NV 2179 KX

You were my pride and joy, my dear Pupfish, but times are tough. Please don't hate me.

You will be fine with the nice older couple. Their grand kids will love you.

Have fun in Canada.

* * *

For a little while, I was Captain Kirk.

But like the preceding 10 months, give my regards to Captain Dunsel.

My Best Girl

She knew who her master was. She proved it by bowing down to me when I'd come home at the end of the day. She greeted me on weekend mornings with the biggest smile, showing me how much she loved me. When I stole the bedcovers she never complained. If I wanted to sit where she was currently perched, she would always graciously move out of the way. When I was sick, she would stay by my side, doing everyting she could to make sure I was warm and comfortable. She never talked back. She was a good traveling companion.

She was my first greyhound, and I loved her like I'd never loved any animal before.

She wasn't a very good racer, so she was retired at age two. Her name was Miracle 2 B Alive, Miracle for short, because she had pulled through some catastrophic illness as a puppy. She was a gorgeous tiger stripe orange and black brindle. When she ran, she looked like embers on the wind. I named her Blaze. She smelled of hay and fur and summer and living things.

She was very much a girly girl. In the spring she did a strange slow-motion dance around flowering shrubs, mooooviiing thiiiis foooot theeeen theeeee oooootheeeer, nose deep in the blossoms, inhaling the sweet intoxicants, a gangly ballet dancer gliding at 1/20 speed round and round. She delighted in joining my wife and daughter in nail painting sessions. They would coat her toenails some gaudy color, and Blaze would prance through the house, lifting her paws high, and show Daddy what a pretty girl she was. She loved comfort. If there was an expanse of tile or wood, you could lay a washcloth on the floor and she would lie on it. She played with the other dogs, a skinny, goofy clown all legs and ears and nose, but when the boys got too rough, she would steal away for a nap or watch from a distance. She had a great mothering instinct, putting up with all sorts of indignities when my children were small.

She turned 13 in December, a redwood tree for a greyhound. We know how old she was because greyhounds have their birth month and year tattooed in one ear. We didn't know the exact day, so we made it Christmas because she was such a gift.

It has been a rough time these last 12 months. When my brother went AWOL and was later found almost dead, I felt the world on my shoulders. Blaze still greeted me with a bow, not quite as deep, but beautiful with her paws stretched forward, nose to the ground, tail held high. It made me know somebody loved me no matter what. When finances became so tight I thought the world would collapse, Blaze lifted and pulled back her doggie lips in a comic facsimile of a smile. It made me know that love is more important than money. When layoffs arrived at work and my department mutinied against me, Blaze snuggled against me on the couch and rubbed her long-nosed head against my chest. It reassured me that love is stronger than hard times. Two cancer scares, strange minor maladies, a recovering brother that brought tremendous family stresses, bounced checks, parenting worries. Through it all, beautiful brindle Blaze was there, more grey than black, slower but no less wonderful, a constant in my life when everything else was change, uncertainty, exhaustion, and fear.

Three days ago it was plain there were no better days ahead of her. She had lost control and couldn't make it outside, she limped on a front leg, her hips quivered when she stood, she would stand vacant eyed in the middle of the room and whimper at nothing. She wouldn't eat and became a stick of a dog. My daughter went with me on Blaze's last trip to the vet. Just before her final moment, Blaze looked up at me with confusion and love. I felt my heart burst in a nova of grief and guilt. My daughter held me as I sobbed and sobbed.

Her name was Blaze, and I loved her like no animal before. She was my best girl.

Goodbye, my Blazer girl. I rescued you and you rescued me back.

There, But For The Grace Of God...

I do not know this man, but I understand his pain in a way you probably cannot. I feel his bewildering grief like a knife across my hands.

I came within inches of an ending like this.

Depression is a very serious, insidious, bastard illness. It unravels from the inside, then tries to unravel everything around it so it won't die alone.

Rest well, Richard; I know your pain. I hope it is ended now. I hope you find the simple things we all need, but are sometimes blinded to. Be free. Be happy.

If someone you know shows sudden changes in personality, flips moods in an instant, is always either high or low and never in between, or retreats far away from the world on occasion blaming fatigue or illness or just needing a rest, or just seems "off" somehow, do something. Do anything. Call a doctor, a clergyman, a help line, family members, friends. Google "depression." Do anything.

Prepare for a fight. A fight that may avoid writing an epitaph like this one.

Sometimes There Is Only One

Is it possible for a 45-year-old man to have a hero? Is it possible for that man to have a schoolboy crush on another man 1 year younger? Is it possible for him to feel a profound and sad loss for someone he doesn't know?

Yes. Unabashedly, Yes.

Steve Irwin is dead.

The Crocodile Hunter was more than any reviewer's simple words. Yes, he was goofy. He was nuts. He was a caricature of himself, the stereotype of the Aussie Outback Guy. But he was much more than that. He was a modern day Tarzan. He was Lewis and Clark, Peter Pan, Captain Kangaroo, and Charles Darwin all wrapped up in a 21st century package. He was the embodiment of every young boy's daydreams of adventure and danger, the unbridled delight of dirt and sky and living things.

He was a grown man's hero as well. He and his wife Terri are a love story for the ages. All the superlatives apply. The brash, dashing wild man. The sweet, beautiful, smart woman. A serendipity of mind, heart, compassion. A melding of the sexes, bringing out the best of each other, bringing forth children. Together, they wrapped the bonds of familial love, courage, and determination around everything they did. The world recognized it, felt it, loved it.

Never a bad thought expressed. Never an apology for passion. Never a bad day.

Always life, and the world, was a playground. Infinite, curious, respected.

DO NOT Rest In Peace, Steve-O. Forever wrestle and tumble and laugh with teeth and claws and fur and scales. Let the Halls of Hereafter echo with your infectious and childlike joy of all things created.

Show God that heaven is not up there, but in the heart of a normal man with the supernatural gift to see it here on Earth.

Sometimes there is only one.

Daddaw

His name was Daddaw. He wanted to be called Grandpa, but his eldest grandson was too verbally impaired to pronounce it correctly, so it came out Daddaw. The name stuck for the following three grandsons and several great grandchildren.

He was married to Pi. She received her moniker from the same dumb tot that murdered Daddaw's name. On a visit, she greeted her first grandson with "Good morning, sweetie pie!" After a day or two, dumb grandson said "Hi Pi!" The name stuck for the following three grandsons and several great grandchildren.

I am that dumb eldest grandson.

When not much more than a toddler, I found a piece of metal. Daddaw, being a carpenter and a handyman of all trades, made it inevitable that I would find just such a castoff. In my wee mind it looked like a camera. So I followed Daddaw around when he took pictures, making sure to line up the scene with my found metal "camera," imitating his every move. I remember a chuckle, an obvious approval of my advanced and keen ability to grasp composition and mastery of the environment.

As a little older, my brother and I were throwing rocks. We got bored throwing them at a fence, at a post, at another rock. We knew better than to throw them at birds or other creatures, so what better than each other? Whiz! went my rock past brother's head. Whiz! went brother's rock past mine. Until Daddaw's kindly voice, low and quiet like a seismic wave, intoned "Stop that. Or I'll string you up by your thumbs." So we stopped. Because we knew that if we didn't, we would soon be twisting in the wind, dried up skeletons long since picked by crows, a lesson to all boys, hanging by our dead opposable digits.

A summer later and I was on vacation. It was a treat to spend it with the grandparents, and we four brothers each took our turn, watching Daddaw make sawdust in his workshop. We learned how to water tomatoes, the best time to pick kumquats, and how to trim raspberry canes. As a voracious reader, I brought a book from the library. I don't remember much about it, other than it involved a young Chinese boy and his grandfather and the Asian hobby of keeping crickets in cages. At my broad hints and without complaint, Daddaw made me a cricket cage. He also caught the inhabitant, because I was afraid of bugs. When it didn't sing like was described in the book, I lost interest. Daddaw never said a word.

One summer, Daddaw took me swimming at the pool in the mobile home park where he and Pi lived. It was luxurious. It had a diving board, lounge chairs, and a changing room. Daddaw actually changed into his bathing suit with me on the redwood bench, proof that I was a growing up. As I paddled, peddled, and puddled in the pool, Daddaw sat in the sun. No book, no music, no swimming, no nothing. Decades later I found out he was afraid of water.

Eventually, I grew into the bones and muscles that would mark me as a man. Daddaw came to our garage one summer, and he and I made a workbench. It was hot, and his hands bruised easily, but we constructed it together. He used an old candle to wax the 5" screws I used to laboriously hand-crank the table top to the legs. When I asked where he learned this, he said simply "It's an old trick my Grandpappy taught me." Even though I had never heard of, much less seen a picture of Grandpappy, I knew some immeasurably valuable piece of family wisdom had just been given to me.

A year or so later we, my father, my brothers, Daddaw, and I, went on a fishing trip to Lake Insertname. Of course, as the teen-aged eldest brother and self-appointed heir to all things wonderful, the trophy of Mother Nature's annointed favorite would fall to me. After a day in a boat, sunburned and disillusioned, all of us, especially my puffed-up self, were left with nothing. On the way back to the dock, one fish was caught. By Daddaw. One single, perfect green and pink rainbow trout. Each scale was a shining nail into my ego, each speckled flash in the setting sun a reminder of Who Was King. Releasing the trout, Daddaw was splashed with pea-green water and the smell of mud, rot and life most real. "How did you catch it?" we asked. "I don't know," Daddaw said, washing his scarred hands in the lake water. "Just lucky, I guess." Chastised, we knew better.

He had always loved travel. Pi and Daddaw (they were invariably named together) had been everywhere, and he had the Kodachrome slides to prove it. On special occasions, Daddaw would pop "the corn," set up the screen, and carefully arrange the slide carousels. (We knew, and he knew we knew, that the carousels were collated with painstaking detail in advance, but none of us would acknowledge the secret.) Where we sat was up to us. Pi, by default, always got the most comfortable seat. The rest of us unfolded card table chairs, crowded the couch, or stretched on the floor. For the next few hours we were transported to Alaska, or Utah, or Israel, all narrated by Daddaw's soft monotone. We could recite the words. The "eskimo gal" he thought was the cat's pajamas, the uncoordinated farce of Pi riding a camel on her birthday, the 1960's theories of geologic strata creating the colors of mesas near Mexican Hat. In those slide shows I learned how much his heart loved the desert.

Daddaw was a quiet man, so the first great-grandson, my first child, came with few words from him. The event didn't need any, for Daddaw's eyes said more than any orator could. And for the first time, I read words he had written.

The second great-grandson bore Daddaw's name. Still few words, but his smile said more than Mona Lisa's.

The third great grandchild, a girl, brought misty eyes and no words at all, just quiet emotion. The memories of his first daughter, my children's grandmother, were written in every line of his face.

Others followed, but that is a story for another father to tell.

Pi slipped into senility. After 70 years of marriage, and for some reason we never understood, she talked about her beaus before she and Daddaw married. One of them, she said, had died recently. I smirked "Hey, Daddaw! Now you can make your move!" The silence that followed made me uncomfortable, but the low rumbling hawhawhaw let me know I had finally earned my place as a man.

Then Pi died.

In the visits that followed, Daddaw talked to me. Not as a grandson. Not as his daughter's child. He talked to me as one good man talks to another. We would be quiet, standing together, watching the geese and trees and pond at my mother's farm where he spent some of his last days. One day, without preamble, he said his favorite bird was the mourning dove. When I asked why, he said because he had always liked the sad song they sang at twilight. More, he did not say, but I knew there was more. I didn't ask, but stood by his side.

The last time I saw Daddaw he was in his bed. I had never, in my entire life, seen him other than upright, defying age and gravity and inconvenience and pain. When he spoke, it wasn't to me, but the window of his small bedroom. He was, simultaneously, bewildered and focused. He said he loved me. I hugged him and said take care old man i love you too. He chuckled and fell asleep. I knew he would die soon, but I wasn't sad. He was old. He had lived better than I could hope to. He had loved. Loved his wife, his family, his work, his world.

The quiet strong soul that was Daddaw slipped away shortly thereafter.

On a sunny weekend morning a few months ago, I was touring our little backyard gardens with my wife and visiting sister-in-law. We admired the spring flowers, the windchimes, the hummingbird feeders, the cacti.

"Oh, look!" said sister-in-law.

Perched on an iron hook, from which suspended a feeder of sunflower seed, was one perfect, sleek, beautiful mourning dove, eyeing us with no fear, fluffing his feathers, the golden morning sun glinting off his cheek patches.

This backyard, the province of a dumb eldest grandson, lives in the middle of the desert.

In this backyard are rocks thrown by my sons, for which I have yelled at them to stop. In this backyard crickets sing on warm summer nights. In this backyard is an above ground pool where my children have honed their swimming skills. In this backyard my wife and children and I have planned and built and painted projects of wood and brick and dirt. In this backyard are tomatoes that have grown green and red and sticky and warm and delicious.

In this backyard Daddaw says Hello.

Good Ol' George

This is George. Good Ol' George.

We know he was born to be a racer; the ear notches and the chest scars of kennel fights are proof. We also know because the registration tattoo inside his ear tells us so. The other inside-ear tattoo tells us he was the first pup of his litter, born sometime in January, 1994. We adopted him in 1998, so he had been in training or actual racing from his puppyhood until about four years old. At four years, he was too old, and put up for adoption.

His first adopter chained him in the sun to a doghouse too small for him. As with most dogs, he turned and turned and turned before settling down to sleep, but the doghouse was so small it rubbed the fur off his hips, shoulders, and forehead. He was left with no companionship, possibly for the first time in his life, in the heat of the desert. The greyhound rescue organization took him back. The rescuer knew us from a prior adoption (his “sister” Blaze), and gave him to us.

Poor George was washed up, unloved, skinny, and beautiful.

All greyhounds have two names: their racing name, which is similar to fancy racehorse names, and a simple kennel name used so the dog knows when s/he is being called or disciplined. In this case, his fancy name was "AY's Carry On." His kennel name was simply "George." There was no doubt when we adopted him that he was a George. Just a George. He looked at us with big soft, happy, pleading brown eyes that said: "Um. Hello. Um. Please love me. My name is George." So George it remained.

The few adoption awareness events we took him to were always fun. George never met a human he couldn't charm. If you didn't acknowledge him, he would just stand in your way until you patted his head, and he anointed you with doggy breath. He was his breed's best ambassador. A common phrase around our family and friends was "Everybody loves George!" It was true. And George loved Everybody back.

He tucked his head under your arm, the greyhound equivalent of a hug, then withdrew with a drippy nose to SSMIIIILE at you, the biggest thank you the world has ever seen. He wolfed down his dinner (because that’s what you do if you don’t want your race mates to steal it), then barf it up and eat it again at his leisure. He tolerated cats walking over him as he dozed. He loved going bye-bye in the car. He loved his vet. He ran like the wind itself, pointed in the direction of his flight, shoulders leaping before his forepaws, haunches gleaming like gold, his long nose an arrow, speed made flesh, the poetry and awe of Celtic Kings, the delight of Pharaohs, the equal of Goddess Diana.

He knew he was the fastest and most beautiful sprinter of all Olympians, legendary, rare, precious. As befitted his stature, he usurped the couch. Or the bed. Or the easy chair. Or the pillows. Or the beach towel. Or the carpet remnant. Or any soft thing he might want to lie on. Because he had worked, dammit. Because he was king among canines. Because his history was the royalty of ancient Egypt. Because he was beautiful and humble. Because he deserved it.

He deserved it because he was Good Ol’ George.

Good Ol’ Sweet Big Hearted George.

George died today.

My wife and I were with him at the end. The last thing he saw. Him, with his deep brown eyes of goodness. Us, eyes blurred with tears before the doctor George loved administered the compassionate dose of calming sleep.

The beginning of his end might have been a stroke, kidney failure, cancer, or any of a number of things. It doesn't matter.

I think Ol’ George’s giant heart just gave out, because it had given so much to so many, and it had nothing left to give.

Run, George.

And thanks for letting us know that the race isn’t how you finish, but the time you spend laughing in it.

* * * Please Help George’s Friends! * * *

Each year, hundreds, if not thousands, of greyhounds are abandoned, abused, or killed when their racing days are over. In an infamous case, dozens of greyhound carcasses were found in a shallow pit in the Arizona desert, their ears cut off so the tattoo marks couldn't be traced back to the owner(s).

Greyhounds make wonderful companions. If you want a dog that will do tricks, or guard your house, or make points with snobs, a greyhound is not for you. If you want a dog with an ancient, rich, and diverse history, a quirky personality that makes you scratch your head and chuckle, or a really good bed warmer on cold winter nights, consider a greyhound. They do have some special, but not burdensome, needs. Stairs? Never seen 'em. Glass doors? Never seen 'em. Extreme heat or cold? They have no insulating body fat, so aren't the most durable of animals. A little research and questioning your adoption consultant will make all the difference. What you invest will be repaid a millionfold.

For more information on how you can make a difference, PLEASE visit any of the links below, or simply do a Google search for "greyhound adoption." Your local humane society or animal shelter can also provide information on smaller greyhound adoption agencies specializing in placement in your area.

For a minor fraction of the price of any pure-bred dog, you can have a beautiful sweet-natured companion, complete with pedigree, shots, veterinary check-up, spay/neuter, leash training, house-breaking, and a heart as big as Ol’ George's.

Waiting to be YOUR best friend.

The Greyhound Project

Greyhound Pets of America

The Greyhound Gang

Goodbye, Mr. Limpet

He wasn’t a blockbuster star, but Don Knotts is arguably one of the most recognizable figures to baby boomers. He was on TV almost every day thanks to “The Andy Griffith Show” syndication, and Saturday afternoon screenings of such classics as “The Reluctant Astronaut“ and “The Ghost and Mr. Chicken.” Even young teens know him from re-runs of “Three’s Company.”

His career spanned over fifty years. During that time, as entertainment grew ever more risqué, daring, and brash, Don kept a sense of kind innocence. His harmless yet hilarious goofball persona was, and still is, a favorite of kids and adults alike. He was the last of a kind: the Jimmy Stewart type of gentleness, self-deprecation, and aw-shucks goodness that has long since departed Hollywood. He was the sad-eyed runt-of-the-litter puppy no one could resist.

For me, however, Don will always be “The Incredible Mr. Limpet.” It’s a boyhood favorite that’s delightful to revisit once in a while. I have wistful memories of the metal-cornered fish tanks, the daydreaming misunderstood man’s wish to be a fish, his friendship with a curmudgeonly tin can-toting hermit crab, and the ridiculous “HAROOM”-ing at Nazi torpedoes. I think I can point to that movie as starting my life-long obsession with aquaria, catch and release fishing, and all things under the ocean. It is a hobby and an interest that has occupied much of my life, even in my dreams.

Goodbye, Mr. Limpet, and thank you. May the great beyond show you safe seas.

The Beam Goes Out

Today one of my boyhood heroes died. Many people won’t know him, but to me he represents an important part of who I have become.

James Doohan, aka “Scotty,” was the most unsung of the Four Heroes of Star Trek. In my tweens and early teens, this show was the basis for fantasy, role-playing, and countless deep discussions of philosophy, the arts, and the future. At least as much as the mental wanderings of young men can be deep.

Some specific others will disagree, but being the oldest of four boys was tough. Male role models, both within the family and everywhere else, were tough to come by. I fear it is still true. But from Captain Kirk I learned a sense of wonder and to stand up for your convictions. From Mr. Spock I learned to disassociate myself from a given situation and see things rationally. (Still haven’t grasped that one very well.) From Dr. McCoy I learned to revel in life’s sensual pleasures, hold your passion like a burning torch, and that a smartass can be a lot of fun.

But my friends and I always knew that no matter how cool all this seemed, our primary heroes would have been squealing little grease stains on some forgotten world without Scotty. He was the glue that held everything together. He was the foundation of the house they all lived in. He was the one who lied outright about fixing stuff, saying it couldn’t be done. But get it done he did, and always in half the time he quoted, invariably because he inflated his estimates. I loved him. I loved him because he made me laugh. Because he refused to accept the impossible. Because he was always one step ahead of his superiors. Because he could grin with a screw-you attitude and get away with it. Without Scotty the grunt, the regular guy, the man who knew and still made mistakes, the Utopian future I so yearned for wasn’t possible.

So call me a geek, a nerd, a pansy, whatever. I don’t care. This was an important part of my growing up. It’s a large part of what I am today.

In one of Mr. Doohan’s last public appearances, he was lauded by none other than Neil Armstrong at a Hollywood Star Trek convention. Armstrong said he hoped one day to captain a starship, and if he did, he wanted Scotty on the crew.

Ironically, good ol’ Scotty died today, July 20, 2005, the 36th anniversary of Armstrong’s first step on the moon.

I hope you were beamed to the good place you wanted, Jimmy. Thanks. For everything.