Archive for March, 2005
« Previous Entries Monday, March 28th, 2005A Visit from the Cousins
Argus had a difficult weekend. His cousins came for a visit, and the youngest one (a fluffy mix of golden retriever and chow) has a bark that can break glass and an annoying way of standing directly in front of Argus’ face when he does it. Argus gathered up his toys and fled to a far corner of the yard, leaving Caribou to entertain and discipline Buster.
Argus worries about his toys, especially his towel, when the cousins come. The oldest cousin pays little mind to dog toys, but Buster is devoted to destroying them with his razor sharp juvenile teeth. And Buster knows where they are kept; piled high in a basket inside the house. So Argus lay in the corner of the yard, with the outside toys protected beneath his paws, and worried about the frisbee, and the turtle, and the rope, and his beloved towel; all laying unprotected inside the house.
It was some time before we noticed the worry in our boy’s eyes.
“He’s shaking,” Kip said.
We brought him inside where he gathered up his belongings and parked himself next to my leg, trembling. When hours later the cousins left, Argus laid his head on his towel, gave a long sigh and fell into a deep sleep.
Clarissa Rides a Horse
Clarissa is one of many disabled adults and children who participate in horseback riding at Triple Creek Ranch Inc. in Redding, California. Here she rides Mama.
For more information about the riding program, read: The Magic of Horses published at The Piker Press
Life or Death
Yesterday a judge’s order played out in the case of Terri Shindler Schiavo. Staff at the nursing home where she lives removed her fooding tube. She will starve to death unless her family’s efforts to reverse the decision are successful. The story is disturbing (her husband has been pressing to allow Terri to die ever since she suffered brain damage many years ago). Terri did not have a written living will. She is not in a coma, but she is disabled and unable to advocate for herself.
I work with disabled aduts and children in my job as a physical therapist. Many need feeding tubes because of difficulties with swallowing. My clients interact with their caregivers families, they make friends, some hold down jobs, they go to the mall, they smile, they cry, they live like any one of us do. Would anyone ever suggest that we remove their feeding tubes and let them starve? The thought of that sickens me. How is Terri Shiavo any different?
Disabled individuals face tremendous bias and discrimination in our society. When someone can’t walk or talk or swallow normally, they depend on the grace of society.
The removal of a person’s feeding tube when they are awake, alert, and interactive is a slippery slope that we must not go down. Who decides on someone’s quality of life? Who decides who deserves medical treatment and who doesn’t?
Dillon and Me
Dillon is one of several horses whose job it is to help disabled children and adults…
Thursday, March 17th, 2005The Art of Riding a Horse
Horses are not dogs. This may seem obvious to most people, but it has taken me a bit of time to learn this simple fact. Most of my adult life has been spent around dogs: owning them, training them, working with them. A dog responds best to positive reinforcement, a look in the eye, and lots of love. I learned early on to get my dog’s attention, get her to focus on me, and then ask her what I wanted from her. I usually talk in complete sentences to my dog. She will often do things for me just because she loves me and wants to please me. A dog is happiest when they know they are pleasing their person.
Not so with horses. Horses need to know who is boss; they need to respect you; and even if they outweigh you by several hundred pounds, they need to think that you can make them do what you want them to do. They don’t usually respond to make their handler happy; they respond because they think they have no other choice.
So, when I joined up as the physical therapist for a therapeutic riding center, I needed to learn all about horses. I needed to learn to ride.
One of my first days at the ranch, I gently leaned into Sage’s shoulder and nicely asked, “Lift your foot, Sage.” So I could pick his hoof. He stood like a rock. He did not move an inch. “Something’s wrong with him,” I said.
Carla stepped over, pushed Sage firmly to one side and up came his foot. “Respect,” she said. “He needs to respect you.” It was my first lesson, but not my last.
Last night, high up on Dillon’s back, I tried to get him to walk around the arena. I wanted him to stay close to the fencing; I wanted him to change directions smoothly. He wanted to leave; go out the gate; and get his dinner. I wrestled with him. He tossed his head. He chomped on his bit. He pulled one way, while I pleaded with him to go the other way.
“Be tough,” Carla said.
“He outweighs me,” I told her.
“Be tough,” Carla said again.
“I don’t want to hurt his mouth,” I said.
“Be tough.”
I sat tall, kept my heels down, turned his head and dug my heel into his flank. I walked him in a tight circle. I didn’t let him stop at the gate. Within 15 minutes sweat soaked my shirt even though the outside temperature was cool. Pushing around a thousand pound animal is no easy task. But eventually, Dillon started to listen to me.
After the riding session, I led Dillon over to a tie out to take off his tack. I leaned against his soft neck, breathed in his horsey perfume and kissed the side of his face. And his eyes slid partly closed; he sighed.
Horses are not dogs, I reminded myself. But for a moment I thought: Maybe next time Dillon will do what I want because he loves me.
Sunday, March 13th, 2005Lending a Paw
One of my first pets was a gray guinea pig. My parents bought him for me for one of my birthdays (I can’t remember now exactly which birthday it was). My mother took me to the local pet shop and instructed me to, “Pick out one you like.” The huge aquarium that housed dozens of guinea pigs had been propped up on a stand, just at eye level for a young girl. I stood in front of the glass and watched the little rodents snuffle in their cedar chips and chew their pellets. One guinea pig stood out. First he was gray while all the rest where white; secondly he had half his fur missing and an ugly sore on one side.
I pointed. “I want him,” I said.
My mother sighed. “Pick a healthy one.”
“Please?” I looked up at her. “He needs me. I want him.”
I named him Gilbert and nursed him back to health. He lived a a happy, healthy life with me. Later my sister brought home a white guinea pig named Prunella and we had a litter of four little baby guinea pigs (after a wedding, of course).
I still rescue animals like the little dog that appeared on my doorstep at nine o’clock at night, dripping wet and scared. Kip and I had just settled onto the couch to watch TV. Outside the last of the thunder storm could be heard rumbling in the mountains. Rain dripped from the roof.
Tap, Tap.
I turned down the volume on the TV.
Tap, Tap.
“What’s that?” I said, rising from the couch and peering out the window.
The blond colored dog sat in front of our door, his paw raised to tap again.
Of course, we took him in for the night. He curled up in a dog crate (that Kip dragged down from the garage rafters) and slept as though he had lived in our house his whole life. I found his owner the next day who explained that his dog was terrified of thunder and had escaped to run away into the night.
“It’s okay,” I said. “He found the right place.”
Raising a Search and Rescue Dog
I stood outside my front door and listened to frenzied yips coming from inside the house. The noise had continued for more than a half hour and it was all I could do not to rush inside and rescue my new puppy. I knew I was being absurd. This was not the first puppy in the world to have separation anxiety and hate being in a crate. I had raised a few puppies before I got this one, however, and she was the first to carry on for such a prolonged period of time. Suddenly the yipping stopped. Quiet fell over the neighborhood. I held my breath and waited. I decided to wait a full ten minutes before going inside and praising her for settling down. The minutes dragged by and everything remained silent. I pushed open my front door, a smile twitching across my face and the words “Good girl,” on my lips. The words died before I could utter them. Inside the crate, my eight week old German Shepherd puppy sat surrounded by shredded cloth. The queen sized blanket I had draped over the crate (just like the puppy training book recommended) was now inside the crate. Soft fragments of cloth surrounded my puppy. Only her dark eyes and huge ears could be seen.
I should have known at that instant what my life would be like living with a Search and Rescue dog. I chose Caribou, my first certified canine partner, for her drive. It is the most important attribute a search and rescue dog can possess. Drive in a dog is equivalent to a Type A personality in a human. Nothing deters a driven dog from its goal. Specifically, driven dogs are ball crazy or highly motivated by prey. Search dogs must possess drive to “get the job done.” Their sole motivation is to complete the game and get the reward…in most cases, their favorite toy. A good search dog will work for hours in difficult terrain and challenging conditions. They don’t want to take rest breaks and will work to the point of exhaustion unless monitored by their handlers. And so, when I decided to pursue a ten year dream of working a search and rescue dog, I went out to find a puppy with high drive. I looked at a lot of puppies over the course of several months before finding Caribou. She was the runt in a litter of three and the only female. From the moment I set eyes on her I knew she was the partner for me. Her bright eyes never left my face. She charged after a squeak toy I threw, pounced on it, killed it with a quick shake of her head, and returned it to me without hesitation. She was a big dog in a puppy’s body with no lack of confidence. I plopped down $200 and took her home that day. Her dislike of the crate was only the first of many challenges. She had no off switch. When I tried to restrict her activity or teach her self-control, she treated me like I was just another dog to be dominated. After a week of no sleep, I gave up trying to get her to spend the night in the crate. She slept in bed with me from that day on, under the covers, her soft head draped across my chest. I fell in love with her despite her stubborn, the “hell with you” attitude.
Intensity
Caribou…waiting for the “Go Search” command; a search dog in training.
Wednesday, March 9th, 2005The Early Years
Caribou was still an adolescent here, in the early years of her training as a Search and Rescue dog.
Wednesday, March 9th, 2005Bread Making
I used to think I would bake fresh bread from scratch; kneading the elastic dough with flour covered hands; letting it rise only to punch it down again; shaping the dough into a monstrous loaf that would yeild a thick, crispy crust. I imagined I had time for this kind of thing. I romanticized the process, bought heavy books about the different types of bread, and dreamed of owning a huge, commercial oven that could bake three loaves at the same time. Of course, I never did any of this.
So you can imagine my delight when I received a bread machine as a wedding gift nearly two years ago. Now perhaps I could bake bread; maybe not the old fashioned way; but it would be warm and fresh and made from scratch nonetheless.
My first attempt was disappointing. I used the little pamphlet that came with the machine; I neglected to correct for baking at elevation; I used all purpose flour rather than bread flour. The result was a dense, hard loaf that was dry and unappealing. I tossed the whole thing into the garbage.
I decided I needed better instructions. I purchased a cookbook made especially for bread machines and have never looked back since. Beth Hensperger (who has written other large tomes on bread making) has written a fabulous cookbook called The Bread Lover’s Bread Machine Cookbook. She explains succinctly how to adjust ingredients for elevation; she talks about different kinds of yeast, and flour. She has created a fool proof instruction manual for making bread in a bread machine. The best part of her book is the vast choices she offers. The book is divided into sections such as: Tradtional Loaves, Earth’s Bounty, Sweet Loaves and Express Lane Bread. She provides a brief description of each type of bread and gives instructions for both 1-1/2 pound loaves and 2 pound loaves. I have yet to make a loaf that has not come out perfectly.
So now, when the mood strikes me, I can spend fifteen minutes dumping ingredients into my bread machine, flick a switch and in just over 3 hours a loaf of bread appears. It is the perfect solution for someone who has no time to bake bread, but longs to do so anyway.
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