Emergency Department

Thursday night I spent 10 hours in the emergency department of Lowell General Hospital.  Saturday I'd hurt my back, being stupid and taking my historically sturdy and resilient back for granted.  By Wednesday morning standing still was gasp inducing with pain running down through my right knee.  Thursday evening my right leg collapsed dropping me backwards down some stone steps.  I suffered no injury from the tumble, but it did get through my thick head that I needed to get this checked ASAP.

The place was packed when I walked in around 8.  I was in for a long wait.  I got my x-rays quickly.  Good news, the x-rays showed no horrible problems in spine or hip.  Bad news that meant I went to the bottom of the triage list.  Gotta love reading your results in the portal on your phone as soon as they are ready.  I settled into my wheelchair for the long haul.  I'd brought a book.  Wheelchair because my right leg was not reliable for walking.

There were families cradling sick children, a young girl who hurt her ankle playing basketball, many others sitting waiting for help.  Everyone here because something was wrong, someone was sick, something was injured.  The staff was endlessly kind and thorough working through the crowd, hour after hour.  No one is happy in the ER.

Then around 1AM a man appeared pushing a woman in a wheelchair, with a nurse running behind.  The woman was in labor, NOW.  A flurry of activity as they rushed the couple upstairs.  Some time later the man reappeared with bag of supplies.  A nurse asked if the baby had come.  Yes, within 15 minutes of them getting to the delivery room.  A girl, dad smiled.  As he walked back up the aisle someone clapped, then another, then we all joined in. That little family brought joy to all of us.  In all our momentarily sick, worried, or painful lives we paused for joy. You could see the room brighten. 

I did not get out of there till after 6AM.  Drugs and instructions for follow up appointments.  Hopefully just aggravated muscles wreaking havoc with the sciatic nerve.  I'm feeling somewhat optimistic.  I will not take my back for granted again.

Only in October

What a night. The sun was setting when I got to the barn. Red and gold trees glowed, moon flashing bits of white through breaks in the clouds. I took Bar and Pan to work the two rams across the road. It was like walking into a fairy tale. Sky in shifting colors, trees in silhouette.  The land muted as the sun’s reach withdrew.  Moisture in the cooling air gave it a texture like raw silk.

Did you see that?

I put Marcus out at 5:30.  Realizing I needed to add hot water to the outside dog water bucket, I decided to walk out on the porch to retrieve it without getting my robe first.  The porch can be seen from the road and by my neighbors, but it was dark, predawn on a holiday.  I stepped out the door and the motion sensor lights on the garage immediately lit up.  Suddenly I was on stage.  The same damn lights I regularly wave my arms in front of to no avail when I actually need light.  And, of course, a car shows up on the road.  I complete my trip, a few seconds of exposing my fish belly white glory to the world or at least that lone driver.  I got my robe while the bucket filled and put the bucket back out on the porch.  About 10 minutes later I notice a car slowing in front of the house.  Looking out the window I see a police car just past my house on the side of the road, blue lights flashing.  I go back to bed.  In bed I see the blue lights now right in front of my driveway, and an officer gets out with a flashlight and is looking around in my driveway.  OMFG did someone see and report my naked ass as an intruder (or mad woman since it was below freezing)!  Did the Puritan spirit of the holidays leave them horrified by fully visible boobs?  I start to laugh and stay in bed.  About 30 minutes later I get up and there are still police around, walking up and down the road looking towards my yard and house.  Now I'm really wondering, but seriously if they thought there was an intruder they would likely have knocked.

Turns out someone had come rocketing by the house around 4AM, scraped along the guard rail on the curve before my house, over the curb when the rail ended, then taken out a construction sign, road sign, and my entire mailbox including post.  My mailbox was 50 feet away in my neighbor's yard.  Oy!  It is a 25 mph speed limit.  I called the police and found they'd caught the guy, report written, criminal charges filed, insurance information documented, and I can pickup the report Monday morning to get my mailbox paid for.  Talk about professional and efficient.

Still chuckling, but thinking I'll try to remember to grab the robe on the way out of the bedroom.

Good Hands

The doctor showed me the x-rays,
not arthritis, maybe a sprain, 
when my hands caught a fall
We can start with physical therapy, and a brace
I like that, tools to take care of my hands

These are good hands, broad and strong
When I was young I wished for long slender hands,
not knowing the worth of strength
These hands have caught many falls,
held firm the reins of galloping horses,
powered hammers, lifted heavy loads,
crimped tiny ridges of rock to take me up cliffs,
managed the paddle that powered me through rapids,
caressed loved ones, lifted my elderly mother, 
and written the words of my life.

These are good hands

©Maria Amodei  2022

Perfectly Wonderful

 Wonderful – inspiring delight, pleasure, or admiration; extremely good; marvelous.

I was in my shop last week, noticing a multitude of flaws in the construction of my wonderful new doors.  None of the flaws compromises their functionality, and few can be seen at any distance.  The doors are part of a post and beam building made in the 1800s, a simple building that is lovely to look at.  The doors join delightfully into the façade.

Nature is a vast harmony of imperfections, the bones of dead trees and curves of crooked trunks as much a part of the beauty of the forest as the members who stand straight.  Within every image that takes your breath away there are a myriad of the imperfect blending into something wonderful.  It is this celebration of diversity that makes wild places beautiful in a way that man cannot match.

Perfectionism – refusing to accept any standard short of perfection.

Perfectionism robs us of wonderful.  Perfectionism demands we search for flaws and dwell on details out of context of the whole.  It tells us only perfect is of value, misassigning importance and misaligning our efforts.  Perfectionism distracts from deciding what matters to us and finding balance in our lives.  It can mar relationships with friends, family, coworkers, animal partners, and ourselves.  

I’ve gotten better at these decisions.  Not so much better at deciding to let imperfections remain.  Time has often intervened on my behalf there.  I’m getting better at letting the flaws blend into the wonderful whole.  I know they are there, but they don’t bother me as they once did.

May the varied details of your life blend together in a wonderful way.  May you maintain perspective on what brings you joy and celebrate your efforts to those ends.  Peace. 

©2021 Maria Amodei

Thoughts on Confidence

 14 year old Song ran up the ramp to my bed this morning. She has done this several times in the last few days. I built the ramp so the old dogs could get safely on and off the bed, but my first attempt at a secure surface did not provide the traction needed for an old dog to ascend and descend safely. Song slipped a few times and learned to mistrust it. I bought a kit to put a rubberized surface on the ramp. There is no slip on this surface at all, but Song’s risk assessment included many young years of jumping on and off the bed and a short time using a ramp where she slipped. She kept jumping. It did not always go well. She mostly only gets on the bed for our morning play sessions, so I’d close her out of the bedroom until I was ready to take her collar and escort her up the ramp safely. It worked, and I was good with continuing with this plan for as long as I’m able to enjoy her company. I had no expectations of her being able to do the ramp on her own. Then after two months of my helping her, she just started doing it on her own. Up and down, joyfully and confidently.

Confidence in life has a huge genetic component along with the impact of life experiences. Often we blame a dog’s lack of confidence on some incident in their past. Yet, in the words of Beverly Lambert, “another dog might have gotten over that.” Life brings adversities and challenges, in particular the working life of stock dogs. Things go wrong, dogs get frightened or hurt. Many dogs come through strong, some need work to rebuild their confidence, and some never really recover. We should work to always build the confidence of our dogs. We should also value the dogs that are resilient to adversity.

Song has always been confident in life. Given her early earned mistrust of the ramp I did not expect her to use it voluntarily again. But she did. Because I did not expect her to use it again on her own, I did not work towards that goal. I simply prevented her from jumping and helped her on the ramp. I suspect that attitude provided patience that was more useful than a goal to overcome her fear.

Whatever the reasons, it is hard not to smile when my old girl bounces up that ramp happily and barks at me until I deliver the special morning squeak toy.

Loss

I walked to my car along this familiar road, the last time I'll hear my feet on the packed dirt, brook dancing along the base of the field, welcome the shade of these trees. Today I stood for the last time where I've stood at the post so many times, watching my dog cross the brook at the Spring Valley trial, up the hill to bring the sheep across the bridge. With the cars parked along the road, familiar faces among the crowd, you expected to see Steve Wetmore walking along, hat on his head, dog at his side, asking how your run went.  Instead he came in the hearts and memories of the many there to celebrate his life.

I loved the setting for this trial, the relaxed atmosphere, the pot luck in Steve's front yard, walking my dogs up the dirt road, and testing my timing on the difficult course. It was the quintessential New England trial, and it was Steve. 

Remember the time he hired the magician Marko for after the dinner? Oh lord I laughed that night. Marko was there today. He handed me a deck of cards, told me to shuffle, pick one, and write something on the face. I wrote "Thank you," that dreaded trial expression that appreciates a job well done even when your run is over.  Of course Marko found it in the deck, multiple times, and we laughed.

Steve was a good handler, a good dog trainer. His dogs knew the job and trusted him. His runs were worth watching, stock and dogs treated with skill and respect. Steve was a friend to me and many in our community. 

Loss sucks. Thank you Steve.