Mutant Dog Toys

This morning, the dogs left a pile of toys at the doggie door. Daisy is the one who snatches a toy from Mia's mouth and then runs like the wind, bouncing out the doggie door, to hide the toy in the shrubbery. I'm not sure which of the girls brought the stash to the door this morning, but I've been mending them for about an hour now.

When I see a pile of fluffy toy filling scattered across the living room carpet, I know it's time to put together what remains of another toy. There is no use in spending more money to buy new toys as the dogs can chew them to pieces faster than I can replace them. I've sewn shut the holes where arms/legs used to be, attached rear ends to heads without the missing body, and held Swiss cheese toys together with masking tape. Some toys that began at a foot long are now mere inches, being whittled away as part of the daily play.

I still have a few new toys stashed in the cupboard, which I'll pull out when I can no longer salvage the current crop of chew toys. Meanwhile, I kinda enjoy the display of mutant dog toys!

Beauty Shop Drop-Out

It is my experience that I can usually get one good haircut from a cosmetologist, but seldom two in a row. Since donating my waist-length hair to Locks of Love, I've been looking for my "regular" hairdresser, the one who can actually cut my hair into a style I like, want, and will keep. I've grown it back to collar length, but the last haircut resulted in those darned "layers" in the back and big puffs on top of my ears. I want to keep the length, but restyle the cut so it lays smoother and has some movement.

Friday, I tried another new gal, driving all the way back up the hill on my day off for the consultation and the cut. I chose her because I've seen some of her clients, all of whom have beautifully sculpted hair that flows together and always looks great.

"Tell me what you want in a hairstyle," she encouraged.

"I don't like short hair, or a bob, or that new style where the back is really short and the front still needs to be cut. I hate layers, that look of rows across the back of my head. What I think looks really good is the way men's hair always blends together, seamlessly, into a cut that can be riffled with fingers and still look good. I'm really comfortable with my length, about to my collar, and want to keep the length, but don't like the way the front is much shorter than the back."

She pointed to her colleague in the next booth, turned her around, and said, "See the way the bottom of her hair is shaped? That's what you are looking for, right?" I agreed, especially since that woman's hair was about the length of my hair, and she didn't have obvious layers, just some shaping at the bottom so the hair flows together.

When I recalled Dorothy Hammill and explained that I've always loved the way her hair flows together in pictures of her from back in the day, she said, "Oh, but you don't want your hair as short as Dorothy Hammill wore hers!" I knew I had picked the right person to shape my hair into a style I will like, wear, and keep.

The huge smile accompanied her confirmation: "I know just what to do. Let's get started."

An hour later, after stopping the process a couple of times to express concern about the direction my hair was going, I realized that she's a key word person: short hair, like a man's cut, that only requires finger-fixing. Lost in translation were the other key words: collar length. Because I had mentioned that my current cut was much shorter over the ears than it was in the back, she took the word "ear" as her hair length. The end result is that I have everything in a haircut that I really hate, except there are no layering lines across the back! I'm not sure if that's the good news or the bad news because there isn't enough hair to cut into layers.

Whatever happened to the confirmation that I did NOT want my hair cut as short as Dorothy Hammill's famous wedge, I'll never know. Believe me, I'd love to have hair as long as her hair was back then, but that's going to take a while.

After I donated my hair, I knew that I would have to wear really short hair for a while, but went with the "it'll grow back" philosophy. It did -- and it will again.

Taking a Knee

Last Thanksgiving, as I was working on the upgrades to my home, I knelt to pick something off the floor of the bedroom closet. My knee contacted the metal door track, made a noise like a gunshot, and felt for several days as if I had hit my funny bone, not in my elbow, but in my knee. However, the pain was not funny, but persistent.

In January (do you KNOW how hard it is to see a doc during the holidays?), I saw a knee specialist at the world-renowned ortho center. It was pouring rain, the office was 2 hours behind on appointments, and I heard the conversation outside the exam room re: let's clear these patients out so we all can go home. When a doctor wants to run on time -- or ram patients through the exam process -- it's done. With his focus on the x-rays, not on me, he explained that there is nothing wrong with my knee. When I objected to that conclusion, he asked me what I had been doing since the accident. I told him icing it, heating it, elevating it -- and hurting like hell.

"Well," he told me, "continue what you are doing. If it's not better in 4-6 weeks, make another appointment." I assured him that was not going to happen and left.

It has not improved, only worsened, including constant throbbing pain and continuing loss of motion. My knee cap feels like it's sitting on jelly and the back of my leg is numb from the kneecap up my thigh. I am crabby, crabby, crabby because I'm in constant pain and not sleeping well either.

After calling my family physician several times, only to be put on hold for a full 10 minutes, hanging up, calling again and repeating that cycle randomly over the course of 4 days, I finally was able to make an appointment for this past Wed. After a physical exam, the PA told me that my knee is hot, swollen, and loose, which means an MRI is in order. I had that Thursday and received the results Friday: a torn meniscus that requires surgery to repair. I have the contact info for the recommended knee specialist, but his office closes at 4:00 on Friday so the office staff can complete administrative duties.

There is a window opening this Friday that allows me 10 days to have the surgery and get back on my feet. I'm going to call the knee guy Monday and see if we can make this happen.

The I-10 Speedway

Accidents are a daily occurrence on the I-10 freeway through the Coachella Valley, racking up an alarming annual fatality rate. Another tangle with an 18-wheeler at a merging on-ramp involving 3 vehicles was received with dismay by most of the bloggers today, who commented on both the frequency and the severity of the accidents. As good, concerned citizens, they also included the warning to drivers to be vigilant behind the wheel and heed the posted speed limit of 70 mph.

Amazingly, another driver took a different approach, chastising all the old people driving the posted speed limit and creating road hazards for those who don't hold their speed to 70 mph. As the blogger put it, "The road was built for speeds up to 100 mph, so if you aren't willing to drive the freeway the way it's meant to be driven, get the hell off the road."

The thought occurred to me that perhaps the I-10 was designed for speeds up to 100 mph, but not so the human body.

Make New Friends, but Keep the Old

Tucked into the little private places of my heart are dear friends, people I’ve known for either a really long time or people who have become special in a short while. Although I often worked with co-workers, I more often worked with friends, those who came into my life through our mutual employment but remain there because they fill one of the little spaces.

When I close my eyes, I can still smell the delicious odor of lentil soup that greeted me when I opened the door to the Career Center, where I worked with a woman who, to this day, is my friend. She is German in her heart, a proud, strong woman who shared more than one career with me. I first met her when we both wrote for the local newspaper, she as a full-time staffer and I as a sometimes stringer. I was drawn not just to her friendliness, but to her self-assuredness, a person who knew what had to be done and then did it, a Nike role model long before that brand made the slogan “just do it” popular.

We next crossed paths in the Career Center, where I supervised the Work Experience Education program and she commanded the Career Center tech desk. We recognized each other at once and forged a friendship that endures today, although our paths have crossed less frequently over the years. The lentil soup was an employment perk, a treat she made for her son’s German class (back in the day, most high schools offered instruction in several languages, including German, French and Latin, as well as Spanish). My stomach growled and she relented: I savored the first serving of the soup, rich in spices and floating bits of ham. Seldom have I enjoyed a bowl of soup more than I did that one, and I’ve never had a bowl of soup as delicious.

Together, we planned a Career Day the likes of which we both doubt anyone has seen since. Because we both are hard workers and know how to get the job done, we invited 125 different presenters to the campus, as well as a dozen different interactive displays, including a helicopter, military equipment and personnel, law enforcement, the medical profession, a ferrier, musicians, and beauticians who gave free haircuts! It was a festival of opportunity for students to sample potential careers, an event of which both of us were proud, but which degenerated within a week to those cutting remarks about how “your Career Day” took away from those teachers’ instructional time. They refused to acknowledge that the event gave students a pathway from their classroom to their futures, a lack that astounded both of us.

We both lost a piece of ourselves as the naysayers picked away at our accomplishment, rather than sharing the experience with us. Neither of us could figure out why so many of our colleagues were so petty, but we finally accepted that it was their issue, not ours, and moved on. I applied for an opening at another school site and left the lack of gratitude where it belonged, while my friend worked for another few years and then retired.

Her life has been filled with extreme joy and devastating sadness, including the sudden death of her beloved husband a few days before their youngest son’s wedding. Of course, I attended the wedding, and it was beautiful, but when I talked with my friend about the day a couple of years later, she confessed that she remembers little, if anything, of that time. She knew that the family had to conduct the wedding, that her deceased husband would have wanted that to be their decision, but her heart was over-flowing with sadness that her beloved husband was not there to share it with them.

When I returned to CA after a brief absence, I called my friend and visited with her, but as it always does, time has a way of passing before our minds come back to that place. Last night, one of my students asked me if I knew a woman, gave her name, and my face lit up. Of course, I told her, we worked together … and so much more. My student told me that my friend misses me, so I called her this morning. Her obvious joy at hearing my voice reminds me how much she has meant to me over the years, and when she admitted that she recently celebrated her 90th birthday, I was momentarily stunned. To me, she is still the vibrant, slightly older woman with whom I shared parts of my life! She is sharp as a tack, recognizing my voice before I revealed my identity, and recalling exact details from our shared experiences. How can she be 90??

I’m picking her up next week for lunch at one of the old inns in the desert. We’ll share some stories, catch up on one another’s lives, and enjoy each other’s company again, although probably not a bowl of lentil soup. I can’t wait!