Thursday, February 24, 2022

They Is Here

Well, God disposes, and Hazel's (the little stray who arrived last week and won our hearts) original family turned up, and she's gone home. They had been out of town, and didn't know that she'd gone missing.

And so... realizing that there's a place here for a small dog, Barb just adopted a pair of senior Chihuahuas.

It's been years since I've been able to go to Starbucks...and Barb brought me home a Cocoa Latte (their names).




 It's to laugh and it's to cry,
and sometimes it's to wonder
just exactly really why
your life's been torn asunder.
It's to hope and it's to pray
and to get up again
when knocked down, to rise and play
still in the games of men.
It's to joke and it's to smile,
in private hide the tears
for to mourn is out of style;
instead, let us get two more beers
and raise them foaming in the mugs
to drink to life and love and hugs.

The Five Minute Friday prompt this week is PEACE. Guess the world needs some, and always did.

And, until He comes again, always will.

All we are saying
is give peace a chance...
well, if so, start praying
for we're more than just plants;
we're agents of action,
and prayer is the tool
that can unite factions
and end ridicule
over our skin-shade,
and ways others speak.
By prayer can be remade
the world by the meek
with a weapon seems small
but 'tis greatest of all.

A shade under five minutes. I'll take it.

Music from Wall Of Voodoo, with, of course, Mexican Radio.

Syl prefers ice cream to beer. Sometimes.




 

Thursday, February 17, 2022

Hazel Is Here

 So in a week of waning strength and vastly increased pain, God had an answer.

YOU NEED ANOTHER DOG.

On Sunday, on the way to church (it seems that God lacks subtlety), Barb ran across a tiny terrier, running panicked down a fast road, far from any houses. She'd clearly been dumped.

We did have her checked for a microchip... none... and there are no lost-dog signs posted. So she's home. In the photo below, she's sleeping by my pillow.


She began her ascendancy to Home Rule with Belle the Service Dog, who is mostly timber wolf. Here they are in the sorely-used mudroom...


Belle has recruited Hazel (she has hazel eyes) as an assistant...at night Hazel sleeps on my chest (YOU try moving her), and if I have trouble breathing she gets Belle to help me turn over for a clearer airway.

The interesting thing is that a few weeks ago I had a dream or vision, that Barb would find the tiniest of terriers.

Good work, God. Thanks!

I have come to dominate,
as regal as that sounds,
so just please accept your fate
from a dog that weighs four pounds.
T'was the Wolf I conquered first,
and then Roscoe the Pit,
but I saved my very worst
for the Labrador I bit.
He felt that he could stick his nose
anywhere he thought to smell,
and what, dear heart, do you suppose
to him I chose to tell?
"Go thee now, you oaf, and hide,
and next time sniff your OWN backside!"

The Five Minute Friday prompt this week is STRETCH. Not hard.

She stretches out her tiny frame,
and sounds a quiet yawn.
Hazel (her eyes!) is her name,
and our whole pack is gone
in fine sappy soppy delight
for this canine bit of fluff
that wanders through the house at night
knowing that she's tough
enough to cope with Ridgeback-Pits
who quail when she walks by,
four pounds that could tear to bits
in the twinkling of an eye
the meanest junkyard dog of all,
then hang his head upon the wall.

Five minutes flat, and that's Hazel.

Music, of course, from Sister Hazel, with All For You.

Sylvia loves hazelnut ice cream.


 

Thursday, February 10, 2022

Thinking Of Heaven

This week has been so hard. I try not to think about Heaven...my heart and duty are here... but sometimes I do.

It feels wrong, feels like I am trying to distract myself from the cancer fight.

I don't want to go, but it's getting really hard to stay.

This life's a hopeful journey
(should be, at any rate),
and when we reach Eternity
and pass through Heaven's gate
we'll see our friends' real faces,
and they'll see ours as well.
We'll speak of far wild places;
the stories that we'll tell!
The writers' paper children
play with welders' kids of steel,
and come, when they are bidden
to the table-bending meal,
raise beery mugs in noisy toasts
to the gracious Lord of Hosts.

The Five Minute Friday prompt this week is COMMIT. I'll try.

I'm committed to this road
that wanders through the dark wild wood,
and though now my back is bowed,
and I ain't feelin' good,
I will push on with strength that's left,
although I'm fading fast.
The painful warp and bleeding weft
of life belie my past
of health and joyous bonhomie,
where laughter never lacked;
was this a true part of me
or just an artifact
of easy days and sunny skies
that now, in this trial, quails and flies?

I'd like to think that the question in mirror of this sonnet doesn't reflect me, that even at the worst moments (of which this, as I write, is one), but as some Dead Greek Dude once said, the unexamined life is not worth living.

OK, I've examined it. Can I please go play now?

Five minutes and a few seconds. I'll take it.

Music from The Alan Parsons Project, with the hauntingly lovely Closer To Heaven.

Sylvia asks what the problem is... there's ICE CREAM in Heaven!



 






Thursday, February 3, 2022

Wealth

Cancer's pushing hard this week. Hard to breathe, and hard (and scary, because I'm very unsteady on my feet) to walk.

But life goes on, and so must I. Not out of defiance, or realistic hope for healing and a brighter tomorrow.

See, I promised.

It's that whole 'for richer, for poorer...in sickness and in health' thing.

It doesn't have to be easy.

It just has to be done.

There are days adrift in sorrow
and in heart-despairing pain,
but yesterday is not tomorrow
and the sun will shine again,
though your plans and dreams are shaken,
and although something loved is gone,
'less it's given what's not taken
is the will to carry on,
smiling while your heart is crying,
laughing when you'd rather weep,
choosing life though you are dying
for there are covenants to keep
that were promised in your health,
and are today your greatest wealth.

Music from The Carpenters, with Top Of The World.

The Five Minute Friday prompt this week is ACHIEVE, so here goes.

Achievement was what I had thought
that effort and great talent brings,
but in a life that cancer's wrought
I make do with smaller things,
like dishes washed and laundry done,
and dogs walked slowly 'round the yard,
but do not think I don't find fun,
for it's close by, and thus not hard
to discover bright surprise
and laughter in the canine play,
and in what I might devise
through the course of each new day
to give my wife and home a lift
that shows each day is still God's gift.

Achieved, in just under five minutes!

For Sylvia, ice cream is riches.