The surviving puppy, the second one born, is alive and kicking. She is strong and well. She knows how to nurse, kneading her mother like Rocky Balboa going to town. I have taken to calling her Balboa, but Joan is calling her Tough Twikett (spelling uncertain) and I imagine that will stick. For some reason we all keep calling her a "he." Her Mama is letting her nurse now and Joan keeps supplementing her. I think she's a fighter and a beauty.
It's an early morning tomorrow. I have to get up and make the almost three hour trek to Cambridge, NY for the Open House art show/reading at Bedlam Farm. I'm selling some of my photo collages and note cards and reading one of the pieces I wrote for this blog. I loaded the car earlier today as I had a busy night. The basket contains my boxed and loose note cards and the bags my matted and framed collages.
Several months ago I began reviewing dog books on this blog. Russ Ryan's book, It's Just a Dog, was a blast to read and I'm glad to be a part of this give-a-way that offers three winners a chance to receive his book.
This Dogtastic Giveaway has been brought to you by
My friend Joan's house always fulls me with wonder. Pulling up the driveway, whether it be summer or winter, is like entering a magical land -- the snow-covered enchantment of Narnia, the lush greenery of a secret garden, the mad fall foliage of a manic wonderland. Regardless of the season, the place seems enchanted to me. I can't put my finger on why exactly. It is in many ways a place of chaos, but always of hope and perseverance. There is a lilt to the land, the same energy Joan carries in her fingers as they dance across the piano keyboard. It is easy to get lost in time here. There are many clocks, but none tell the time -- some by accident and some by design. The hours pass and you wonder if you are under a spell: have you been here five minutes or five years. Pugs gather around you and you feel as if you are a visitor in their world, where they hold court and host teas. And, Joan is the wizard, the good witch, bringing life to it all.
When I left the newborn puppies at Joan’s house the other night, they were noisily squealing, earning the first-born pup, the nickname Aria. The second, another girl with a cockscomb hairdo, we mistook for a boy and took to referring to as “he.” The third was born two hours later, seemingly big and strong and healthy. By the 9:30 a.m. feeding, she was gone. Aria lived long enough to earn a name and steal our hearts. She had passed away later the next day. The second puppy lives still and seems to be going strong. Her Mama still doesn’t want anything to do with her, but Joan is making sure the pup is fed. We are trying to supplement her with a goat’s milk product I picked up at the Blogpaw’s Conference in May. I planned to review it on my blog. Instead, it feeds a tiny life. Several times a day, Joan holds down the mama long enough for the pup to suckle.
We are left to ponder why. Why did these two pups come into being only long enough to receive a nod and a smile before dying? What is life and what makes it so fleeting? The questions are the same whether one is an hour old or ninety – life always seems so short, death so familiar and yet, so foreign; something we recognize, but never truly expect. As Joan and I worked to bring the puppies into existence, then to keep them alive, her daughter and son-in-law stood vigil at his mother’s bedside. She died in this span of time and they made plans to return her body to her home in Puerto Rico. They make funeral arrangements even now. “There are so many flowers,” Joan’s daughter says.
To hold a puppy in your hand, no bigger than a bird, is like grasping a living heartbeat. You feel every fragile pulse and yet, in that teeny body with such very big lungs, I also felt a universal strength. She was alive and moving, full of energy, full of life. She made her presence known. In the hours after she was born, her bigger sister cuddled with her. Resting her head against her back, not unlike the way my Alfie sleeps with Waffles. They were small, but instinctualy they knew how to keep warm; they understood the rhythms of life.
Once another of Joan’s pugs had a large litter of puppies. One died each day until they were all gone. I can remember holding one, no bigger than my finger, naming the coal black creatures after the blackest of things – Blackberry, Black Bear, Blackbird and singing away the minutes, “Blackbird singing in the dead of night, take your broken wings and learn to fly, all your life, you were only waiting for this moment to arise.” Singing, until her own time came…We tried a sip of vodka in a last ditch effort to jumpstart the tiny heart, it did no good and the last little puppy, wrapped in a stark, white napkin, died. There were others that did not live long. I remember one we called Winnie from another litter and then of course, last year, our little Batman, seven-weeks-old, growing strong, then suddenly inexplicably gone.
It’s so easy to see the heartbreak, to be crushed by death’s uncompromising greed, but during my time at Pugdom, Joan’s house, where the birth and death of dogs is a regular occurrence, I have become intimate with the cycle of things. My heart has been tugged at, broken and mended with the waxing and waning of each small life. Once touched by these heartbeats I become part of their pulse. I weep at their passing, but I see the flowers. There are so many and though they shrivel and wilt, they bloom glorious for a time. Life is something to relish, however brief. It demands celebration and notice. No matter how fleeting it is incredibly strong; unapologetically real, unforgettable! It leaves a lasting song.
“…you were only waiting for this moment to arise…”
Releve's first puppy was born after 8:00 p.m. yesterday. Her second puppy shortly after 10 and her third, a big girl, arrived at 5:30 p.m. about an hour-and-a-half after I left Joan's. It was a long labor. I have been at Joan's when puppies came so quickly it was difficult to clear them from their sacs before the next arrived. This was all about waiting. Releve was stoic, getting up out of her box in Joan's kitchen to pace, but otherwise remaining almost silent -- no panting or moaning for her. The first puppy had bulging eyes and was so teeny and cold. Releve wouldn't feed it and we worried that perhaps she was rejecting it because she thought it was too weak and wouldn't live. The second puppy was a bit larger and perhaps stronger, although it took a lot of work on Joan's part to get it to breathe. I didn't want to leave Joan, but she convinced me it made little sense for both of us to lose sleep. After I left, the third baby, a big girl, arrived. Before leaving I held Releve while Joan coaxed the two puppies to eat.
It's 4:00 a.m. and I left Joan's house in Warren and two new little pug puppies in my wake an hour ago. It is a long night as the Mama still has more to birth. The two little ones are very tiny and Mama has not been up to feeding them, so Joan and I had to help out. First, giving sugar water and then holding Releve, the mother, still and forcing the pups to suckle. If another puppy doesn't materialize by early morning, Joan will meet the vet who has already been called. I have dubbed the first born girl Aria already because in spite of her small size, she has been singing her lungs off all night.
Rose with the sun today to show Alfie and Joan's pug, Lumpi. Both did us proud. I will share more about the experience tomorrow.
I visited Joan's house near Sugarbush Ski Area on Thursday. After days of rain, the sun was shining. I looked up and caught this beautiful dramatic sky. I actually like the juxtaposition of the telephone poles and wires with the natural world. A story is being told here, a drama unfolds.
I have a student who is an excellent writer, a true memoirist. She has a book in her if anyone does. In fact, she’s already written it. She’s worked on a manuscript for years and finally had one ready to go to an agent. Her life had not been easy and her memoir reflects this, but recently things took a turn. She experienced some pleasant surprises. She made some happy changes. And, suddenly she isn’t writing anymore. She is living, and she doesn’t seem at all inclined to revisit the painful experiences of the past. Her writing in many ways was cathartic for her, a healing process. But now, she doesn’t need to heal. She doesn’t need to analyze, reflect, put things in perspective, or even share. She is busy living. I encourage her – so much of her life was on hold for so very long – it is not a time to sit isolated at a desk, behind a computer. It is a time to laugh with a lover, to build a strong foundation, not a story structure.
There is a belief that writers have to write. They cannot help themselves. Writing for me has always been my way of sharing my perspective on the universe. From the time I was a little girl, I remember wanting to write. I have not, however, always felt compelled to do so. Some days I can take it or leave it. Does that make me less a writer? Maybe, but perhaps it makes me a better person. I put my pen and pad of paper down and tote a carload of seventeen-year-old boys to an action film. I drive my 92 year-old grandmother to the doctor. I witness my seventeen-month-old niece see her first dinosaur exhibit. Sometimes I pick the pen back up and share what I’ve learned from these experiences. Sometimes there isn’t time before the sun sets and rises and the day begins again.
There is another belief that to be a writer you need to be selfish – to guard and honor the work above all else. Good writing is honest writing, but in the end, I think, people are more important. And, so I tell my student not to worry, the book will happen or it won’t. Go live and embrace all that you find! Writing is a creative act. It gives birth to worlds and reinvents them, but it plays second fiddle to love. The Bible says, “In the beginning was the word…” but it also notes that in the end it is love that remains. Love may be revealed on the page, but it is discovered in relationships. Words have a life of their own, but they are not my life. I write to share what I think and feel and learn. I live so the words aren’t empty.
