I felt the tug of the Snow Moon to rise and complete this story that I had started on Saturday. It’s 4:44 am, Sunday morning. As Samuel said to the Divine “Here I am, Lord.”

I have not written in about 2 years. Not sure why I stopped. This morning, I woke with the sense I wanted to write. I will start with what has been happening the past few weeks in our household.

PETS

It was time for Freddy’s annual check-up. We had been notified that Dr. Swenson had retired and his practice had been sold to other veterinarians. No problem there as I had not thought much of Dr. Swenson’s competence. A nice enough man, but if there was a problem, forget it, I could not count on him. Years ago, he was the Vet for my dog Casey, and he could not figure out what was the matter with her. She was losing weight, shedding handfuls of hair, lethargic, and had skin issues. He recommended I put her down. By happenstance, I spoke about Casey to the house physician at Canyon Ranch in the Berkshires where I was working; I was aware she was a dog lover, too. She suggested that Casey be tested for thyroid disease. And, sure enough, Casey was hypothyroid. A simple medication-Synthroid–was all she needed to live fully, happily another 3 years.

Dr. Cyran was pleasant, engaging and she gave Freddy a thorough examination. She said his teeth were in dire need of cleaning. She explained dental surgery was needed and he would need to be under anesthesia and likely loose teeth in the process. I had previously raised this with Dr. Swenson who had disapproved. We agreed to schedule Freddy for dental surgery.

As in past winters, Freddy’s eyes were irritated by the wind, sand, and salt from the roads and Dr. Cyran prescribed a new eye ointment. Ca-ching.

She also recommended a new vaccine for Leptospirosis. Ca-ching.

During the exam, we raised a new, disconcerting behavior–Freddy was jumping out of bed numerous times during the night, starting around 1 a.m., for no apparent reason. She was just as baffled as us about this new pattern. After taking in all the info and her observations of him, she suggested testing for and ruling out Cushing’s Disease as he had gained a few pounds. Ca-ching.

We were upset, just thinking that there could be something the matter with our lil doodler. She ordered a urine test and asked us to bring back a sample. No problem. The next day we dropped off a sample. Two days later, she called back and asked what time we took the sample–“1:45 p.m.” She said she needed a new sample from his first pee in the morning. Ca-ching.

Oh boy! The usual routine is that Freddy gets up a 5 a.m. and Bruce takes him out for a walk, and he does his duty. In this instance, I would need to accompany Bruce to catch the sample. At 5 a.m. it is dark and cold; Bruce has gloves on, a flashlight in one hand and the leash in his other hand, his eyeglasses fog up. The next day, we are all up around 5 a.m., Bruce and I are bundled up, and I have the plastic cup in hand, ready to catch the precious sample.

Well, Freddy is no ordinary dog. When he goes out to do his duty, he doesn’t lift his leg and pee in any old place. In fact, he squats first and raises his leg, ever so slightly. He walks around with keen concentration, checks the topography thoroughly, sniffs exhaustively…and repeats 4-5 times, in ever-enlarging circles before finding the perfect spot to empty his bladder. In the meantime, remember, it is early morning, and it is dark. As we are roaming our neighborhood, our neighbors’ security lights are flashing on brightly in each driveway we pass. Finally…He stops. He squats. He pees. I shove the cup under his little penis and catch the sample. He kicks it off and I spill half the sample. Luckily, it was enough to perform the test. We later learned; he does not have Cushing’s disease. Thank you God.

Back to the problem of him waking repeatedly throughout the night. The Vet prescribed a sedative to help him relax and we put it in his late afternoon meal. Ca-ching. We question whether it is having any substantial effect as he is still waking and jumping out of bed, jumping back in bed, just not as much. Sometimes. We are exhausted.

In the meantime, Freddy was scheduled for an appointment with a new Groomer. Let me give you some background. Freddy is a mini labradoodle, about 24 pounds, 11 years old. Freddy has been to about 15 different groomers. We can’t seem to find the right one–he comes out looking like a poodle, rather than a labradoodle. When we asked our new Vet for recommendations, she gave us a list of 12 groomers. We had already been to 8 of them who proved to be unsatisfactory; 2 of the groomers I had read negative reports about; leaving 2 unknowns. Of the 2, one worked at the Dakin Humane Society Center. I read about her and thought she must be good to be taking care of dogs who come in who have been abandoned and are in dire need of a bath and grooming. She also donates one half of her fee to Dakin, and I was impressed by her generosity and commitment to animals. Here is a picture of Carol from the Dakin website. She has a beautiful smile, and you can tell she is a dog person.

We book an appointment; show up; and she says I have the wrong time. “I am sorry” I say, and we rebook for another day and time. Bruce looks at me as if to say, “Did you screw up?” Later, she telephones to apologize; it was her error. No problem, we all make scheduling mistakes. A big snowstorm is predicted for the day of our new appointment–we have to cancel and reschedule. Finally. The big day comes. We bring him to the Center. He will be ready to be picked up in 2 hours, Carol tells us. We like the fact that Carol works on only one dog at a time and Freddy does not need to be disturbed by other dogs, and he doesn’t need to be away from us for very long. He looks great! She did a terrific job, especially around his eyes and mouth and not too short on his body. We are very pleased! We will be back in 8 weeks.

Next day. To the dental surgery facility at 8 a.m. We feel a bit anxious, yet we have faith that this is the right thing to do for Freddy. He had not displayed any pain nor discomfort in his little mouth, and we wanted to avoid any problems in the future, such as emergency extractions, odor, gum disease, or infections. So, after 12 pages of legalese later, we sign off and leave Freddy in the capable hands of the Feeding Hills Veterinary Services staff. BIG CA-CHING. It felt weird not to have Freddy with us during the day and we were nervously excited to pick him up at 4 p.m. He came through beautifully. Thank you, God.

Four days later, we are pleased to say Freddy is back to his normal whack-a-doodle self, less 8 teeth. They were bad and had to come out. He is still the cutest dog in the world. Hey, he made the cover of Rolling Bone, and that’s no small feat.

We love our lil doodler, as we did Nadine, and our prayer is that God helps us to be the best caretakers of him.

CARS

Onto the story about our car, a Subaru Outback. I have to say, I am wowed by the advances in technology in the car repair industry and its customer service. Full disclosure: Bruce and I know nothing about cars. We don’t look under the hood because we would not know what we are looking at. We scheduled our 2015 car for its regularly planned maintenance. In addition to the routine things that needed to be repaired or replaced, there were some pricey glitches. For example, a rodents’ nest was found near the engine. Wires were chewed on and totally disconnected. And other things added up-brakes, battery, etc. Ca-Ching, Ca-ching.

Here’s an audio video that was given to us, showing what the service rep found and the recommended action.

Very sophisticated. When I picked up the car, the person who checked me out said “Wow you have a practically new car!” We think we will keep the car for another year (it will be 10 years old next year) and get back, so to speak, the couple thousand dollars we just put into it. We will likely stay in the Subaru family of cars, but probably not an Outback as we don’t need that level of power. We originally traded in our VW Jetta for the Outback because we needed it to haul the Teardrop Trailer, which we never did haul…anywhere; the Teardrop Trailer never moved off the driveway except when we moved it to the front yard so the driveway could be enlarged to accommodate it. Don’t even get me started on that!

The loaner the dealership gave us to use while our car was in the shop was a Subaru CrossTrek. We liked it; maybe something a little classier (like a Legacy), less sporty for our next car. It was fun browsing through the brochures the rep was only too happy to give me. In the meantime, we have time to research.

SPIRITUAL PRACTICES, YOGA and NAIKAN

If you know me, you know I have a deep spiritual practice that includes prayer, reading the Bible and other inspirational books, mostly from Unity or Science of Mind, passage meditation, and yoga. I follow authors who write from the metaphysical world view, such as Charles and Myrtle Filmore, Florence Scovel Shinn, Eric Butterworth, Ralph Waldo Emerson, Emmet Fox, Ernest Holmes, Elizabeth Sand Turner, H. Emily Cady, Wayne Muller, Louise Hay, Eknath Easwaran, and many others. Although I have used journalling over the years, it has not been consistent.

Recently, I discovered Naikan (pronounced Ni-kon, like the camera). It is a Japanese method of self-reflection that leads to a deeper sense of our interdependence with all others and our connectedness to the Universe. The practice includes writing each evening, answering three questions:

*What have I received today from someone or from the Universe?

*What have I given to someone or to the Universe? and

*What troubles, difficulties, or problems have I caused or created for someone or the Universe?

I have found this very useful and practical. The practice can go deeper by reflecting on periods of our lives and or focusing on specific people in our lives. I have not done this exercise yet. The guidebook I am using is “Naikan: Gratitude, Grace, and the Japanese Art of Self-Reflection” by Gregg Krech. I have also purchased “Even in Summer the Ice Doesn’t Melt” by David K Reynolds, Ph.D., an anthropologist who brought this Japanese method to the US.

After a 2-year hiatus, I am back to the yoga studio and am happy that I have resumed my practice. We recite this prayer before we begin each session:

“Lead me from the unreal to the real, Lead me from darkness to light, Lead me from time-bound consciousness to timeless state of being.”

That is all for now, friends.

Namaste

P.S. Please know that I write to share with others, not necessarily to influence others. I am interested to learn what is happening with you, in your life. Please feel free to contact me here or at soapsusan@aol.com.

P.P.S. All photos are by Bruce Barone, except noted. Visit his website at www.brucebarone.com