Goodbye, Hazel

This summer was a time of learning for me. Learning to say goodbye to my childhood home. Learning to be patient with healing after I fell and broke seven bones in my face. Learning to reappraise my home situation and say goodbye to one of my canine companions. I will be honest from the onset. Three dogs are a lot to handle. When my daughter came home with a fourth, an English bulldog puppy, I knew we were in way over our heads, even though she plans to take Henry back to Baldwin Wallace when the semester begins later this month. Nonetheless, my injury was a wake-up call to the reality of living in close confines with three dogs of my own. I knew it wasn’t going to be easy. Since my daughter’s childhood dog is nearing her 13th birthday, I knew Hailey could not adjust to new surroundings. Finnigan, who I adopted two years ago as an abuse case, is also too fragile to part with. That left Hazel, my 7- year- old standard poodle. I began making inquiries about possible adoptive homes. In all, I interviewed four couples. One had a young child that I was concerned about, since Hazel has never experienced living with a baby. The next two couples were uncertain. That’s when I connected with Oliver’s parents, also a standard poodle, five years old, with gorgeous coal black hair. With their hiking and cross-country skiing background, not to mention weekends at the lake, I knew this family was a perfect fit for my active dog. We went for a morning walk last Saturday, Hazel and Oliver included. Hazel played patty cake on command and walked on the lead like a well-trained dog, which she is. I could tell that Oliver’s mom was falling in love with Hazel, but it still wasn’t easy. So I showed my new friends photos of my face from when I fell, how bruised and battered I looked. They understood my dilemma. I asked them to follow me to my house to get Hazel’s bed and some of her food. And then I knelt before her and told her how much I always loved her. I asked her to forgive me for giving her to someone else. I kissed her gray/black forehead and promised that I would never forget her. The next day I received a photo of Hazel playing at the lake with her new human family, actually boarding on the lake with her new mom. The text said that she and Oliver were already good friends. I was ecstatic. It was then that I remembered that sometimes, when we truly love, we need to let go. That’s another lesson I learned this summer. Farewell, friend. Until we meet again….

The Magic of Antioch

The Magic of Antioch There were 11 of us in the class…all women, except for our talented teacher. He made our number 12. For 6 days, nearly 15 hours, in fact, we discussed one another’s writings, endeavoring to make all the pieces of the puzzle, both written and unwritten, come together to make sense. No more than just make sense, make magic. We were magicians, I guess you could say. And we spent a week together at Antioch Writer’s Workshop in Yellow Springs, Ohio. For some folks, paradise is a museum vacation in a big city. For others, it might be a hunting or fishing expedition. For me and over 100 other writers, a trip to Yellow Springs to the yearly writing workshop is about as good as a getaway can be. This was my fifth time. I now have dear friends at the workshop from Ohio and beyond. We enjoy lectures from top writers in fiction, non-fiction and poetry, I pitch my creations to top agents, and I get to sample the best darned gluten-free muffins on the planet. I was the tour guide for my friend, Michelle, a newbie at the conference. She, too, was a participant in the non-fiction category. We stayed at the lovely Hearthstone Inn, just a ten-minute drive away in Cedarville. Every morning, we drove to Antioch University Midwest at 8 a.m., to listen to the lectures. Most lunch times we spent at Current Cuisine, a darling little grocery store with a fabulous deli designed to meet the needs of even the pickiest eater. We assembled in groups to talk at small tables along the street, where so many of Yellow Springs inhabitants hang out. After shopping a bit at the many boutiques that sprinkle Xenia Avenue, we drove back to the university for an afternoon of non-fiction talk led by Distinguished OSU Professor Lee Martin, who has published many non-fiction and fiction selections, winning many top honors including a Pulitzer nomination. For the next two hours, as the sun blazed out the window of our classroom, we talked craft. Each of us submitted 20 pages to be dissected by the group. After 6 days together, filled with laughter and yes, tears, we were friends, the 12 of us, posing for pictures so we would never forget this time we shared together, this time of magic. On Friday, we packed our suitcases, checked out of the inn where we stayed and attended our last morning of instruction. In Lee’s afternoon class, we critiqued the final writings before hugging each other goodbye and driving off for home. I circled Yellow Springs’ central thoroughfare, that place where once a year, for one week, I find magic. And then I hopped on the freeway and headed toward home. Ahhhh, Yellow Springs. A place of magic.

Wednesday's Child

I can't believe that after a lifetime of teaching drama and speech to high schoolers and elementary kids, that I would be a writer now. Check the-daily-record.com every Wednesday for my column called Sentimental Journey. Today's topic was dear friend, Jim Rea, who demonstrated a kindness of heart seldom seen in today's world. Jim was a read gem.He passed away last week. Besides my column writing, I am working on a memoir about my therapy dog, Hannah, training my new dog, Hazel, helping my teenagers survive their adolescence, and homeschooling my daughter.I will be writing on this blog about any and all of those issues. Besides those activities, I sing and cantor at church (did six services last week alone: one wedding, two masses, two funerals and one reconciliation service). I study voice and guitar, run my household and taxi my kids to and fro. Hazel and I clomp a few miles a day through the neighborhood.I guess after seeing my column in the newspaper on Wednesday for ten years, I now think of myself as Wednesday's child. Hope you enjoy reading my blog. Hugs and ear scratches, Leslie

Dogs, dogs and more dogs

The Apprentice

The playroom at Children’s Hospital was busy. Although some kids sat quietly in wheelchairs, others dragged IV poles in animated fashion. Tiny toddlers meandered, babbling aloud, with parents trailing them. One child was playing “Starbucks” with her grandmother in a make-believe car, ordering a frothy cocoa from beneath her turbaned head.

And then he entered the room. Jajca, the Standard Poodle, that is. The tall, furry gentleman sat at his master’s feet, surmising the situation. His broad shoulders were unflinching. His long legs sprawled before him. His tail swished the floor like a mop of ebony hair.

“Where should I start?” I could read the therapy dog thinking as he surmised the bald children in every size and color.

I didn’t hear the child calling, but evidently Jajca did. A slender hand reached out from the blanketed wheelchair. Jajca lifted his big black head and raised the front paws of his muscular 60-pound frame to the child’s lap. A smile burst like a morning sunrise across the sick child’s face.

I dabbed a tear from my eyes as I watched the scene unfold. In Jajca, I had found a dog so like my Hannah, a dog that could read and minister to the sick and failing. I couldn’t wait to run my own fingers through his fluffy hair. I asked Jajca’s handler for his breeder’s name. I would write and ask her about future litters, I said. After Hannah passed away, I would be on the waiting list.

When Ellen, the breeder, responded to my initial email, I told her I was nowhere near ready for a puppy. I already had two dogs: one that was elderly and suffering from serious ailments, one that was young and full of life. She sent me information about her website, JE Poodles. There I found Madeline and Monique, the black beauties; Brooklyn, the silver and white; Celine, the stately matriarch. There was Paris, a glamour girl befitting her name, and Farrah, of the luscious white coat. There was a whole host of adult dogs, including J and E’s Champion Triple Play.

And then I turned to the puppy page and saw the remaining female from the last litter, a big-boned hearty girl. Ellen turned down a few prospective owners for the three-month-old, she wrote at the website, because she loved this puppy so much and wanted her to be in the right home.

I again told Ellen I wasn’t ready for a puppy, but would be happy to drive the 150-mile roundtrip to see the pup for future reference. By the time I left her house that Friday the 13th, the deal was sealed, a deposit left in place. We would go to pick up the puppy the following week.

There was just something about her, I told my husband. The fact that she was born on November 28, ten days after Hannah, the very same day I met Hannah when she was a newborn dog. The way the black pup had white markings on her two back paws, as Hannah did. The way she calmly approached us, then lay at our feet, looking up with a wise expression, just like her uncle, Jajca.

On the night of her homecoming, my son and I struggled around the block in the arctic wind with three dogs in tow. Later, I cuddled with my furry friend in a blanket on the sofa and softly whispered her chosen name, Hazel. And I knew, as circuitous of a route as I traveled to find her, she was meant to be mine. Just like my Hannah before her.

Remembering Bill Ports

He was a real dog lover, just like me. And although Bill and I never had a lengthy conversation in the two years that we were neighbors, I knew the goodness of his heart.

“How’s Casey?” I asked when I saw him puttering in the yard that first year, his big dog beside him.

“Danes don’t live very long,” he answered with a sad smile.

I saw him walking the old dog slowly around the neighborhood in those final months. The Dane was struggling, but I could tell that Casey was getting the very best care.

“How about Hannah?” he asked as my old dog declined.

“She’s hanging in there,” I said. Bill always bent to scratch Hannah’s ears. He cared about my dogs, and that mattered to me.

When Hannah, my Standard Poodle, died not long after the death of Casey, Bill extended his condolences.

“So sorry to hear about Hannah,” he said. “She was a good girl.” They were two short sentences, but they held a whole lot of meaning. I knew that he cared.

The autumn leaves had just begun to turn the last time we spoke. Bill stopped the mower so he could pat the head of Hazel, my young Standard Poodle.

“She’s a pretty dog, “ he said with admiration.

“I bet you miss having a dog, don’t you, Bill?” I asked cautiously.

“Yes, I still miss Casey,” he said. “But my wife and I want to travel now. We decided not to be tied down to a dog for a while. But someday, I know, we’ll have another Dane.” Bill smiled a satisfied smile, then waved goodbye as Hazel and I ambled up the street. What a nice man, I thought.

A few days later, I heard the news. Bill Ports, the neighbor I liked so well, who loved dogs the way I do, had passed away suddenly. I remembered the way he always said hello, even stopping his car to greet me as I trekked up the street accompanied by my dogs.

I wasn’t surprised to read in Bill’s obituary that his family didn’t want flowers, but rather were asking for donations to Harlequin Haven, a rescue organization for Great Danes. How like Bill to make that his final wish.

On Thursday, when the sun was shining in the crisp October air, I stopped to see Bill’s wife. I told her about my last conversation with her husband. Margaret told me about all the dogs of their marriage: the Great Danes, the Irish Setter, the lab mix, the “mutt” terrier. I wiped tears from my eyes as I left their front porch, my pup shuffling beside me. I would miss Bill’s daily salutations, his heartwarming concern about all things canine.

The night of his wake, I was scheduled to take Hazel to her first obedience class. I considered cancelling. But then I thought about what Bill would want. “Take the dog to her class,” I could hear the soft-spoken neighbor say. To him, a dog really mattered.

Driving to Brigadoon, I remembered Bill walking beside his fawn-colored Casey. I remembered the grief in his eyes when Casey died. I remembered the warmth he shared over Hannah’s passing.

And I knew then that Bill and his dogs were together again. Somewhere in a field of swaying daisies. Walking side by side. A dear man with his sweet dogs.

Because for Bill, that would surely be heaven.


(If you would you like to make a donation to Great Dane rescue, please contact: info@hhdane.com Tell them Bill Ports sent you.)

An Empty Crate

Taking down the crate was the hardest part. I wanted to collect every precious drop of DNA to save in the remembrance box along with her collar and toy duck, therapy tags and snippets of fur. I thought of all the times I knelt beside that crate, administering pills and stroking her. As the sides of the giant contraption folded with a loud clang, I remembered the December day when we brought her home. That crate was so big for the tiny, not-even three pound standard poodle puppy. Within hours of sleeping on my chest, she surrendered to the nighttime incarceration. Last summer, when incontinence was added to her list of health ailments, I regretfully took the crate back out of storage, where my old dog once again slept.

It’s been a week since Hannah left us. Between the epilepsy, thyroid disease, arthritis and liver problems, we knew her days were numbered. But that just made us treasure her more. The night she passed, her legs trembled. Her stomach grew swollen. She experienced gastric problems. And then her snout became as cold as ice. It was after 11:00 p.m. when her problems escalated. I called the vet. I could see that a simple pain pill wasn’t going to correct her worsening condition.

My daughter sang lullabies to Hannah as I drove to the Orrville clinic. My son ran his hand down her back, reassuring her in soft whispers.

The Christmas lights were shining on the night my husband and I brought six-week old Hannah home. My children were wild-child toddlers back then. The night she died, a soft rain fell on the black pavement as I navigated the car down the darkened streets. My children looked like adults sitting beside me.

The kind vet, Dr. Yost, assessed her quickly, agreeing that the day we dreaded had arrived. We cried like fools as we memorized the contours of her precious face, kissing her as the sedation took hold.

But her determined heart kept beating. I told her how great a job she had done. I reminded her and the kids of our many adventures. I told her it was time to let go. To please let go.

In the 4,549 days she lived, Hannah loved and protected our family for all but the first 41, when she was a newborn puppy. She performed gallantly in her years of therapy service in the nursing homes. She lay at the bedside of many of our loved ones as they sickened and died. She participated in bite prevention programs with the deputy dog warden. She accompanied me to preschools where the little ones learned to trust my big black dog. She starred in a play, portraying Helen Keller’s dog. She tagged along to my children’s theatre classes where she helped kids overcome stage fright. She rode shotgun in my car nearly every day of her life. She ate countless McDonald’s ice cream cones, and walked thousands of miles beside me.

I know, someday when God calls me home, I will find my beloved Hannah again, waiting for me, just like she waited for me by the back door every day for the past twelve years.

As she lay dying, I told her, if I would have looked the world over for the dearest of dogs, the most constant of companions, I would surely have chosen her.

“You’re my perfect dog, Hannah,” I confirmed.

When her relentless heart finally stopped beating, her legs relaxed into an elegant running pose, devoid of fear and pain.

I knew then, that she had found her way.