Hurty.

When I was just a few weeks shy of turning 9 years old, my parents told me I could have a cat. Being the animal advocate my mother is, we went to the shelter to find my new companion. There weren't any kittens there ready for adoption, and while I begged and pleaded for one of the full grown cats, my parents told me to be patient (which was good, because it later resulted in the adoption of Nelle from a litter one of our neighbors had, and she was easily my best friend until she died). While we were there, though, we saw a little blond cocker spaniel puppy, just six months old, looking adorably up at us, begging for us to take her home. It was impossible to turn away from her, so we brought her home. We found out she was a cocker spaniel/dachshund mix, which would make her a "docker." As a result, she was given the name "Levi."

Levi was put to sleep earlier this week.

Everyone says this, and it's so cliche, but she was one of the best dogs in the world. She had a paint brush tail and snow boot feet, with a little tuft of hair on top of her head that could be styled into a mohawk. I was reading "Chicken Soup for the Pet Lover's Soul" and there was a story about a little boy whose dog had been put to sleep. His parents weren't sure how he was going to handle it, and one of them said out loud, "It's a shame dogs live lives so much shorter than their human companions. I wonder why God did that." The little boy thought for a second and said, "Well, God sends us so we can learn how to be good and love everyone. Dogs already know that when they get here, so they don't have to stay as long."

For Levi, that was definitely the case.

Greasy potstickers.

Do you ever discover a cut on your hand that you decide had to have been painful once it occurred, and you're disappointed you weren't allotted your whining time because you didn't realize it when it became?

I'm feeling a little bit of that right now.

Camping this previous weekend was a blast, and I thoroughly enjoyed having both a hatchet and a water filter. The hatchet made me feel a lot like Carrie Nation(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carrie_Nation), and the water filter meant we didn't have to lug thousands of gallons to our campsite. The giant 8 person tent was heavy enough for me, thank you very much. The hatchet came in handy when I was chopping wood, which I looked adorable doing. We went mountain biking the second day we were there, and I managed to bike over a very large lip on the edge of a bridge, and in my excitement, went off the trail, unclipped my right foot, and fell down on my left side. My poor elbow took the brunt of it as it went crashing down into the loose rocks. That was one I got my allotted whining time for. Three cheers for that.

Speaking of mountain biking, I'm going to be doing a race next Saturday, and according to my sources, there are usually only about 4 entries in the beginning women's catergory, so I won't do worse than fourth in my first race. Hot dang! To prepare for it, I've been biking every day (except for today... was a little late getting out of the house) to my internship/class/work, and I had no idea how many miles I was putting into my commute. On Tuesday, I clocked 24.25 miles. That's almost a gallon of gas! I'm going to keep the biking thing up to try to save us some money.

Little Chuckles seems to have come down with something. He's been really stuffy, sniffling a lot, and has sneezes that could knock someone over. I'm hoping it will go away in a couple days (he's had it since Monday) and trying to ignore the articles that say it could be a symptom of Feline Leukemia. I had a cat die when it was 2 years old from that, and she was vaccinated against it (as was Chuck). I would be absolutely devestated if I lost Chuck. If it's still going strong this weekend, to the vet he goes.

We got a visit on Monday from Bobby's paternal grandparents, and it was an absolute joy. They're the perfect people to go to for advice, and I was discussing with them my sorrows about living in Provo. They talked to me about the very things I'm learning in my social work classes, and how to look for the good in people rather than focusing on all the rotten. It's difficult for me, especially since I've been trained to notice social injustices and what needs advocating, but it's something that I certainly need to work on. We were supposed to come to Provo for a reason, and perhaps that reason is just this. I need to learn to be more positive about it and stop letting everything that bugs me... well, bug me.

Next week, I get to start teaching at the Boys and Girls Club's summer program. Can I tell you how absolutely stoked I am? The Scera Park Elementary School kids are adorable. Instead of doing homework with them, I'll get to teach them fun stuff, like soccer, drama, gardening, and how to develop healthy self-esteem. I love it! And now, I must frolic off to re-learn CPR and discover the mysteries of First Aid, so that while I'm enjoying teaching them all of those fun things, I know how to rescue them if I get a little too carried away. Ta!

Awareness test.

I was going to write a fun little entry about our camping adventures this past weekend, but this morning, a friend of ours was hit by a car while he was biking to work. He'll be in the hospital for the next few days.



Think about it.

A little dose of crazy.

My job is fantastic. I love working with little kids, but sometimes, my brain threatens explosion with some of the things that happen. I went in yesterday fully anticipating another fairly normal day, when I was informed that we were doing the store instead of classes, which entailed the kids being able to spend their points they had acquired during the year for being obedient and doing their homework. The kids were running around in excitement, and we were hurrying to get everything together, including making pieces of paper with the amount of points each item would cost. I laughed when I saw a stack of preschool workbooks, and asked Mitch who he was planning to purchase those. He shrugged and said to keep the cost of them low.

The kids were running around still, requesting snack and we had to remind them a few times more than usual to keep their hands to themselves. One of the kids approached me and told me one of the girls was crying on the stage. I went to comfort her and she told me she had swimmer's ear, and that her ear was killing her. I was prone to a lot of ear aches in my day, so I had immediate empathy and made it a priority to get her a cell phone to call her parents so she could go home. Just then, two of the little hispanic girls came up to me and in broken english, showed me a hand full of transparent tiny balls, and started joking about how they had each convinced the other to eat one. I looked at the little balls closely and knew exactly what they were. Those little silicone gel packets you get in new purses, shoes, or anything else, should really say "DO NOT EAT" in Spanish, too. I grabbed Mitch and told him what had happened. His eyes widened and he asked, "Are they okay?" I wasn't sure, since it sounded like they had just eaten them, and so he sent them to the water fountain to drink as much water as they could.

That crisis down and the swimmer's ear girl's parents contacted, I thought we had met the quota for insanity. Just then, a kid ran into the gym and told me that one of the older kids had sniffed some Mexican candy (a lot like pixie sticks) and his nose started bleeding. Fantastic, I thought, and then it was topped off with him telling me the kid was also vomitting in the bathroom. Grateful not to be a male, I grabbed Mitch and had him investigate. Hopefully that little experience will teach the kids that pretending to sniff cocaine is almost as painful as doing the actual thing.

Then came the auction, and there were lots of tears. LOTS of tears. I felt pooped and ready for a nap. I was ready to write the day off as a yuck fest when up came Christian. Christian is kind of a superhero. He's one of the older kids, and a year ago, he knew very little english. Now, the only indications there are that english isn't his first language is a slight accent, and the occasional question of how to say certain words. His little sister (one of the gel ball eaters) is one of the youngest in the group. Christian is one of the better athletes, and during games with partners, everyone wants to be with him, but he always picks his sister to be his partner. In a big game, if she gets hurt, he immediately takes her aside to take care of her. He's pretty much amazing. So it shouldn't have surprised me when he picked up several of the preschool workbooks and asked me how much they cost. I laughed and asked him what he was going to do with all of those, and he said, "I'm going to give them to my cousins." He then picked up a couple "Over the Hedge" books, and said those were for his older cousins. He was spending all of his points on everyone but himself. I had to convince him to buy something for himself, and even then, it seemed like he was doing it to make me happy.

Christian is only 10 years old, and he's my hero. If I knew all of my kids were going to be just like him, I wouldn't be so anti-baby.

Nalgene of diet coke

Shoes have become increasingly more difficult to pick out these days after working at the Boys and Girls Club. After days of making horrible decisions, my poor feet are purple and blue and blistered from wearing inappropriate footwear while playing some seriously intense indoor soccer. Though my dungeon of an office is freezing, I'm currently sporting some flip flops, the only shoes that do not apply pressure and strain on my broken stumps.

I'm giving three cheers for the weekend being over. That lapse into emotional messiness was more than I could handle, and trying to think at every passing minute whether that would be when I would start my descent down the hill for the big celebration of ending my collegiate career was thoroughly depressing. Wednesday marks the day of my second to last test for the term, leaving only one more and a paper before I finish my last social work class. Summer term entails Book of Mormon and a weights class, so I'm not exactly concerned about putting a lot of work into my final days as an official student. Tomorrow is also the first day of Peli's intermediate dog training class, so I'll be able to mark the passing weeks with something to look forward to.

An apology seems trite for my previous entry, as it seemed entirely too negative of my current living situation (though I assure you that was not my intention). Those close to me never believe it, but the truth is that I am quite shy, and the structure at KU was perfect to remedy that problem. With the succession of each class determined for us by the social work program, we inevitably were in the same class with the same students each semester, rather than having a wide assortment of individuals each time. While some may find the variety refreshing, my insecurity and low self esteem leaves me scrambling to start over each time, and my struggle to trust anything with ovaries easily prevents me from opening up in the times I meet with my peers once a week. I can provide the occasional wise crack and bring about laughter from those around me, but the public shunning experienced in classes previous when I attempted to offer my experience from another university leaves me terrified and unwilling to volunteer my true self. My experiences in Kansas, where I was considered more conservative as a result of my religion, were met with respect and understanding from my peers. To me, that is at the root of social work, where we are trained to meet clients with a grasp of cultural sensitivity as well as social justice, and starting where the client is, we help them with what they need. Here, with an absence of the strengths perspective, much of what is taught or expressed is through looking at individuals as things that need to be fixed rather than survivors of circumstance that just need some help getting even further than they've managed to on their own.

This weekend was hard. Coming into work and going to class these past couple of days have been little battles against drained motivation. But I've made it here 10 months. I guess I can handle a few more.

Pomp and circumstances

Waking up today was difficult. My alarm went off at seven, and having showered the night before, I planned to jump right out of bed and hop into my padded bib shorts (sexiness embodied) and ride my bike to work. However, a combination of riding 15 miles on a mountain bike yesterday and killing myself at Boys and Girls Club because they decided to play soccer (I forgot how fun soccer was to play), and realizing what today was, I simply did not want to get out of bed. You see, had I remained at the University of Kansas, I would be graduating with all of my social work friends today, and would be done with school until I decide to go to graduate school (depending on whether or not I actually want to be a social worker... we shall see). I sat in my bed, running in my head over and over how disappointing Utah is. I have my husband, my dog, and my cat, but that's about it. I can't name two people in our ward, the students in my classes think I'm some crazy liberal hippie, and I recently found out that our landlord loathes Peli's existence. All in all, I did not want to crawl out from under the covers.

However, upon arriving at my internship today, nausea was on my side and had detained Mrs. Stock, leaving her with only gmail chat to entertain her. So, I might not be graduating today, but I get to spend most of it talking with Heidi, which has lifted my spirits in ways they have not been in a very, very long time. Three cheers to old friends that rock my socks off.

Mother's Day is a flying sack of poop.

After a long day in SLC spending time with the Clarkes and attending their baby blessing, we returned home to find that Peli had used her crate as a lawn, which is typical after having her in there all day (she had her DVD playing, so we're not horrible parents!). I offered to clean the crate while Bobby took her outside and bathed her. Upon bringing her back inside, Peli ran around the house, and Bobby frantically grabbed her to keep her from spreading her pee paws all over the apartment. As he grabbed her, her foot caught on the plastic bag full of the urine soaked paper towels and feces and flung it in the air, showering all of the contents all over me.

Happy Mother's Day, everyone.

Feeling trunky.

Tis the week that all my social work friends back in Lawrence are scrambling to finish their final papers/projects, and wrapping up their internships to prepare for graduation. It's hard not to dwell on the fact that I still have three long months left (which seems even longer now that I'm not even sure I want to do social work anymore).

But that's pessimism in writing, and that's boring to read. Instead, I shall tell you about my fantastic adventure this evening that was pretty much identical to my adventure last evening, except this time I didn't end up with a big bruise on my bum. We've capitalized on Peli's love for the mountains by taking her with us to go mountain biking. Yes, I am finally back on a bike, and this one has shocks, thicker wheels, and I'm sporting a full face helmet and arm pads (tis why I only bruised my bum yesterday when I fell). Bobby put a computer on my bike so now I can tell how far I go, and I was a little disappointed when I realized our familiar trail was only 3 miles total. Then I looked behind me and saw Peli trotting away, and realized that every time we rode this trail, Peli was running three miles. She has short legs! She's kind of a superdog, and I love her. Right now she's watching her new DVD I ordered for her off of amazon.com (in fact, Chuck is watching it too!). Bobby mocked me a little bit for ordering a DVD made for dogs, but she's loving it. I wanted to give her something to watch so she would feel less lonely while we're at work. Right now, there are pheasants pecking away at some dirt. Peli seems less interested in the bird scenes, which doesn't surprise me, as she has little to no reaction to birds while we're hiking (but if we come across a deer, all of the hair on her back stands straight up).

Bobby's wish has come true. After two weeks at the Boys and Girls Club, I'm ready to call a doctor to schedule a hysterectomy. It's not that most of the kids are brats-- most of them are actually wonderful, sweet kids that I love working with and talking to. However, there's the 10% that I find myself plotting ways to set on fire and make it look like an accident that deter me from ever wanting to sport the fetal accessory. Instead of day dreaming about names for our future children, I've turned to making plans for our little farm and all the animals we're going to rescue from the shelter. Here's the latest one that Bobby's agreed to let me adopt if I can convince the landlords. We're going to name him Cheese, so then when Bobby speaks Spanish and is referring to our cats, he can say "Chuck y Cheese." For those of you that were wondering, that's why I married him. Cheese is a cute little kitten (this picture does not do him justice) who sounds like he's barking when he meows. It's so cute! He's been at the shelter for a while now, and I'm getting a little worried, so Bobby agreed to let me adopt him as a Mother's Day present. It will be nice for Chuck too if he can have a more lively friend to play with (he loves Kelso, but Kelso is kind of a lazy bum that doesn't do a whole lot).

Peli is fascinated by the roosters. All of my skepticism about DVDs for animals is gone.

Now let's see if the CD I got with soothing sounds for dogs has the same effect. Jealous? You should be.

Dry eyes aren't clear eyes.

Perhaps my last post was confusing, but I'm experiencing a lot of frustration as of late resulting from my constant checking of ksl.com to look at animals (because I'm obsessed with animals) and seeing how many of them are being shipped off from their owners because they're moving and they didn't find an apartment that allows pets (yes, I know it's difficult, but to me, the equivalent would be for me to look for housing here in Provo, and finding that single housing is more readily available, I would post an ad trying to sell my husband), or because they can't give the animal the attention it needs because they're so busy (puke. there are doggy day cares, look them up), or because they're having a baby and can't have the dog too (my parents had dogs before we were born, and we grew up with a MUCH better relationship with the dogs than we did with the humans in the house!). I've also been looking at animal shelters in the area, fueling my desire to work at one as an adoptions counselor or the like once I graduate (that's kind of like a social worker, right?) and also breaking my heart over the many animals that will probably be put to sleep (over half. And did you know that black dogs are more likely to not get adopted, and thus euthanized? Three cheers for animal racism).

When I was in middle school, I stopped talking to one of my best friends because she fed a Gardetto to a duck, and I was taught salt was bad for animals.

It drives me absolutely crazy to read about all the animals that are put to sleep because humans are stupid. There are countless ads for pure bred puppies from breeders, looking for $500 a puppy, when there are tons of adorable dogs in shelters for a quarter of that, most of which will be put to sleep while these breeders put on the Barry White and light some candles so their dogs can make some more potentially eventual homeless pets.

I want to adopt them all. Sadly, our landlords are terrified of us getting even one more pet, so I guess that's out of the question. I just need something to do so I can feel like I'm not one of those people that just says, "Oh, what a shame," and continues on with my daily life as if it's in a completely different plane rather than happening just a few miles away at the shelter. Lori looked at me funny the other day when I was trying to explain to her how I don't like people. With all of the stuff I'm exposed to in social work, and all of the things I read to keep up with current events, and now learning what I can about animal cruelty and abandonment, it's hard to not see human beings as evil creatures. Sure, we all have the light of Christ in us, and we are inherently good with the potential to do great things, but as our culture has evolved, we live in a world where so many terrible things are presented as options for coping mechanisms, and it's acceptable as long as you don't get caught.

http://www.animalsinourhearts.com/shelter/quest1.htm