Jill Rants and Raves

where is oscar?

 I'm writing this now because I won't be able to write it afterwards. I brought Oscar into my office so that he could be right here, right now beside me. He lies on a little fleecy bed and I covered him with a light blanket. He looks tired. He had a bad night and so, of course, did I. He was crying in discomfort, and continually trying to change position, but his back legs are weakened and so moving around in bed is an enormous effort. It was like sleeping with a restless lover. Of course I could leave a restless lover and move to another bed, or the sofa but I just held Oscar closer and rubbed his belly, his back, massaged his beautiful short strange dachshund legs with those sweet folds of skin. He nudged his head over my bicep and lay there staring into my eyes, little cries eventually diminishing into sleep.

It is up to me to make a decision he depends upon me for. His heart thuds solidly like a metronome, his appetite never wanes, he tries his best to make it outside for the art of peeing and pooping, but fails now as frequently as he succeeds. He has not heard a word for years, yet seems to be able to tell the difference between the opening of a packet of salami and the opening of a packet of dried fruit. He has begun to startle as another dog runs by him, his eyes flashing with sudden anxiety, he sometimes stands by the wrong bed because he can't actually tell which one I am in. His plaintive repetitive 'whump' like a dry cough wakes me wherever I am and I get up and fetch him.

The last few weeks we've been changing meds and adding and subtracting - nothing elaborate, just simple anti inflammatory tabs and antibiotics, and I still take him to the landfill every couple of days because he comes to the door every time I leave with the others and I believe he wants to go. Then I or Susie or Aida spend most of the walk carrying him. If he is not with me, every other person says 'where is Oscar?'

Oscar's age is a little unknown - but it hovers in the 19 year range. I have cared for him fulltime since September 2005 since his loving mama Aida left him with me when it became clear that he preferred the staid dependability of my Berkeley routine over the more exhiliarating life of the Mendocino country squire that he had been for 8 years before that. He started life in a Victorian in Noe Valley so he has seen the world. But every time I visited his old home in Point Arena, and we hiked the 40 acres of forest and fern and creek he took on the confidence of a country boy. He and I both. Often I would sit at the computer and write, looking out onto the foggy pillows overhanging the Garcia River Valley, and Oscar would be curled up with his cat in front of the space heater, his feet jangling in dreams of chasing rabbits down embankments and finding bobcat poop on the trails.

He was, in the absence of a human one, my photographic muse. I had never known a dog to be so in love with the camera. He seemed to know. 'Hey Jill' photograph me in the front seat of the Plymouth', 'hey Jill, look I'm up on the John Deere', 'Jill, Jill, look, look at me!'

He had back surgery when he was 4, to correct the terrible genetic spine problems that many dachshunds experience, he had half his ear bitten off by Zelda, the cattle dog - and I believe Aida when she says ' he asked for it', we have rushed him to the emergency vet (because these things only happen at night or on holidays) three times to have his stomach pumped and the gravel removed afer he ate more than the intended cat scat in the yard, and he has been dropped (dachshunds have the strangest centre of gravity) fallen down stairs, been tripped over, stumbled over rocks and gone missing (temporarily in the long grass) so many times I can't remember. But like the little trooper he is, he just gets up and dusts himself off.

 He is in short - and he is - one of those animals that one should never ever try to replace. I will not have another dachshund. I had, I still have Oscar. Yes, that Oscar. And now, all that is left for me to do is to listen really carefully to him whispering. And hope that when he whispers, I have the courage to let him go and to break my own heart.

the conservative animal right

 I've been able to tread a relatively fine line running down the middle of my psyche - and until now it's worked out alright to be a fierce and passionate defender of animals while fending off the accusations that I care more for them than I do about people. My engagement with animal welfare activism was always rooted in my deep sense of fairness, justice and my deep belief that animal rights issues are as much about human beings as they are about the animals.

But there has always been a lingering discomfort that while 'pure' animal rights - the defense of the wild - gorillas, elephants and whales - has been aligned with those on the left of the spectrum (Greenpeace, In Defense Of Animals, PETA) the 'domestic animal welfare' movement has been more identified with middle aged ladies who never had any kids whose political activity ends at the local humane society volunteer booth. Right wing radio and media personalities have been for many years vocal and active participants in the protection of domestic animal companions. Even while their gun toting huntin' companions were shooting to kill every wild beast that crossed their path.

When a bichon was ripped from its' owners arms after a minor traffic altercation and thrown into oncoming cars and killed, the outpouring of horror, sympathy and of money to pursue and prosecute the offender niggled at many who wondered why so many cared about a small fluffy white thing. It seemed to many that while millions of children live in poverty, while innocents were being blown to pieces in conflicts around the world, while human eyes stared into the cameras pleading for mercy in crisis after crisis around the globe, how could we prioritize a creature which is not our equal.

Conservative Matthew Scully, speechwriter for Cheney and for Bush, picked up that chord and elaborated on it when he wrote eloquently in his astonishing book 'Dominion' that it is precisely because they are subservient, because they are subject to our control, our will, our benevolence or our cruelty, that we must be stewards of animals. Animals born or bred as food or domestic companions have no rights, they are not created equal, with 'inalienable rights', they have no free will and so we must be their protectors and defenders.

And it is that faith based obligation that Rush Limbaugh evokes in his new PSA for the Humane Society of the US. That the obligation we have towards ending cruelty and abandonment of animals is borne of a god given 'superiority'. Without naming the dark knights of the airwaves, whose crackling loathing of the left, of muslims, of gays, of feminists, of Obama, of the unions and teachers, of clipped haired lesbians, of the 'homo agenda' fuels a seething rage across Amerika, Rush is talking about his good friend Mark Levin in particular and others on the right whose sentimentality about animals is not matched by compassion for two leggers unlike themselves. Mark Levin is one of the most powerful and vitriolic left-baiters in radio. His high pitched spitting vulgarity seems completely at odds with his soft, furry eulogies to his animal companions - and his heartwarming story in the book 'Rescuing Sprite' evokes the joy of saving an animal from a shelter. And Michael Savage who sits atop a garbage pile of insults about me and mine has spoken quite openly of leaving his considerable fortune to animal welfare groups.

Limbaugh's PSA reaches across the aisle in a condescending nod to those liberals who he credits with having some redeeming morality. How could that be? We don't have religion. We don't believe in the Almighty. Many of us are agnostic or atheist. But, oh my god - we are moral human beings? Who knew? Where could that moral and spiritual relationship with other creatures possibly have come from?

And it is odd timing - that at this moment in history when anti gay sentiment is being prodded and provoked by these titans of taunt more so than ever before - that the right should be showing its softer side. While gay and transgender suicides are on the increase, while bullying of young gay boys is rising, these men are embracing the humane welfare movement which, if you were to remove all the queers working in it would come to a crunching halt.

It is this intersection which is most troubling to me - do I simply accept that occasionally one finds oneself aligned with enemies, do I take their money for my cause, do I take the checks and run, or do I say ' this just isn't going to work for me'. This compromise is one notch too far on the belt of mutual do-gooding. I'm vermin to them. And this mouse isn't about to stop roaring.

the education of an animal rescuer....part one

This whole discussion about the Obama pup got me bothered. I really don't give any sort of flying fuck where Bo came from. The discussion we need to be having is about why there is still any kind of mass killing going on in our animal shelters, why law enforcement agencies are in charge of most animal shelters (do they run other social services?), why we have no federal department of domestic animal welfare, why there is no concerted effort to put an end to puppy mill breeding, and why we don't take animal abuse seriously until an abuser crosses that line to hurting humans.

If you're squeamish - be warned. It ain't nice to know some of what still goes on in animal shelters across the country. Over the last two decades there has been an explosion in pet ownership across the country - it is estimated that there 75 million domestic dogs in homes and the pet industry is a 45 billion dollar business. There has also been, thankfully, a decade of reform in many places, leading to lower euthanasia rates, more humane treatment of animals in most shelters and an emphasis on adoption and rescue over killing at the end of the stray hold period. But we are still miles away from all animal shelters fulfilling the role of safe haven instead of slaughterhouse. When a former staff member at the Oakland shelter blew the whistle on the conditions at the animal shelter, her charges included that some dogs owned by people were killed, that a staff member was running an illicit breeding operation, and that dogs were being found alive in the freezer after euthanasia.

Many municipalities including Berkeley are building new animal shelters to meet higher standards of care. Every one except Berkeley is building a larger facility than they have now, to accomodate higher intake as the economy worsens and more and more animals are being surrendered, and more and more animals are being bred in vile conditions in puppy mills across the country. Berkeley is designing a shelter with fewer dog kennels - I can smile about it because it worries me a bit, but the reality is: Berkeley is the only city whose progressive policies have emptied the kennels. My role in that is one of my proudest accomplishments.

I've always loved animals - no secret there. There are photos of me trying to befriend wild ponies on the moors, and pictures of me sitting with small monkeys clambering all over me in Kuala Lumpur, there are tales of my rescuing an owl from a garbage can when I was 6, and the intense relationship I had with my cat Lola when my mother ripped me from our home in Berlin and left the cat behind. My ability to have cats and dogs in my life as an adult was severely impacted by the chaos of my life as I tried and usually failed to stay in one place.

But when I moved to San Francisco in the late 80's, I knew I had arrived 'home'. And by the time I  bought my first home in Berkeley in 1997, there were three beautiful dogs and two amazing cats in my household - as well as Susie of course. We adopted Roxy from San Francisco Animal Control in 1993 so I knew what to expect at an  animal shelter. I found RiffRaff lying in a gutter in Fruitvale in 1994 and I had 'rescued' Frankie my border collie from a family whose 4 year old child kicked him till his belly was bruised, in 1996. I began to see the abandoned, the abused, the stray and the desperate everywhere. When an exuberant young pitbull mix leapt in front of my car on Third Street, we loaded her up and took her to Animal Control where I argued ' yes, she's a pitbull' as they tried to argue that she was a lab mix. Finally they said 'if she comes in here as a pitbull mix, she'll be euthanised'. I took her home and Susie's sister adopted her the next day. She died recently at 16.

So, by the end  of the 90's, I had discovered how to circumvent the probable death sentence for a pitbull mix by calling it a lab mix, and I had come across my first activist vet who helped me trap feral cats and literally snipped the male cats on my neighbors kitchen table before releasing them. I had a primer in animal rescue 101. But nothing had prepared me for how I would respond as I became aware of how badly most municipal animal shelters operated.

At about the same time as a Berkeley animal control officer told me the dog I found on my street would be better off dead, a huge social injustice threw itself in front of me, as I learned about the eviction of the large homeless encampment at the Albany Bulb. Susie and I had discovered the Albany Waterfront where we could run our exuberant dogs offleash and where an unusual mix of outsider artists, the outlaws and escapees from 'normal' society and off leash advocates accepted one another as fellow travelers at this place of wild imagination.

I knew that most homeless people at the Albany Bulb had dogs and cats as companions and that our local animal shelter in Berkeley would routinely impound those animals and usually kill them, as the 'owners' had no money to pay the impound fees, and certainly no proof of licenses as they had no permanent address. They were deemed 'irresponsible' or 'unsuitable' pet guardians. Better to put these animals to death than to let them live in the uncertain world of those without homes. Right? The pure inhumanity of this set all my antenna flailing.

I didn't realise then that I had signed up for a decade of activism and personal struggle as I set about transforming my local animal shelter and defending the rights of the homeless to be treated with respect with regard to their animals. I was not emotionally prepared when I found out what actually happens in animal shelters, the cruelty and the negligence, the brutality and ignorance. In 1999,when the Chief of Police showed me polaroids of a dead 'love bird' with bite wounds on it, it was a total shock when he told me that an animal control officer had bitten the bird to death - as retaliation for it nipping him. What was worse was that I had come to collect the bird that morning to take it to an animal rescue group and was told the bird had just been adopted 'by a wonderful woman'. It's body was actually lying in the office of the Police Sgt who ran the shelter. 'It's just a bird' the Police Chief told me his staff were saying.

When an animal control officer called me secretly and said she wanted to talk about the brutality at the shelter I was stunned by what she told me. A senior staff member walking through the kennels and pointing randomly at dogs and saying 'this one, that one, that one...this one' and one by one those dogs were led into the dirty laundry room, muzzled and killed. She told me that at a BBQ at one of their homes, one officer was telling another about her experimentations with euthanasia drugs, cutting the dose to see just how little she could use to kill, and having to re-administer a second dose if the first didn't work. Female cats were routinely separated from their kittens but could see each other across the hallway and would cry and cry until they were mercifully taken in the back room for PTS (put to sleep). Berkeley Animal Shelter, in one of the most liberal and progressive cities in America, killed 75 % of its' intake 12 years ago.

Today that figure is under 15%. Part Two ahead....

tears for rowdy

I came home from the Albany Bulb with a heavy heart today. Tears streamed down Sarah and Animal's faces, their dog Rowdy lay, quietly peacefully newly dead in the campsite where she lived, on a bloodstained blanket where her painful tumours had ruptured over the last day of her 16 year life. I walked back to the car with my friend Karen and the vet who had gently and tenderly eased Rowdy into a world of endless rabbit chasing under blue skies with steak in her food dish and flowing streams to swim in. Three months ago I had taken Rowdy to the vet and the mammary tumors had been diagnosed as inoperable and probably just the visible tip of a raging cancer. Animal took the news well, stuffing down his emotions as a guy who has a broken history can do and broke the news to Sarah that it was just a matter of short time. Today was that time and it was an easy passing, the dog had not wanted to eat yesterday as if making as clear a sign as she could to her doting owners, that she was ready.

I had brought a photograph of Rowdy to them, along with the vet, so that as soon as the light left her eyes, they could look right back into it again. I had arranged for this moment to be as simple and as manageable as it can be for people who live on the edge of society, living in poverty and a makeshift home, struggling to make it through the month on a small amount, wondering what might have been if drugs or alcohol, or crime had not been part of their emerging lives.

Animal is 50 now, I think, and his once powerful physique is not quite as impressive as it once was. He looks like everyone's favorite uncle, yet he used to scare me sometimes with his rage and fury if he felt that he was not being dealt with honestly. These days I see him trying to get his breath back as he hauls a 5 gallon container of water on the small carrier he has attached to the back of his bike. He won't accept my help. Sarah was once undoubtedly a beautiful woman, tall, elegant and smart as a freakin' whip. The day I brought Rowdy to the vet, Animal worried that Sarah was having menstrual cramps and hadn't eaten for two days. I walked back to my car, drove to Safeway and stocked up as best I could for people who have no refrigeration - a roasted chicken, Ramen, cans of tuna, bread, water, cookies and some fruit. It is the only time in the time I have known them, over 9 years, that they ever commented on their own needs.

I have known them since I got involved at the Albany landfill, in 1999, when I tried to help the large homeless encampment with their animals as they were being evicted onto the streets, railroads and freeway underpasses of the East Bay. Recently, these two returned to their former home after attempts at living indoors and Animal's occasional returns to jail for minor violations of probation. I have always liked these two people. And I have always marveled at their intense and persistent devotion to each other and to the dogs that shared their life.

This is a part of my life that relatively few know about. That one of the most profound lessons I ever learned came from people who do everything that I don't do - get drunk, do serious drugs, commit crime, live on the streets, pick up cigarette butts and re-use them, live without walls, heat or light at the end of a switch, accept a level of discomfort that I can't even imagine, live in fear for their safety, live always waiting for an eviction or a visit from the police - the encampment at the Albany landfill educated me in one short fast burst of time about a level of humanity, of neighbourly concern, of the extraordinary relationship between homeless people and their animals. Like anyone else, I have sought and received acclaim in my life, I have been honored and praised and my photography and writing eulogised and admired. But it is the moments like today when Sarah hugged me - though I hate being hugged by anyone - crying into her hands and dripping tears onto the photo of Rowdy, that it all seems to make more sense to me.

state bark

I got a call yesterday evening from someone who couldn't stop laughing - they were looking, they told me, at a redecorated sign at my beloved Albany Waterfront Park. Just as the sun was easing out of the sky (where does it go when it goes down???) I arrived with my trusty little point and shoot....
I won't bore you with all the details about why State Parks need to be softening their regulations on dogs in certain parks. For now, just laugh along with the wit who came up with this....

oscar's great adventure

 

Oscar has had some life. That's for damn sure. He's so old, Aida can't even remember when he was born. We know he started life as a San Francisco dachshund, Noe Valley to be exact. This suits him. And then he became a Mendocino County squire, overseeing 40 acres of redwoods, pines and ferns, crossing the creek fearlessly and becoming as famous in Point Arena as the lighthouse. When he was four he had back surgery, and when he was in his early teens his older 'sister' Zelda took a chunk out of his ear after he picked a fight with her over food. He has been lost in the woods, chased by whippets on the Albany Bulb, and assumed to be dead on countless occasions when I couldn't see the little rise and fall of his beautiful chest. He has driven in classic cars, Toyota pick ups, Dodge trucks, Volvos, VW's, Nissans, Subarus and an F150 called Black Beauty. Up and down the coast road, down the dirt roads of the ridge, across the bay bridges, ears (one with a chunk missing) flapping in the cool coastal breezes. He is so well known and loved at the Albany Waterfront that if I go for a walk without him people approach me every few yards as if holding a bunch of condolences until I say 'he's Ok, just sitting this one out at home'. They look relieved. I have promised everyone that on the day Oscar flies off into his own sunset I will post a huge au revoir on the notice board down there.

He outlived his siblings, Spotty and Tiger and may yet surprise me by celebrating another birthday - his 19th - which we have designated as June 1st (just because that's the first date we have on a vet record). Like me, he hates the rain and the cold and has been peeing in the house, which I hate as much as I hate the rain and the cold. His back legs buckle on walks, he cannot hear anymore and clearly his vision is fading. Yet. 

Yet, he runs to the door when he thinks it's time to go for a walk with the gang, his tail swishing excitedly across the wood floor, he exuberantly scarfs down his food and anyone else's who is stupid enough to take their eyes off their dish, and cuddles up at night with me (the only dog allowed to do that) with his breath as vile as ever and his luscious brown eyes staring at me until his lids, heavy with the day's adventures fold down. He is the only dachshund I have ever had, and likely to be the last. He arrived in my life 4 years ago, visiting occasionally as Aida worked nearby, and then one day in September 2005 after he had spent the day at doggie daycare (my house) carousing with Roo, Aida came to pick him up and he stared at her blankly, turned his back on her and walked away. He has been here ever since, working on his memoirs. He's had a damn exciting life.

He won't go on the walk this morning. It's a little cool today, and he's dreaming of days sunning himself on the gravel in the backyard. One thing is for sure - Oscar and I have just about had it with winter.

i'm not in love....

....and that's OK with me - at the moment. Valentine's Day has never been a day I've paid attention to, even when I have been crazy in lustful adoration of someone. I did get a very sweet hand made Valentines card yesterday from a friend and I have a feeling the dogs are planning something special. I came home yesterday afternoon to find the tell tale signs of a handicraft session - cardboard in shreds around the house, magic markers with their caps chewed off, wrapping paper torn from the roll on top of a table and an extremely sheepish looking bunch as I walked through the door. You know, that moment when they all go into wax figure mode when they have done something really bad, and then you notice one of them starts really slowly and discreetly to try to leave the room. This is where the phrase 'hangdog look' comes from and I know I'm supposed to be angry, and I make a big show of saying 'What the fuck! Who the freak did this, what the @*ƒø#˜∂** were you thinking?' And they all stand back as I'm clearing up the mess, occasionally they look at each other and shrug their shoulders as if to say 'what's she upset about?'.

The thing I find funniest right now about Valentines Day is the way in which one particular flower advertiser has their ads for roses (imported from where exactly?) running on every talk radio station - no matter whether right wing or left wing (roses - the real fairness doctrine) and each of the talkers have their own 'special code'. If you buy online just punch in Sean, Savage or Rush, Randi, Big Ed or Rachel and you'll get the best deal on your 12 roses in a vase delivered to your 'wife' or mum. I'm betting right wing talkers get more 'buys'. Selling roses is the only point of agreement between left and right hysteria on the airwaves at the moment.

 But back to the important things - my little empire of fur here in the flatlands of Berkeley. It is pouring with rain and this makes me irritable. It's grey and dismal, water is seeping under my foundation and I need to deal with that, Oscar is doing that thing old dogs do - just barking at his shadow, and I worry that these are his last few months. Frank will be 14 this year, Calvin turns 13 in the summer and Oscar will be 19 on June 1st. Is there a reason I'm feeling so piss-awful today? Oh, it isn't Valentines Day. It's Friday 13th. Goddamm.....

dachshund dotage and doting

I stumbled a little on the path by the creek in Tilden Park yesterday, and almost dropped my precious cargo. I looked down at the little 10 pound form nestled in my arms, his front legs and long snout draped over my forearm, his back legs dangling slightly. His eyes gazed out at the passing sights and he seemed entirely at peace with the situation. A few minutes before I had looked behind me on the trail and had asked the rhetorical question 'where is Oscar?' to no-one in particular. He had wanted to come on this hike, like he always does, but just a little distance from the trail-head, he had stopped in the shade of a bay tree. And as I reached down to pick him up to carry him the rest of the walk, he did not resist as he often does. In fact sometimes, Oscar will do a little swerve like a receiver avoiding a tackle and gun his little engine to evade my attempt to pick him up. Like 'whoa Jill, no way, there's a smell wafting down this trail, and I'm gonna be right here at floor level when the source of the aroma comes into view'.

Oscar is and has been my visual muse for the last 3 years, since he came to stay for a few days and then pretty much refused to leave. He's 18 now, and I am more sentimental about him, with his belly smelling like basmati rice, than I am about any of my others. He has the worst breath - like a sewer on a hot day - and we've discussed endlessly the pros and cons of dental work, to remove the decaying teeth and treat chronic gum inflammations, but at his age the risks may outweigh the benefits. So, I just turn my head when he yawns. I have photographed him more than any dog I've ever known, and I'm not the only one. People I meet on my walks grab their phones and snap away while Oscar, oblivious to his stardom, ambles towards the small screens to nudge them, as if they were dog treats.

But yesterday, he hung limply in my arms and for a moment I thought his breathing had stopped. These trails that he had once bounded along are becoming hard on him, his back legs are clearly causing him discomfort. So two weeks ago, I started Oscar on an anti inflammatory analgesic which gives him an amazing lift for a couple of days, he virtually leaps from the car and goes stomping up to a dog 8 times his size, barking with the fervor of a younger guy. But this drug will shorten his life, by exacerbating the kidney problems he is already, like many old dogs, beginning to experience.

I am OK with this. And Oscar, I think, is also OK with this. I use the medication very sparingly, at most once a week, and only when I see him struggling like I did on the trail. These are the decisions animal lovers face and when we truly love them as dogs - not as extensions of ourself, not as emotional struts to get us through difficult emotional times - as animals who have no means to make these decisions themselves, then the decisions become easier.

Oscar races to the door each morning and evening for walks, springs from the sofa when I return, eats his food voraciously, poops perfect poops, pisses in the garden and not in the house, growls and barks at anything he chooses to growl and bark at and so far - wakes up every morning with a yawn and a stretch and a small smirk on his face as if to say - 'Fooled ya. Got another day to go'. I'll know when he doesn't want to fool me any more.

life, near death and the changing of the seasons

Roo Surrounded By Friends, Point Arena, March 23rd, 2008 © Jill Posener

It was easter Sunday two years ago, here in the beautiful woods among the redwoods and madrones, amid the yellow soil and the bluejays, and the house on the ridge that I love so much, that I lost sight of Roo for a moment. And then in an instant her cries pierced a foggy morning, a misty, cold lonely morning, as Mamma, a feral dog I had known and loved for years, grabbed Roo by the throat and carried her into the woods beyond my reach. Roo's small frame hung from the large jaw and her eyes were empty with terror. I felt a searing horror, and a pleading longing 'no' burst out of me with such volume that birds fluttered from trees and my border collie Frank rushed from the house and on a pursuit of Mamma, though he did not know why.

In those few minutes when I thought I had killed Roo with my carelessness, I watched helplessly, racing through underbrush, and over embankments, sliding down the rain slicked trails as the larger dog would stop ahead of me and drop Roo, only to gnaw at her legs or stomach and then pick her up and run some more, Roo's limbs drooping by her sides. She made no more sounds.

Frank kept me on the right track. Suddenly we emerged into a clearing, Mamma looked back at me almost adoringly, as if to say, 'look, look what I did'. I ran harder then and screaming at her to back off kicked her in the side just as she bent over to retrieve her prey once more. I reached for Roo and without thinking tried to pick her up. Her eyes flashed fear and her jaw snapped open and shut on my hands puncturing them over and over. I took off my sweater and wrapped her, lifting her to me, as her head dropped to one side. I flailed then, sobbing and saying her name again and again.

I was alone, it was easter Sunday and the blood from my tiny dog spread over a grey sweatshirt on which I can still see, after dozens of washings, the palest of brown as a reminder of her agony, and mine.

It was the kindness of people whom I didn't know well, that saved Roo's life. The woman who was able to reach the vet during his easter family dinner, the vet who did what he could but who warned me that she might not survive, that she must go to an emergency vet in Santa Rosa, a two hour drive down the fog draped coastal road, and the emergency staff who took her from me when we arrived, leaving me with blood seeping through clothes and empty arms, Roo already in a state of disengagement from the world, and me.

I left Roo there and drove back to the house on the ridge in the woods and to the rest of my pack and looked at Mamma and her mate Yogi, now back in their locked enclosure and decided they had to die. Not out of vengeance, but because I could not ever let them run free again after this attack. Roo survived. The two dogs died.

Today, sitting at the same computer I had sat at starting that dark day, the world could not be a more different place. That day a melancholy settled into my brain and leaked into my soul and it has taken almost two years to exorcise it. I, who am filled with the sheer joy of living, exuberant in the way the days begin with light, enamored of the visions I see dancing around in my head, and excited by the way in which simple things exalt the art of living - I was lost in a tunnel. No air, or light and no sure knowledge of it ever coming to an end.

I'm not sure what brought me to the door through which I was able to burst out of the tunnel - the zone, I describe it to the therapist I have depended on for two years. I remember the night of the day I had the two dogs killed, I called Jody and a dear friend Sarah, and they both called me back hourly until I was able to fall asleep, exhausted by my horror and self loathing. That was a night so black, so dense, I knew it was the beginning of a terrible journey.

Today, the fog sits somewhere across the ridge, Roo is lying on a chair with sun streaming in through a window, glistening in her rich thick coat of fur. She never seems to look at me or this place, even the spot on the trail where her blood mingled with dirt and leaves, with anything but a grin of life affirming pleasure.
Depression is, I'm glad to say, a companion whose claws left scars. The memory of that journey makes me even more alert to life and it's unexpected joys.