SAINTS

i just watched clyde come trotting out of my bedroom with a large and now empty stainless steel cat food bowl in his mouth…i guess it is  a soccor bowl night again.

cole and maude who are so close to wild ranging wolves in so many ways, just about killed me when i popped into their area to say hello. i can pretty much withstand anything and stay on my feet except with two thrusting husky heads shoved between my knees…where are those wild and independent, “i don’t have to listen to you if i don’t want” dogs that i know and love? 

i almost lost my nose to mugsy who if he is going to continue to insist on jumping up to say hello, better learn to do it with his mouth closed…ouch, that hurt. i gave both he and cleo a raw hide knot thing and they are happily sharpening their teeth as we speak.

and sweet pea is stalking me…i am too tired to be stalked tonight.

i couldn’t eat it all. we had a nice visit and my daughter liked her gift. we talked about alot of stuff (my son and ex are watching the american presidential candidates closely) my daughters talked about their jobs and both of them are back at school now too (lindsey working on her masters at night and jenn is still working on her bachelors degree)…jenn just got a second  job at bc place and on her first shift a lady who had too much to drink bopped her in the head with a poster…hmm, not to happy someone is bopping my baby in the head when she is trying to work to help pay for school.

i told them about pete our new giant goat and they remembered wilbur and panda and bill and what great animals they were with me.

i almost ruined the very nice morning cuz i just had to cry once. they asked when i was going back to work in hospice and i told them i decided i just couldn’t do that any more with this ankle. (it is hard enough working an 8 hour fulltime homecare job and keeping on my feet for the stuff around here but there is no way i can go back to picking up extra 12 hour shifts running up halls plus do everything else that i do.) i told them it made me sad because i missed hospice care. my ex said… well it is kind of sad work anyway and wanted to know why i missed it so much…so i told them a story.

i had a young mid 40’s patient who was suddenly very sick and newly diagnosed. she had a young family like mine with new adults just starting out in their lives and their first big challenge was losing their mom and best friend. mom used to become really distressed with coughing spasms and the meds were not always really quick to give her relief. it distressed her family to see her struggling so and they were helpless to help her too. one night i showed the daughter an accupressure point to inhibit the cough reflex and taught her how to massage it to make the coughing go away. it worked. the daughter came to me on my next shift, she thanked me because that was the very first time she truly felt she could help her mom when she needed it most. and it is so very important for families to feel that they can contribute to their loved ones comfort and care. it takes away some of that helplessness and powerlessness that all of them feel so much.

and that is why i cried as i told that story because that is what i miss about hospice care, bedside nursing at it’s most basic and finest….to me that is the real core of nursing, it is the nuturing, and teaching and the empowerment of others that is such a big part of what nurses do. at the hospice level, it becomes absolutely raw and real and critical and i will always miss that part of what i used to do.

my daughter just looked at my tears and said…ok, where did that come from?…ha ha, sometimes i still surprize even them!…anyway quick shift back to politics and the happenings at saints, geez my hormones are right out of control this week.

i shouldn’t say “they”, when really it was clyde, even tho clyde slept like a baby. but for some reason they were all banging around and making weird noises that i couldn’t quite identify and i kept thinking it might be clyde having a seizure so i better check. i am tired, i didn’t get home from work til well past nine and they were alone for quite along time. they can make a very big mess when they are alone that takes even longer to put right once again. 2 more afternoon shifts to go and then 3 days off whahoo!

the garbage bin is overflowing again, didn’t i just do a dump run? it will have to wait til tomorrow cuz i am leaving here soon, i am having breakfast with my family to celebrate my daughters upcoming birthday so i am going into maple ridge early today. and since i will already be in town, i might actually get to work at noon on time too!

birthdays are special days and frankly i didn’t know what to get her. she is a teacher and her wages are decent and since she doesn’t dump all of her money into saints like i do, she actually has alot more money than me. hmmmm, i had to put my thinking cap on.

but i came up with the perfect gift. she told me a few weeks ago that she has been buying food for her classroom, she is a support teacher for grade eights. some kids are coming to school hungry because they just don’t have any food at home. this has bothered me ever since she told me, kids in this day and age should not be hungry.

so i bought her one of those plastic rolling carts with drawers and i stuffed it full of granola bars, breakfast bars, juice boxes, fruit cups, cheese and bread stix packs, oriental noodles in bowls, and individual kraft dinners to go. i put a pretty bow on top and i think that i got her the perfect gift cuz she loves those kids.

it is going to be a good morning today cuz i love my kids too and i get to have breakfast with them today.

pokey-goat phil lived 20 miles from civilization with his friend whose name is unknown. they belonged to the caretaker of a logging camp and lived there for many years. one day the caretaker left and a new caretaker took over. he was not a pokey-goat fan and so he never fed them. the goats managed to forage for food but pickings became slim and so did they. about a month ago, several shots were heard out in the bush and that night pokey-goat phil came home alone. apparently big tough guys like to go up there and shoot things, like abandoned, lonely, hungry and very trusting goats without names. someone a bit nicer knew what was happening up there and called animal control so sherry the AC officer drove all the way up to save a poor abandoned goat. she showed pokey-goat phil a bowlful of grain and he happily jumped right into the back of her truck. she drove him straight to gun free saints where unlimited grain and some very nice people awaited.

welcome home pokey-goat phil, we hope you will be very happy here.

pokey-goat phil is the stuff that legends are made of and now he is one of our saints.

Pokey…the goat – he’s huge, looks more like a goat crossed with a horse.
Carol can correct me if i’m wrong, but I believe he was a ’stray’ found up near alouette lake and they believe his mate was shot.
truthfully carol told me to put up a ‘name the goat’ contest, but i’m trying to sell the name Pokey. Carol thought of calling him polkadot, cause he has some, but you can’t go around saying ‘come here polka dot’ -  Pokey sounds much better.
but I’m guessing no one else will like my name for him, so feel free to offer other choices and, like normal, carol has the final say. Pokey pokey pokey

Here is Cleo and Mugsy:
they are both very very sweet and like lots of attention

Here is Packer (looking like he’s dead, but he’s really alive, just rests with his eyes open):
He’s like a Copper that you can try to hide food from (not always successful, but it’s a little easier with him being blind)

8 hours of sleep, that’s a first. i was up twice, once when mugsy started to howl (i thought he wanted outside to pee but he in fact wanted a beggin bacon strip and a cuddle) and once to let cylde off my bed and back into the kitchen when he was done being the warm and fuzzy good little son and needed to return to “i am mr aloof, and i am big enough to sleep alone”

i haven’t decided yet if 8 hours of sleep makes you feel more better than 5 or 6 hours but i will let you know.

anyway i was multi-tasking and did some problem solving in my sleep. i awoke to the answer to one of our problems absolutely crystal clear in my head. (it is amazing how your mind can do that when the rest of you is dead to the world)

…i have decided to move the sheep and carl back into the big barn, back into their center spot since that is where they want to be. percy and jeanette can have an even bigger area out there in the new barn and i can have a small area to store their hay, feed, shavings, a wheelbarrow and maybe even a couple of jugs of water too. that will be good for me (less stuff to haul around every day)…everyone wins which is what we all would like to have happen whenever we can, if we can happen to arrange it that way.

i hope after a good long sleep i feel more human and not like such a whiney toad today. i felt somewhat guilty yesterday complaining and dragging my ass around work when i should have returned to work all refreshed and raring to go…isn’t that what holidays are supposed to do for you? re-charge the ole batteries, and not to drain them out even more?…hmmm, i think i messed up that part of the expectations of the positive benefits of vacations. oh well, too late now, i will try to do it better next year if i can. 

the sheep won’t go into the barn. i don’t need to be dr doolittle to know what they are saying…hello??? we like the other barn better.

dexter is sleeping out on the patio on one of the raised beds, he is under the overhang but it is still freaking cold…i made him put on his fleecy raincoat. (he looks like a tubular glad bag!)

i am cold and wet and REALLY tired tonight (it is that gawd awful trick of nature double homonal thing…we are menopausal, oops no we are not.)

i am mike’ing some mac and cheese, having a beer and a really hot bath and going to bed to suffer in silence (if the animals will cooperate and be silent)

everyone seems well except the doornobs outside but the stall door is open for the sheep and the patio door is open for dexter if any of them think to change their minds.

when i first started out in organized rescue, one of the volunteers i worked closely with became my mentor. she taught me little of value except there is always a way to justify.

she dedicated herself to educate me about the “perks” in rescue, what she taught me is that the animals are never free of being exploited. she collected alot of donations for the animals and then picked thru what was “too good” for them but “good enough” for her. she bullied others and looked down on the losers from lofty heights. she pretended that she was rescue but she wasn’t, she was just someone who happened to like animals and used them to get somethings that she didn’t have.

over the years i have watched some astounding things like stuff going elsewhere than where it belongs. a store once accepted a $100 donation but never passed it back on to the rescue i was working at then. people have done independent fundraisers or set up donation cans and were never seen again. did they intend to commit fraud, did they even know they did…no. they had the very best of intentions but life got in the way, they got busy or they forgot, or they in a crises spent the money and intented to pay it back. but somehow it just got less important and they never actually got around to that part.

i have seen people donating their time and effort and really expending alot of that too but really they were looking for something. like a sense of value, or a sense of purpose or a sense of importance, or belonging, or whatever. and those things can freely come to you in rescue if you are here for all of the right reasons. but if you try to take them because you are entitled then it becomes a theft like any other.

when you take something that doesn’t belong to you and wasn’t about you then you are taking something that wasn’t yours. and sometimes when you take what wasn’t given, you can even steal the peace of others. i see this in other shelters where personalities and conflicts create strife and strife steals the focus away from where it belongs…how sad is that when we steal from our animals that all of us love simply because we don’t know why we are really there?

we have such a great group of people here. i have to say for the first time in my entire career in rescue, there is not a single taker here. i was watching tammy and eva yesterday with everyone here…and i saw how much they give and how much they recieve in return…it was a good trade. and i was thinking of all the others who come…and i am not even going to start listing names…cuz the story is the same in every single person…they come here to give to the animals of saints and they receive some special gifts in return. and that is a gift to me too.

i think we all need to be very careful to watch what and why and how we do what we do, because we could easily be here for all of the wrong reasons, which would be because there are perks in rescue if you insist on taking, like free stuff, or free emotional fulfillment like importance or power or belonging to something so good. but that stuff just isn’t real.

the real stuff you can’t even see, but others can when they look at you. they will see the goodness and the light growing inside you of which you are unaware. i see it, i see it every single day when someone walks thru our gates and this is another good thing among many…it makes me feel all warm inside for free and all i have to do is open my eyes and that perk just rushes right in of it’s own accord. 

i run things thru my head…

enough feed, shavings and hay for the barn til my next days off?…check.

enough meds for everyone including spritely? check i got the quatrisol today, and eva picked up the phenobarb for clyde and baytril for clover and everyone elses meds are fine. medically everyone is stable so unless something changes we should be ok without vet calls.

enough canned food for the dogs and cats and litter box pellets? check.

are the vet bills under control?…ok well we will just skip that for now.

greg has the paint for the felv room so that will keep him busy and stocked for the next couple of days.

kathy brought bleach, i got new mops and we have enough paper towels and garbage bags. the dumpster is empty, the rabbits have food…hmmm, so i think we are ok for the 5 days.

i can’t remember if i told you, but saints hired trina as our regular part time replacement for me when i am at work, she takes care of the cats and dogs. she checked in tonight about who is new and what they need and who is still on antibiotics and who is done. good for her to be proactive and prepared for her upcoming shifts!

so i think i am ready to go back to work but i really wish i just had one more day.

mugsy and cloe had their first solo field run. tammy and eva forgot i was out with them and came out with phebes…it went ok.

but boy were those dogs happy for a run in the fields, they really enjoyed it and you could tell.

jeanette wouldn’t go into the barn last night, i think maybe carl is spitting at her over the fence. she didn’t want to go in tonight either and i patiently waited for like 20 freaking minutes while she stuck her head in the door and gave it a thought. i finally slipped past her and stood in front of carl and then she came in and went over to the other side. bad llama. and a couple of ellie’s teats have little hickey type bruises around them and why do i think that she was letting carl nibble where he doesn’t belong?  (she loves belly rubs)i told her to not let him do that anymore.

and speaking of bad animals…i told ellie today that she was a VERY BAD PIG! she was helping me clean the new barn out and as soon as we were done, she picked up a full bucket of water and reefed it around the stall. i bought her one of those giant purple exercise balls at the thrift store today and greg inflated it for her. i hope she likes it but probably shouldn’t buy her toys on the days that she is bad but i did anyway so there you go.

AND!!!! while i was in there, i was looking for a couple of comfy small chairs for the new cat room and guess what i found real cheap???

an old fashioned red upholstered rocker and a very cute and small fuzzy red couch. these cats are coming up from the states (their origin is colorado i think,  via BF in utah…they are part of the 650 cats rescued from a rescue group gone very bad and by the sounds of it, came right out of hell)….anyway a few years ago i worked at BF and was paid on a 2 week trial, then they offered me a job, which i turned down cuz i had stuff that needed doing up here, i always felt guilty for getting paid for that 2 weeks so here is my chance to pay them back by helping some of these cats….these cats have had a very tough time of it and i want them to like their life here in canada as much as i do… i am decorating their new home in the good ole red, white and blue because it is fun and fun is good. i still want to find an old fashioned picture or poster of an old american flag to finish the room off and make it look like home.

humming now…”i’m a yankee doodle dandy, yankee doodle do or die….” now that was a great movie!

ok, enough decorating cat rooms in my head, i got meds to do.

 

sigh, i have done it again…i am everyone’s best friend. packer wants me, cleo wants me and even mugsy wants me (and he is sooo freaking cute!) i make them all want me, i am good at it and i have alot of experience at getting animals to love me. i do it for a couple of reasons…

A. dogs have to love someone and be loved by someone in order to be happy.

B. dogs have to love me in order to respect me and do (or stop doing) whatever i say…and this is critical for controlling the masses around here.

C. on a personal note….i happen to like to be loved and i like loving in return.

but there is a downside to being successful at this…love means feeling the burdens of responsibilty. it means knowing and hurting when they want and i don’t provide…like, now there are three more dogs who want me to hang out with them all the time, and geez guys i can’t…i have to spread myself around. and difficult and unneutered or blind little dogs who can’t safely go everywhere i go just means there are more places i have to be.

sometimes it sucks to be wanted even tho it has to be.