Bucket List- Welcoming new neighbors to the 'hood

Have to share a quick story that happened yesterday with Shelby, because it might be one of my favorite stories that has happened to date with her. 

I got home from the barn yesterday afternoon (and it was a gorgeous day, can't wait to get back out today) and realized that we had new neighbors moving into the house that recently sold, two doors down. I did the quick conversation in my head "should I go down and introduce myself or wait" and of course I did the right thing and just ran into the house and hid, oh wait, that is what I did earlier in the day when I saw some religious folk knocking on doors in the neighborhood. Of course I made the decision to go down there and say hello. In true form of my dogs, one an introvert, one an extrovert, Balco hid behind a tree and just watched, Shelby just pranced along with me as we walked down the street. 

Naturally, they loved her, she invited herself into the house to check it out on her own and went up and met the army of people moving my new neighbor in, Karen. Great lady who has moved into the neighborhood to be closer to her family, even better lady because she offered me a beer. While Karen and I chitchatted it up, I couldn't help but watch Shelby work the crowd out of the corner of my eye and realize that she truly doesn't ever meet a stranger, and I haven't met one person to date, that couldn't help but just fall in love. 

And then it happened, one of the kids couldn't help put pick up a stick and throw it for her, you would have thought the dog had won the lottery....another sucker she has in her back pocket to throw something for her to retrieve....

..Now I have to stop the story for a minute and explain something. As most of you know, Shelby has an addiction to tennis balls, she has never met one she didn't like. As I type now, and is laying next to me, she is accompanied by about three of them. Tennis balls are her crack. I discovered that something was wrong with Shelby (cancer) because when we would be playing fetch in the yard, she would pass out. It's not fun to watch or go through, and it really does scare her. So her fetch time is limited right now (as in almost never) because anytime she has a tennis ball in her mouth, it inhibits her to get big breaths of air, causing her to collapse because she has an enormous flippin tumor growing inside of her lung,  Trying to limit Shelby to tennis ball time, is very difficult, let me tell you. But most of the time she is just content chewing on one, as apposed to chasing it. I think she also knows that chasing the magical fuzzy ball, also leads to issues she would rather not go through. Back to the story....

So the stick fetching went on for about three tosses, Shelby was clearly less than impressed this little kid didn't have the ability to toss that stick as far as she wanted, and after the forth toss, Shelby went home. It was the first time I have ever seen Shelby leave a social situation, she is usually the last one to leave, I was a totally thrown off-guard. (By the way, in the event you are wondering where Balco is, he has now inched his way a few feet closer to the neighbors, and has found another bush to hide behind...still watching, but not ready to make the move to socialize with these new people)

Just about the time when I'm thinking it was time for these people to get back to work, it happened, what will be one of my favorite Shelby memories. I wish I could have captured the look and excitement on my dogs face, when she came back to "the party" but this time she had a bright yellow fuzzy piece of crack in her mouth. She didn't go home because she was bored, she went home to grab a tennis ball so this kid could toss it for her. In those moments, she was so proud of herself, and my heart just melted a bit inside. 

I let them toss the ball for her, knowing that today wasn't going to be one of "those" days. She couldn't pass out, she just had to welcome the new neighbors to the neighborhood the best way she knew how.  Welcoming the neighbors to the 'hood with tennis balls- one item on the bucked list, complete. 

Hi, My Name is Lauren, and my dog is dying....

So here is the thing, the last few weeks have been emotionally draining on me. I've switched jobs and stepped out of my comfort zone, I've lost my husband to baseball and my dog that has been by my side for almost 13 years has been diagnosed with Frickin lung cancer, and there is nothing I can do about it.

I've tried to do a blog that has explained this whole experience and I just can't finish it to post. I've come back and forth a few times trying to put in words just what this whole process is like, and I can't. All I want to do is scream a bunch of four letter words from the top of my lungs to just get the anger, sadness and emotions I have right now to just escape me, but I can't.

I've tried to keep a good attitude about this, but at the end of the day, I'm losing my dog, who can keep a good attitude about that? Nick and I did the right thing in deciding to let her LIVE her life the way she wants. We aren't doing any complicated surgeries and loading her up with copious amounts of medications just to bring her down mentally and physically. We've put it in her hands to decide her time, and my God, I know she will fight until she doesn't have it in her anymore to do so.

Shelby is doing a really good job of letting us think she isn't sick. She knows it, she tells me everyday in her special little ways that her time is coming to an end. She checks on me every night in bed by licking my face, she lays with me or is by me every second that I'm with her. It doesn't matter what I'm doing. Cooking, cleaning, drinking wine, sorting socks, going to the bathroom, brushing my teeth, watching TV...she is right there. She has always "been by my side" but she has put a brand new meaning to it recently. She also has no rules...you want steak for dinner tonight, yup you got it. Want to get on furniture...hop on up. All she has to do is look at me with those sweet brown eyes, wag that tail and I just melt. I don't know how much longer I have with her, so I have to give her everything she wants.

We are putting together a bucket list for her (or me to cope) so I'm asking all of my friends who know this sweet dog, to think about what Shelby would want to do in the next few months that would make her appreciate what this life has to offer. I'd like to think I've given her a pretty damn good life, so anything I can do to make it better...I have to try.

And lastly I just have to say Eff You Cancer, I hate you, I hate you SOOOO much....I am literally and figuratively giving you the biggest middle finger that I can. Screw you and every cell that you produce that kills the things that we love. Go To HELL

Why do bad people happen to good dogs?

....I found this unposted blog from what I think is about summer of 2011, I somewhat picked up where I left off

I started this blog about a year ago, and for some reason thought I would have a ton of time on my hands to write about my experiences with dogs. Obviously this is not the case, late August is when my time is filled with late nights and early mornings getting ready for another obsession in my life, football. Being in sports marketing is a great job, and the end result is an incredible rush of satisfaction each Saturday when toe meets leather here in the south. Crazy enough, my obsession with football and my job does play into this story I'm about to tell, because it almost didn't come to be.
Nick and I had just adopted out Tucker (foster #11) on a Thursday, and we both had a conversation about how Tucker would be the last foster I would have for a while. Once football season starts, I'm never home. I work six to seven days a week and 12 hour days, the burden of a sometimes crazy foster would be all on my husband, and that's just not fair. It was Sunday afternoon and I got a text from the adoption coordinator about a dog in South GA that was in a shelter and very bad off, she sent me a picture and I just couldn't say NO. Fast forward a few hours and Junior entered our world. We called him Junior because he looks like Balco in the face, he's a flashy fawn with a flashy personality and the name just came to me.
Junior is a fantastic dog, and won our hearts over immediately with his classic boxer wiggle, smooshy face and the ability to just make you laugh. I believe it was day two of having Junior that Nick said to me, "this dog is cool, I would keep him" and it was day three that he said "it sucks that bad people happen to good dogs, because Junior is an awesome dog" and from that statement on, I've been thinking about those words ever since.
It's a pretty powerful statement, because being that we're a foster home for these incredible animals, it is so true. We've been blessed in the almost two years to have Mack, Elliot, Wilson, Buster, Ozzy, Onxy, Tonka, Cash, Oprah, Frank, Tucker and Junior to come through our house for us to find forever homes for. Each with their own stories and own set of problems and are all very unique, except for one thing: Someone gave up on them. People suck, there is no doubt about it

....So fast forward, again, this time about three years, and we haven't had a foster since. After Junior we brought in Trooper, who just about broke my heart in every different way. Again, a dog I simply thought I would keep, until just the right family came along and allowed him to live a fabulous life. It wasn't until Ripken, one of the prettiest boxers we had, brought me to my tipping point. I know there was a good dog in there, but at the time, I was complexity worn out and exhausted with life, and we had to pass him along to another foster home. I couldn't handle his anxiety, his inability to get along with my dogs and the constant uneasy feeling he (and I) had. I had given up on him and it crushed me, but at the same time, it stood for a few things I had given up for me. I was in a strange place and needed some saving of my own.

Little did I know, a few months later, someone would rescue me. A tall, dark, handsome, and incredibly fat and out of shape....horse. Yes, you read that right, in a swing of what must have been karma repaying my husband and I for all the right things we had done in life, Jackson found me.

Shelby

Where do I begin with Shelby. Shelby in more than one way has saved me through the years, and ultimately the reason that I found the love of my life. As I sit here and write about her she lays by my side, where she has always been since day one.
I got a call from one of my college friends in Auburn one day to tell me that her boyfriend's dog had just had puppies. Knowing I was a sucker for puppies (yellow labs at that) and knowing that one of the puppies was unclaimed, I think she knew what she was doing. I went to see the litter as soon as I could, with a beer in one hand and a puppy in the other, I made my decision in that trailer park that night that this puppy was going to be mine. That's right, you read that right, I said trailer park. In Auburn, it's just another place to live, much like an apartment or a house, trailer parks are everywhere and I'm proud to be a momma to a trailer park dog, and really, it's the greatest story I can tell of my Shelby girl. Unexpected and totally my style.
I have no idea where I found $200 to pay for my new puppy, I hadn't done a lick of research on vets in Auburn, didn't have food for her or even a bowl to put water in. When I went to pick Shelby up on the night she was ready, she wouldn't come out from behind the sofa, we literally had to MOVE the sofa so I could pick her up and take her  home. I put her in the passenger seat of my car, and off we went, it was the beginning of something special!
There hasn't been a day that I wish I didn't have a dog, in fact, once I got Shelby, I think my life got a bit better. I had something other than myself to look after, and for a few years in college I forgot how to even look after me. It's almost like Shelby was an angel, not like a guardian angel or anything, but I really think she and I found each other for a reason. She made me grow up in a way, made me learn how to be responsible. I had to get home at night and up in the morning, life was about me and my dog, and I didn't want it any other way.
You just look at her and you can't help but laugh, where there is a white mask around her face now that shows her age, used to be a dark gold one that looked like she stuck her head in the mud one day and it just stained her face. She isn't your typical lab, she is tall and lean with a long nose and funny ears, but personality wise, she is all lab. She is obsessive with retrieving anything and jumping in any water that is laying around. She'll eat anything you put in front of her and sheds so bad I have mini tumbleweeds of Shelby hair all along my baseboards.
Most of my stories will be about Shelby and I, it's been a great nine years together and she has taught me a lot. As I write more and more about the lessons that my dogs have taught me, there is no doubt in my mind that you will fall in love with this yellow dog as much as I have. She is a special dog, and holds a special place in my heart and always will.

How It Started

I'm not sure exactly how my obsession with dogs started, I know I've always loved animals. While my friends growing up had imaginary friends, I had an imaginary dog, named Dog, that lived in my parents dirty clothes hamper. And while my friends had real dogs named Whopper, Shotzie and Joy, I had stuffed dogs named Fritz, Lucky, Puppy and Pongo. I was always jealous that my friends had dogs, never understood why parents didn't want me to have one. I had to settle with being the neighborhood dog sitter until I was about 10 or 11 years old.

I remember the day like it was last weekend. My mom had gone out of town on a business trip and my dad loaded my little sister, Susan, and I into the Suburban to take a ride. We pulled up to Dr. Stonesifer's house, I had been there before, had no idea why we were there that day. We walked up to the back of the house and there they were, the most beautiful litter of Yellow Lab puppies my eyes had ever seen. The rest you can say is history. We picked mom up from the airport about a day later, happened to stop by the Stonesifer's house on the way home, the puppy fell asleep in my mom's arms and dad passed the check over to Ms. Stonesifer. We were FINALLY going to have a dog at home.

Savannah was a great dog, named after one of my mom's favorite cities. I wanted to name her Emma, after Emmitt Smith of the Cowboys. The litter was born on Super Bowl Sunday and the Cowboys had won that year. (Looking back at it now, I guess I was just as obsessed with football as an 11 year old...but that is another blog, another time) I'd like to have said that I was not the typical kid that promised their parents that I would take care of her and always do it, I wasn't, but I'd like to think that I was a pretty big part of Savannah's upbringing. I loved that dog, loved everything about having a dog, and missed that dog like crazy when I went away to school.

Much like I don't know why I just have always loved dogs, I don't really know why I've decided to start this blog. I am not a writer, in fact, English was my WORST subject in school. I am a horrible speller and my whole life I have heard "you hold your pencil wrong." (and I do) What I do have is a big mouth, a lot of opinions and an observant way about me. The more I understand my dogs, the more I realize just how amazing they are, and how we all can learn a little bit about ourselves, through the eyes of our dogs.

"My goal in life is to be as good of a person as my dog already thinks I am" -unknown author