it's almost time

This morning I had to pry Scout's wolf mouth open to slide pills hidden in a lump of icecream into him. These last couple of days have been the first time Scout has ever been uninterested in food or the outdoors. Everyone said Scout would let us know when it was time... it feels like he's telling us now.

He's so weary, but still the Scoutie who wants to be as near us and get all the pets as possible though. I want for Scout what I'd want for myself--to pass away at home surrounded by loved ones. We have an appointment with the hospice vet for Monday. 

Pic: One of my favorite pictures of Scout. In the old house, he'd lean on the window sill with his stuffie under one arm and get so excited if he saw any creatures swim past us in the river. He wanted to be friends with every living thing when he was a baby. I first posted this here.
 

lament

every day is goodbye  

                                       every breath is a sigh    

every day a library of sadness circulates inside

                                        every day is goodbye

every breath is a sigh   

every day another opportunity to dream/decide

every day is goodbye       every breath is a sigh    

some day you will have    known me not to cry

as sharp shards of hope               scrape for joy 

every day is goodbye       

every breath is a sigh 

Pic: Daffodils, MSU Beal Gardens

photo swap

Thank you for all the good wishes and confidence in my ability to take good photos. The photographer turned out to be the partner of someone I adore in one of my classes, so I felt quite at ease + I wore an Indian scarf and felt grounded and comfortable. 

Despite all that though, I somehow look exceedingly stiff and startled in the picture. Ah. C'est la vie. It's unlikely that this copyrighted, corporate photo will be used for anything other than the press release anyway. 

Pic: The photo that brought me joy today was Nu's picture of Scout and Huck keeping me warm. Their touching butts make a heart shape if you squint just right.

slowly

Kind of a slow day over here. Big A did the 36-mile Barry Roubaix this weekend and it seems to have rendered him both sore and silent. At some point on our very long walk, I asked him what he was thinking about:

Big A: Cycling. 

Me: What about it? 

Big A: How to do it faster...

Me: Faster? How?

Big A: I have to pedal faster. 

Scintillating. It was a good day for Scout and us, but we're heavy with dread.

In other news, I panicked because I have to get headshots taken tomorrow. I asked a couple of my networking groups for tips because I can be camera-averse + awkward + preoccupied by Scout. People were so kind and someone posted this YouTube link that really helped. 

Pic: A turtle sunning itself on a rock. Red Cedar River, walk with Big A.

"cherry blossoms fill the air"*

It rained all day, but both our cherry trees are in bloom--overnight and within a day of each other.

But At was home for dinner and Big A leaves tomorrow for MKE, so I took the annual cherry blossom family picture today. 

This is weeks earlier than any other year I can remember. 

Temps had dropped thirty degrees over the course of the day (from 75-35 degrees), and Nu urged me to hurry up with the pictures because they were cold.

I was worried about the tiny sprints Scout broke into a couple of times (the doc has advised against running). But At said something that made me think--"imagine how happy he must be that he feels he can run again." 💗

Pic: Scout, At, Nu, Big A, and Huck between the cherry trees.

*Title: from a song At used to sing to Nu while they were in my belly. Video version here. 

I guess I won something...

I attended yesterday's faculty meeting virtually because I wanted to get home to Scoutie. The sound was iffy from the beginning, but completely cut out right as the Prez announced the tenured faculty teaching award. 

I gathered (from chat and texts) that apparently I was the one who won it this year? Yay! Yay? It feels unreal and anti-climatic, because I missed the nice stuff I could see him saying about why I was nominated etc. I can't help noticing how uncharacteristically unexcited I am about this right now.

Usually, my students win awards. Ironically, this year--my students were runners up and I have this award. Honestly, I prefer it the other way--awards definitely mean more to them as they set off on their post-graduate careers. 

Pic: Scout and Huck sniffing spring and deer smells. Good day for Scout, but he just looks so tired in photos lately. 

springing

I got an hour of sleep last night. There are inscrutable little comments and emails from me with time stamps ranging from 1:30 am (when I headed up to bed) to 4:30 am (when I fell asleep) all over the place. 

Then I had a dream where Nicole and StephLove visited me--I lived in a flooding basement apartment, the leak from the street-level windows springing up like tears. Happy times. But I remember smiling because Nicole asked, with gentle curiosity if "the seal would hold"--and I remember thinking how like her to address an issue without alarming everyone.

EM and I did a 40-minute version of our "Hope as a Cognitive Process" workshop for the WGS Consortium out of the U of Wisconsin this morning. It feels like we have enough to turn our spiel into an article. For the first time, editors have been sending us queries for an (as yet) unwritten article. That feels kinda fast track; kinda high pressure. 

My breathless delivery of all this news = my high because Scout is having a good day after the okayest day yesterday. 

Pic: It's spring everywhere and seemingly all at once--on my walk with Big A this morning, both the forsythia and the willow were in rival shades of yellow along the Red Cedar.
 

spinning

It's no secret that Big A is a more indulgent puppy kid parent than a human kid parent... and it's no surprise that Scout's condition hit him hard. I've had to be the emotionally supportive partner more than I can ever remember being. 

I was kind of depending on Big A because... what do I know--Scout is my first ever pet and all I've ever done is read books. Big A is an emergency physician, he had a lot of pets growing up--he'd know what to do, right? No. Families make end of life decisions not healthcare providers, and all his pets "got given away or run over" and hearing that made me want to cry all over again.

Anyway, last day of classes today and then a wine-and-cheese thing at our college President's house. When Prez A politely asked me how I was, I started telling him about my dying puppy (face palm). He then valiantly saved the conversation by telling me that he and Big A follow each other on Zwift, so we were able to turn back to safer topics before I had a meltdown.

Pic: Big A with Scout and Huck post backyard walk; a glimpse of me in the mirror.

tiny, beautiful things

The hospice vet visited this morning--everyone I asked recommended her, and she lives up to all the wonderful things people said about her. We now have a sort of plan: we are to call her when the bad days begin to outnumber the good days. 

Today was a bad day, FTR. On good days, I feel Scout could go on for months; on bad days I wait for the next good day. I was such a mess today; in meetings, I could definitely feel myself bringing people down with my horrible energy.

Also, it's not helping that I've been watching Tiny, Beautiful Things, which is devastating. It's based on the Cheryl Strayed book and I cry through half the show at least. When I peeked at the book, it looks really different in structure, so I'm going to have to get it and read it. And cry some more.

Pic: Scout and Huck love this little dell with its carpet of tiny bluets in April and I'm glad I got this picture of them together so carefully sniffing everything.

living in hope

My colleague-friend, who helped me get to Scout and lost her own puppy unexpectedly that same week, thinks Scout died too. It makes sense because Scout's death seemed so imminent ("a matter of hours to days") and also I kind of avoided her question about Scout when we were texting in the aftermath of her loss. It seemed such an unfair allocation of fate.

Anyway, the hospice vet is coming to check on Scout tomorrow. There is no good news (if the internal bleeding doesn't take him out, they say the tumors causing it surely will). But friends tell me their own loves have lived up to a year with similar diagnoses, and so I live in hope. 

playing catch up

I really did take the weekend off for once, so there was a ton of Monday stuff to get through this morning... almost all done now. I worked so single-mindedly that when I got up at the end of that session, I was quite dizzy. I keep thinking I should set a timer for an hour to remind myself to move/drink water/give my eyes a break. I should just do it already.

Scout and Huck are a bit miffed about the end of Easter weekend; Nu has a ton of PSAT testing this week so they're taking things easy; At showed up for dinner with a couple of his labor friends; Big A returns tomorrow; this is the last week of classes for me. There! All caught up.

Pic: Scout! These days I follow him around the way he usually follows me.