eye. So after we tried a dog psychologist- mainly to placate the owners of Bootsie the schnauzer, who has since died of old age, by the way- we leash her when she is outside 100% of the time and we have all adjusted. But her own pack? She adores the cats, worships Frankie and mothers Chiwee- taking anything he does, from tail biting, to being climbed on, to sharing a dish, in stride. She is very loyal to her own pack.


She tries to hide behind the legs of some random strangers on the pier










But, she has a weird phobia, about cameras...... They TERRIFY her- she shakes like a leaf and runs away- it is all a mystery-it isn't the flash per se: even seeing the camera in my hand triggers it. As a result, we have very few pics of her. So the other night I decided, after several months' hiatus, to try again. It was marginally better, as in, she only ran to the end of the leash and asked the people sitting next to us on the dock, to adopt her, LOL. At least I got a few and then I couldn't do it to her any more.
Camera put away, Daisy, returns to her own pack,
exhausted by the trauma of it all, where Chiwee
gives her a reassuring kiss.

Some day-to-day news, in pictures

SUMMER ALGAE


The "sand" that appears to be on the beach in this photo is actually washed up algae that has dried in the sun. This is one of the few minuses of living where we do- it can get very stinky after a storm has washed a lot of it up and it hasn't finished drying out. But, our old house had constant traffic day and night streaming by the front door. I will take the stinky lake-(this shot is only yards from our door)-which is only a hot weather phenomenon, any day. Apparently, it is all over several Great Lakes- Erie is worst, then Ontario and Lake Michigan has it too. It grows offshore, from the bottom, breaks off in wavy conditions, washes onshore and rots. It is not dangerous in any way, though, just odiferous.Here, I am checking out the swimming possibilities for the big dogs. Some days the water is quite clear, beyond the wash-up.Sometimes the wash-up washes away entirely and all is idyllic, as it is in spring and fall.


UPDATED PICS OF CHIWEE THE WONDER DOG










JUST SO SOULFUL!-deceptive, however, as he is actually a tiny tornado that seldom stops.








For reference, the toy dog, which he carries around a lot, is from Ikea and is about 2 inches long. Clever Chiwee is learning to read, heh.








He loves stuffed animals. When he first came, this toy came with him from the breeder. he was about the size of its head at that point.












This looks like a standoff over a giant bone, but actually, he is 'play bowing'. Poor guy, he wants so badly to play with the cats and they so totally don't get it. Cats are dumb, if you're a dog.














EARS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!










He doesn't need clothes, at least till the cooler weather but I have been web shopping!

















She is having trouble understanding him. She studies him in his crate as he sleeps like he was a zoo exhibit.










Life is never dull, with a puppy. In some later post I should speculate on why I came so late to being a dog person. I was well on my way to being "The Cat Lady Of Glasgow Street" before we,( when I was ummmm....49, nearly 50) got our Frankie and look at me now. Interesting......can dogs be a midlife crisis?

Now and Then

On August the 25th and 26th, both my "kids" are going to be here sleeping under the same roof with me (along with my son-in-law, two grandchildren, my future daughter-in-law, two cats, three dogs and a husband!) On one of these two days my step-daughter, her dog, my step-son and future step daughter-in-law will also be here, although not actually sleeping over, for reasons that should be obvious, as we live in this
house, heh. I really cannot wait!
As I read this blog I am struck how sort of regular and normal it all sounds, as if my life is pretty perfect. I guess it is, now, as it appears to people on the outside. I wonder why I am letting this impression stand, if I am, as I write here.
My life is probably the best and most stable it has ever been, this part is true.These "Grammacello Years" were arrived at with a lot of work of many kinds.
I rememember being at a conference once, when Jenn was 21 and Matthew was 11- we all slept in the same ROOM (at a hotel) and it was the first time I had slept well in 15 months. This was July, 1993 and Shawn had been dead 15 months- the conference was the national Compassionate Friends Gathering. Nothing ever seems normal after a loss like that but a new normal gradually takes shape. It would take so many words to tell that story.

Sometimes I really really really wish that it were a different "now" and that I was posting this;

Here are my 3 kids at Pinery Beach, Lake Huron, summer 1984. Jennifer is 13, Shawn is 11 and Matthew is 3. I used up a whole roll trying to get a good one of all three, but, sigh, kids-you know how it goes.

It makes me cry to write this.

I wish I had him back, to sleep in our bursting at the seams family sleep-over in August.

I just want him back.

"It's MY toy"......."No, it's MY toy"......."and my 'Mom'"