A Five-Dog Thanksgiving

I have successfully returned from a Thanksgiving trip to Norman with all three dogs in tow. They were obliged to accompany me because I’m too cheap to board them, and my parents are tolerant enough to put up with the insanity of having five dogs in the house for a few days. So off we went.

Kobi insisted on riding in my lap, and every time the car slowed down, she would get up and press her face to the window in hopes that I would roll it down so she could stick her head out. Normally I don’t mind her doing so, but A)  I wasn’t going to open the window in the cold on the highway, and B)  when Grayson is in the car and Kobi has her head out, he has anxiety attacks that she’s going to fall or jump out the window. 

I used the window lock button to keep the dogs in the back seat from being able to step on the button and lower the windows themselves, but unfortunately this function does not work on the driver’s side window. So periodically when Kobi was hopefully pressing her nose to the glass, she would step on the button and roll down the window, whereupon she would immediately lean as far out as possible and Grayson would gasp in terror, and I would swerve all over the road, trying to get him calmed down, keep her from falling out, and get the window back up without taking off her head.

This is fun.

Half way between Tulsa and Oklahoma City, Roxy decided she needed to ride in Grayson’s lap. She bellied up over the console and army-crawled into his seat, where she remained, looking anxious, until his wriggling and complaining drove her into the floorboard at his feet.  From there she refused to be dislodged.  We finally had to stop and haul her bodily into the back seat. A long hour of ultra-sonic whining followed, punctuated by Grayson and me alternately shouting “Roxy! Shut up!” To no effect.

Upon arrival, we got to enjoy the five-way rodeo of integrating my three with my parents’ two.  Circus hilarity ensued, followed by a brief, but very exciting, dog-fight culminating in all of us running around waving our arms about wildly and chasing all five dogs outside.

Then Roxy and Flower got in the pond.

And brought a lot of it into the living room, via the doggie door.

Much sliding, slippery, wet and smelly chaos ensued… culminating in all of us waving our arms about wildly and chasing them outside again.

And blocking the doggie door.  And mopping.

Things did calm down after a few hours, but my parents’ dogs were completely cowed by my galumphing, bossy hoard, and consequently spent most of the four-day weekend in my father’s lap. 

Ah, it’s good to get home for the Holidays.  No doubt my parents are eagerly awaiting our return at Christmas.

Happy bits

I got this from the Nat'l Geographic Animals site, here

My friend Michael informed me that the Hyperbole and a Half post I recommended as comic relief in my last post was sad, not funny.  I guess jokes about depression are only funny to people who have been depressed. 

So, to make up for my pitiful post, I am hearby determined to make this post an upbeat and entertaining one.  So, here are five things that are happy and/or entertaining

1.    Flower ate the crotch out of my best pair of jeans yesterday.  This is not good news, of course, but it is funny.  My question:  what’s in it for her?  WHY???  Flower is otherwise such a good dog.  Roxy eats holes in everything:  my sheets, my blankets, my sofa… rugs, chairs, washcloths, socks… but never the crotch out of my jeans. That’s a specialty of Flower’s, and it’s not the first time, either.

2.    The Walmart just over the state line in Jane, Missouri, not only has a HUGE liquor and wine section, it is also open all night AND it’s cheap.  Bonus:  they sell soft fuzzy sofa blankets with a giant image of the Virgin of Guadalupe on them.

3.    I wrote a story about the Preparators at CB and they really liked it. It’s always good to write something and have people respond favorably to it, even more so if it’s a story about them. The team seemed flattered and pleased that I had taken the time and effort to profile their work.  They deserve it, though.  They just got done installing 450 works of art.

4.    My parents visited this weekend and I had the pleasure of taking them and my son through the museum for the first time. It was fun to visit the museum as a civilian, and to take the time to really look at all the artwork. My dad also fixed the fallen towel rod in my bathroom, which means I can quit dropping my towels on the floor.  

5.    This is not all that “happy,” I suppose, but it is an entertaining bit of insight into my overall state of organization:  I have missed trash and recycling day three weeks in a row.  This means that both bins are overflowing and I no longer have a place to stash my recycling except in a cardboard box in the garage. Incidentally, I have been throwing the cardboard boxes associated with my favorite cheap box wine into this box in the garage for some time now, because they take up too much space in the plastic bin in my kitchen. I went out there yesterday and realized there were no fewer than eight boxes in there.  So… great. Awesome, on Tuesday I get to take all of that out and put it by the curb and the neighbors will think I drank 24 bottles of wine in a week. A stretch even for me. 

And bonus happy thing:  I saw a handful of bluebirds on the trail on the walk in to the Museum this morning.  And if bluebirds don't make you happy, you're dead. 

Back to Dante's Wood

I was having lunch with a group of co-workers yesterday at Crystal Bridges.  We all sat at a long table in the dining bridge, surrounded by happy museum visitors and the nice, busy, homey sound of clinking dishware and distant conversation.  The museum had been open for four days.  And there we were, in the middle of it.  It had happened and it was all going along merrily and now we were in the New Normal:  the museum as Public Property.  No more super-secret works of art, no more mystery.  There was something so strange about sitting there, surrounded by the public, in a place where it had always been  Just Us.  And someone said something about how amazing it had been to be there for the beginning.  "If this was the coolest gig I'll ever have, at 41, I think I'm okay with that,"  she said.  It made me think.

I've been sort of casting about these past few years, trying to find out what the next "rest of my life" will be, and not, frankly, being all that happy with what it's been so far.  But if I look back on my life, really, I have nothing to complain about.

If you think about what you wanted to be as a child, as some measure of how your life turned out:   well, I wanted to be a veterinarian, a writer, or an actor. And really, in some measure, I've done them all.  I've worked as a vet tech, even assisting in the treatment of big cats. I've helped deliver baby snow leopards by c-section.  I got to do that.  I've also volunteered at the wildlife rehabilitation center and fed the baby birds, got my knees licked by curious fawns, and held the fat-bellied baby opossums.

I've worked at some pretty amazing places.  I have met artists, writers, musicians and performers from all over the country during my time with the Oklahoma Arts Institute. And met some truly gifted kids, as well. Then I spent nearly 12 years in a wonderful natural history museum:  learning about everything from dinosaurs to fish. I've learned and written about all of it.  Now I've been present for the birth of a major art museum in a beautiful location. Science, art, science, art again.  Who gets to do stuff like that?  And how could I really feel as if I've somehow failed?

I've shimmied through a crack in a cave to see the bones of a prehistoric bear lying right where it died 15,000 years ago. I was photographed nude standing at the base of the praying hands at Oral Roberts University. I rode a speedboat around the Italian Cote d'Azur and hung out with traveling circus performers in France.  It really hasn't been that shabby.

Perhaps more importantly, I've lead a charmed life. My parents, who love one another dearly, have weathered nearly 48 years together. I've not lost anyone close to me to illness or accident before their time. I'm healthy and reasonably fit myself.  I have a son who is so full of love and joy that he is like a shining jewel in the eye of the world. And he loves me as much as I love him. He believes in me.

I'm damned lucky, is what I am.  And if I feel as if I haven't done anything with my life because things have taken a small unexpected turn, I'm just pathetic.  I'm lucky to have been there, for all of it.  For any of it.

Yet I'm still putzing around Dante's woods, feeling as if I've somehow come untethered. The straight up fact is that I have yet to find my feet after my divorce. It's ridiculous and embarrassing, but I still feel as if something has been taken from me and I'm not complete without it.  Not HIM, god no... just my sense of What Comes Next.  Of what my life means and where it's going.

I had hoped the move to a new place would jump start me somewhat, but it has not.  It has been an incredibly beneficial move for my son, and for my lifestyle, due to the lower cost of living overall here.  G is much happier here:  so much so that it makes the move completely worth it, regardless of where my own heart lies. He is surrounded by friends, and rattles off their names and what they did together at school every day.  It lightens my heart to hear and see him so happy.

But my heart is heavy. Something is still missing, and I am trying very hard not to give up on watching for it. I am reminded of a party we had for G at Halloween.  We got the invites out late, but we had high hopes, and made tons of food and decorated the house and everything... but only the kids next door came, the ones who come by every day. None of his new friends from school.  He kept going back to the door for over an hour, watching for them.  Finally, a time came when I knew they weren't coming. And I saw him reach that point, as well.... But unlike me, he wouldn't give in to it. He kept watching for them. He didn't want to give up hope, or at least the appearance of hope.  That's about where I am now:  standing at the door, watching for guests who  I strongly suspect aren't coming to my party.

Wow.  Is that pitiful, or what?  Don't worry, I recognize it.  I'm not wallowing in it.  I'm trying to put on a stiff upper lip and all, like G did. But even he gave up eventually and curled up on the sofa to watch The Nightmare Before Christmas with me.  He ran a fever that night, too... as if the disappointment he wouldn't express just had to find a way out of him.

I guess I need to find a way to work off my disappointment at life, so I can pick up where I am and start having fun again.  Nobody's coming to the party... but hey, there's lots and lots of food leftover!


One of the best things I do when I'm low is try to find something to laugh about and to share it with someone. Usually I laugh at myself. If I can't do that,  it's also good to find someone in a similar situation who is able to laugh at herself.  So I direct you to a wonderful entry on Hyperbole and a Half, all about the pitifulness of depression, which ironically cheered me up somewhat... and made me think maybe there was hope.  I'm not up to making a funny just now, but I'll let Hyperbole do it for me.