Mar

24

Winston

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Winston

About ten days ago I found Winston acting like he was trying to cough up a hairball. After a final loud hack, he settled back onto his bed. Then he went through the process again. Afterwards his breathing was very shallow and strained, but eventually he dozed off again. Monday morning he started coughing again and this time he went through the cycle a few times but it passed. His breathing remained a little shallow. I called the vet.

Winston has had a heart murmur for a few years now but he didn’t seem to be bothered much by it. Hell, he was blind in one eye and had bad sight in the other, he couldn’t hear a thing, and occasionally he seemed to lose track of where he was. He increasingly ran into things, but on the whole remained quite independent and mobile. Considering he was sixteen he was doing pretty well. There were increasing signs of decline though. Rather than standing at the door and barking when he was ready to be let in or out, he would lie on his stomach and bark. He jumped onto and off of things less and slept more and more of the day away. But he was still Winston.

Dr. Karen came and said that he was having trouble breathing and that it was probably his heart. She thought there was fluid in his lungs obstructing his breathing (if it wasn’t a tumor) and she prescribed medication to absorb the fluid. I was to double the dose if he hadn’t improved in the morning. His cough persisted the next day and his breathing continued to be labored. I doubled his dose and called Karen to let her know. We decided to take Winston to the animal hospital for x-rays and possibly an injection to help with the fluid, and made an appointment at the animal hospital for their earliest opening, the next morning. There was talk about what signs might indicate that it was time to intervene, but generally the situation seemed hopeful.

Winston was one of those good things that happen when you aren’t expecting it. I had talked about wanting a lap dog for months and one day I came home to him. My girlfriend caught me completely off guard with her present. His left eye had a nasty cataract and he possessed a pronounced overbite, which made him a little funny looking up-close, particularly in later years. But he made up for it with an endearing, irascible charm. I was taken with him immediately.

Winston was a ladies’ man. I think he liked me well enough due to frequent feedings and walks, but in mixed company he went right to the women. Needless to say, women loved Winston. He was a fiercely independent dog and outspoken about his needs. I rarely wondered what Winston wanted. While he got along very well with all animals, it was also clear he was more or less tolerating them and didn’t mind gruffly putting them in their place if needed.

Winston went through a phase where he was very determined to get out of the backyard. He found a couple of places where it was easy to dig and he burrowed his way out. I only became aware of this when I heard him barking with his “let me out” bark. I knew I had put him outside and I started to go look for him, confused. As I passed the front door I heard him bark from the front porch.

I opened the door and he scampered in. I was perplexed. This happened a few more times over a couple of weeks. I mentioned this to my neighbor, J.D. and he started laughing.

“You know what he’s doing dontcha?” I didn’t have any idea and said so.

J. D. laughed again. “He’s digging out under the fence so he can go to sleep on the other side. We seen him digging the other day and I went around to the other side and he was just laying there in the grass happy as all get out. I never saw anybody in such a hurry to not go anywhere.”

He was digging out of one side of the fence so he could nap on the other. When he was ready, he came to the door and barked so I could let him back in. I’m sure he had his reasons for not wanting to nap in the yard, but I knew better than to figure it out. Just as inexplicably, one day he stopped digging and started napping on the back deck. Winston always had his reasons for what he wanted, though they usually remained a mystery.

His last night was a little difficult and he was increasingly restless and uncomfortable. He spent the night upstairs dozing fitfully and finally passed around 5:30 am. Helen and I sat together for sometime sharing our favorite stories about Winston and trying to wrap our heads around the idea that he wouldn’t be coming to door to greet us anymore.

I’m still not entirely reconciled with this.

Feb

23

All Thumbs No More

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I not sure if anyone should be surprised that I was asked for pictures of the injury to my thumb. But I did get requests and someone at work thought it was cool enough that they took a picture on their cell phone when I went back to work. The original post has been updated with a picture. Right now I am considering ideas for a tatoo for the thumb. My favorite is a dotted line with the works CUT ABOVE LINE. Please share your ideas if you have them and send them along to my blog name at comcast dot net.

tsm

Feb

11

In a Blink of an Eye

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Something I reflect on from time to time is how fragile and tenuous life can be. Regardless of who we are or what we do, we are all living on borrowed time. While we may not want to think of it often, the circumstances of our lives can change literally in the blink of an eye.

I was reminded of this several days ago. I was making a piece of trim with the table top router. The board bound in the router and was pulled towards it with great force. My right thumb went with it.

I knew immediately that I had hurt myself badly before I even looked at my hand. When I did look at it, I also knew that I was quite lucky. Most of the digit remained and I could still move it. Finding that my neighbors were not at home, I drove to hospital and had my injury treated.

Ten days have gone by and everything is healing up nicely. The thumb is fairly disfigured and now looks like it is sitting sideways on my hand. I have complete mobility and use of it, there is just a lot less of it. Most of it above the first joint is gone.

thumb1

In the days since this happened I have thought about how quickly that happened and I have thought about how lucky I was. I have also considered what it would be like to have lost the thumb completely. But mostly I have thought about how much I take for granted. Most days I assume a great deal about the quality and condition of my life. It was good to be reminded that despite all my complaints, I am indeed living a fortunate life, the direct result of a fortunate birth. Now I don’t have to look very far to be reminded of that again.