From "Waiting for Daisy"

Thursday, 22 March

Week three for Daiz has gone pretty well.

• On Monday, we learned why it is important not to sit on Mommy when she's home sick from work. It makes her already laboured-due-to-allergies breathing even worse when your boney heiney is on her lungs.
• On Tuesday, we learned not to run underneath Hunky when he is going out the back door. He will eventually move if we are patient, and lifting him a foot off the ground while he's trotting only serves to make him cross.
• On Wednesday, we learned LOTS of things. We learned that if Jeany eats poo in the backyard Mommy brushes EVERYONE'S teef. We learned that taking the glass that Mommy had tea in that she left on the coffee table to a dog bed is not the smartest idea we've ever had. Further, we learned that if Mommy is asleep on the couch and we step on her windpipe in an effort to snuggle up as close as possible to her she turns a very interesting shade of purple.
• Today we learned about the BROILER. When Mommy has something yummy under the BROILER we should not put our noses anywhere near it. Mommy says that if we do, it becomes a BROIL-HER and that it will hurt a lot. Also, we learned that sitting in the chair and a half that Mommy sits in WITH Mommy will make her get up and move to the sofa, therefore giving us more room to stretch.

Other random things we've learned this week:

1. Pot holders are not toys.
2. Mommy's pants are not toys.
3. The cat is not a toy and can get very cross.
4. Noses and tongues go in water bowls but back feet do not because then they sliiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiide across the kitchen and create a pond.
5. When Mommy leaves the house she always comes back, or at least she has so far. We're not sure when she comes home and then goes right back out again, like to a place called the post box.
6. Jeany does not like to be bounced on, nor does she like having Daisy's mouth around her nose.
7. Hunky does not like having Daisy's mouth around his nose but will tolerate that longer than Jeany.
8. It is not a good idea to body slam Hunky OR Jeany when one wants attention from Mommy.

Daisy...I still look at her sometimes and have to pinch myself that she's real...

Friday, 30 March

Week Four was a little better than three...

• When you put together a bookshelf, make sure that you've collected all the little plastic pieces and put them away when you're done. If you don't, your Leelo Baby will eat them but then give them back in a nice puddle all over the living room carpet.
• If you are running late, give up the ghost. Your Leelo Baby will sense that you are in a hurry and absolutely refuse to enter her crate without being picked up and tossed.
• We have sort of learned that stuffy toys do not live in the backyard. Sort of.
• Daisy and Mills are tolerating each other. Mills likes to stare her down and back her up by putting his ears back and puffing up his tail.
• Daisy is just as good as Jeany at helping me clean up cat vomit.
• There is absolutely NOTHING better than being half asleep at 6am, letting the dogs outside, and seeing Daisy dance around the yard with her tennis ball in her mouth. If the world had one teensy fraction of the joy that she has at ANY given moment of her life...

As Seen on a Church Sign, v.2.5

On the PCA sign this morning: "If we believe in the new covenant why do we learn the old one?" My answer? Those who do not learn from History are doomed to repeat it. Just look at the war on terror...

There was another great one on the sign in front of a UMC this morning but of course I can't remember it now. It was very positive...last week's on that same church was "I was going to waste but Jesus recycled me." Sounds like a hippie and someone from Campmeeting got together to write a gospel song, doesn't it? I like it though...promotes the never-ending forgiveness that is one of the best parts of what I believe in, considering what a screw-up I tend to be.

OH WAIT, I've remembered... "Love sees with a telescope, not a microscope." Isn't that fantastic? Love includes everyone. Love does not discriminate. Perfect.

Wait, is that a shoe?

Wait, is that a shoe?
Originally uploaded by NanLassiter.

Daisy has redecorated my house a million times over with the toys from the toy box. See if you can find the object that she brought to the den that WASN'T one of her toys...

She's Home and So Is My Heart

There was a huge hole in my heart when Profile died. He was such a big part of my life. I wanted to just curl up in my bed and never get up again. But something miraculous happened the first week of March that has given me back my Home and taped up the shattered bits of my heart. Two somethings actually.

Just in time. Thank you Daisy for filling the hole in my pack and my heart that Profile left gaping. I'm sure he would have loved playing with you. And Simon? Well, ta. Just ta.

Reflections on a Month

For the past four weeks, I have been the only interpreter at the hospital. (Now to be fair, I was gone for five working days in the middle, so technically it's only been three weeks.) Today, in honor of surviving that month without a single fatality or screamingly huge contract interpreter bill (well, other than the week I was gone but I digress), I wore a striped shirt and tennis shoes along with my jeans for Casual Friday.

For those scratching heads at the moment, interpreters tend to NOT wear stripes or plaid or anything other than solid, non-distracting, colors that contrast with one's skin tone.

There were days that I didn't sit down but once or twice all day. There were days that I was literally ready to fall asleep while actively interpreting just because I was so tired. Some days I could spell trazadone but couldn't spell my name. But it's over and Brian will be back on Monday.

I've learned that I know myself pretty well when it comes to my job. My flat out refusal to interpret anything longer than 45 minutes without a team interpreter does not come from laziness, as I'd feared, but rather from the fact that the message DOES indeed suffer when my brain and hands start to tire.

I've learned that I'm not as afraid of my job as I thought recently. It's hard to be worried that you're going to get socked in the teeth when you're running 90 to nothing all day long. Just doesn't occur to you.

I've learned that I really love interpreting and really don't want to do anything else. Ever. I don't want to be a teacher or a psychologist or a social worker or a secretary or anything...I like what I do, I know how to do what I do, and I feel that I do it pretty darn well.

I think I've earned a sick day next week...

Steam

I am a professional.

I am fluent in both languages. I'm not sure that you're even fluent in English.

I don't need to be told how to do my job. I had to have been pretty clear about what I was doing for my college to grant me a bachelor's degree and my professional organization to grant me national certification.

I'm fairly familiar with mental illness and working in this setting. The past 9 years of working in this setting have seen to that.

I know what I was hired to do, and I know what you were hired to do. Let's not confuse the two, shall we?

Until you know what it is like to be a necessary evil...until you know what it is like to be a walking after-thought...until you have been spoken about in front of your face as though you are an appliance or a chair in the room...

(Here's where my more sensitive readers might want to scroll down, by the way.)

Until you can understand sign and English and work between the two, get the hell out of my face, my business, and my way and let me do my job.

Whew.

As seen on a church sign on my way to work today...

"Do not love the world."

How disturbing is THAT? I know what they are getting at, being the good preacher's daughter that I am...I'm sure it's a reference to the passage in Romans that says to be of the world but not in the world. But do not LOVE the world?

What about "love your neighbor as yourself?" Or one of my favorites from friends that lived in the same little conservative town where I grew up: "hate the sin but not the sinner?" In my mind, "Do not love the world," is equivalent to "Hate those that are not just like me," and those of you that know me should know how well that idea would sit.

Our world is a miraculous, marvelous, terrifying, beautiful, horrible, interesting place and if we do not love it, embrace it, include all the people on the earth in it...then we do not deserve it. For the more fundamental Christians among us, how can you follow Christ's missive to "go make of all disciples" unless you love them first? If you don't love them, then who cares if they go to Heaven or Hell? For those in helping professions, how do you help someone if you don't first love them...not love as in Barry White, chocolates, hearts, and flowers but love as in care for as a fellow human being? In my world, you can't help if you can't love.

If "Do not love the world," means keep your eyes/focus/mind/heart on your concept of a reward after death, a Heaven or Nirvana or whatever your tradition recognizes, then I feel sad for you. The God that I believe in put us on the earth and made the earth for us to enjoy, not to shun and seclude from, keeping only to other like-minded believers. The God that I believe in is represented in every tree, every plant, every face of every person that comes into and out of my life. Why would I not love the world? God made the world.

So I say love the world. Love the people in the world. It's a lot harder to destroy or wage war against your fellow humans when you love them, wouldn't you say?

Unpacking Adjectives, Digestives, and Dog Toys...

The time since 28th February is a bit of a blur for me. Let me try to catch you up to speed so you can see why I'm not sure where I've been for the past two weeks...
28 February
Work half day at the hospital. Go home, sling dogs and belongings into car. Head north for Austell. Drop dogs off at sister's, head to Atlanta to pick up Simon. Pick up Simon, go back to sister's house, out to dinner, then resume restorative coma...that hasn't been restorative since I left London in August.

1 March
Load belongings and dogs and Simon in car and head for Jekyll. Swim down I-16 to meet Kimmy and Leah in Savannah. Continue swimming south through torrential rain to Jekyll Island. Check in for Sandy Paws and move into the Sistah's Villa. Again seek out coma.

2 March
Attend various and sundry Sandy Paws events and pick up Daisy from Anne and Cathie. Decide Daisy is the most perfect greyhound girly ever to be born. Host dinner for Follow That Hound folks in the Sistah's Villa. Sort out Daisy's first night with me and proceed to not sleep until around 3-4am, thanks to Daisy pacing and intermittently trying to open the door by biting the door knob.

3 March
Am awakened at 7amish by dogs wanting out. Am allowed to sleep a bit longer by the most wonderful man on the earth who takes the dogs out. Jeany and Daisy have a minor arguement resulting in a boo boo on Jeany's face. Resume attending Sandy Paws events and showing off the new baby, as well as getting to know Simon.

4 March
Pack up the villa and head for Jacksonville. Are not permitted into room until 3pm, make it to Cathie's for dinner around 5pm. Watch Daisy and Hunky run in the puppy pens and feel heart swell three times its size.

5 March
Do absolutely nothing all day but hang out with Simon and the pups, then head to the track at Orange Park in the evening for the FTH party. Totally enjoy evening. Become sad at the prospect of my vacation being almost over.

6 March
Drive the most boring road EVER, I-10, back to Alabama. Deposit dogs and go grocery shopping. Begin to mope that Simon is going back home on Wednesday.

7 March
Call Delta and extend Simon's stay till Saturday. Rejoice, give thanks, and sing. Take Simon to meet parents. Coma at the end of the day.

Thursday and Friday
I had to work, and Saturday my heart broke sending him back home on the plane. Now...I have to work again?? Ugh. Pictures to follow I'm sure.