Bye Bye Sugar Pie

Poodle Heart

Bye, Bye Sugar Pie

Sug and Alf

     She was a southern beauty, a gentle lady, a demure soul. Sugar Pie to acquaintances, shortened to the more intimate and familiar “Sug” by family and friends; she was as sweet and refined as her name.  Petite and quiet, she would slip into a room with barely a whisper and coyly recline on the nearest sofa. Hair as soft and white as the first magnolia blossom of spring, brown eyes as dark as midnight; oh, she was lovely in the most classic of styles.  The men all adored her, following her trail like deerhounds on a hunt, scuffling and shoving to see who could gain the honor of sitting nearest her side.  She led them all on endless chases, never intending to let anyone truly win. It was a game of thrust and parry, deflecting suitors with a toss of her head and a bored yawn, leading others on in hopeless pursuit. Yes, she was witty like that, and even though she pretended at times to be aloof and standoffish, with her family, she was fiercely loyal and tirelessly loving.



A happy pile of sleepy poodles

      She was classic and timeless, agile and lithe, and age seemed to elude her for the longest of years. Then suddenly, as if on some secret command, it began to sneak in and snatch away bits of her life. She rested more than before; preferring to gaze across the lawn rather than run through the grass chasing a ball or butterfly or bird.  She would spend hours seated before the long French doors in the dining room, the perfect spot to bask in the warm morning sun while watching all the comings and goings from the house to the road.  Hearing was the first sense age robbed, and it was so subtle that it took us quite some time to realize that she wasn’t ignoring us, but that she couldn’t hear us.  We resorted to communicating with hand signals, which she quickly learned, and life seemed to go on as before. Then came the day when a strange dullness clouded her eyes. I had to stop and peer deep into their murky depths before understanding dawned that her sharp vision was now no more than a muted blur. Her appetite dimmed, and she no longer loved the treats and tidbits she had thrived on, preferring instead to nibble on soft foods that were hand fed, slowly, one small bite at a time.  Dementia, in all its cruelty, was the last battle she faced, and it was the harshest of all, forcing her to lose her way in her own home.  She would wander off, and then stand frozen in the driveway or the garage or the hallway, lost and confused in her own home, a bewildered expression on her face, until someone would come and pick her up and carry her back into the house. She rested more; she slept often; she tottered around on shaky legs; she became too weak to stand on her own and had to be carried up and down stairs, lifted in and out of the car, and hoisted on and off the furniture.  

Yes, Sug, you can eat it.

     She began to do strange things. We would carry her outside, then catch her eating dirt in the yard. We would take her out to the front porch, where she would begin gnawing on the blue slate stones.  She tried to eat a small concrete statue of a pineapple, but refused to eat the fresh turkey we gave her from the delicatessen. To our great horror, we came home one day and found her in the garage, licking the gas hose connected to the generator.

     “Chris,” I whispered to my husband, as we stood there helplessly watching her, “I think she’s trying to commit suicide.” 

Visit to Santa

     We knew, but we didn’t want to know, that her life was coming to an end. 

     It was not a decision we were ready to make, so we left it up to her doctor. She had stopped eating, walking, hearing, seeing, or responding, but we clung to the smallest sliver of hope that she might still endure, might still revive and might, just might, return to life as normal. We did not want to voice the truth of the situation, that her quality of life had ended, and that prolonging her being was merely for our sakes and certainly not for hers, for she was a part of our family, and we were not ready to say goodbye.

     Chris gently lifted her tired body into the car this morning and drove her to the place we had entrusted to care for her for the past twelve and a half years. He would let the professional medical team make the final call. His leaving with Sug for this final car ride was not a scene I wanted to witness, and I am grateful that he delayed the inevitable until after we had departed. It had been two days since Sissey and I had returned to South Carolina for the final semester of college; we had said our goodbyes earlier, giving her sweet hugs and soft kisses, whispering words of love that she didn’t have to hear to understand. Deep in my heart, I knew it was the final goodbye.

      In the end, it was the right thing to do. She slipped peacefully away under their tender care, released from her pain and suffering, her deafness and dementia. With a gentle sigh and a quiet breath, Sugar Pie went to the place where all good dogs go, and I’m certain she was greeted at the gates with slobbery kisses and happy barks by Gus and Auggie, her first two loves

     Bye, Bye Sugar Pie. You were one of the good ones.

Going Home

Les Miserables 2013

 I dreamed a dream in time gone by,
When hope was high and life, worth living.
I dreamed that love would never die,
I dreamed that God would be forgiving.

I dreamed a dream about an America that was united and prudent, responsible and pragmatic, but it was just a dream. When I awoke, it was to a country so divided and reckless, so contentious and irresponsible, that I cried out in prayer to a merciful God to save us all.  Contrary to Mayan myths and Internet warnings, the world did not end as expected, thankfully that date is a secret held only in the soul of an omnipotent God, but the world has definitely slipped to a precarious position. We are more divided as a nation than perhaps any time since the Civil War. Our leaders are incapable of leading, and instead have driven a wedge between the nation that has created a precarious chasm.  We are  dangling on the edge of a fiscal cliff, and whether or not we crash and implode at the bottom of a vast gorge is yet to be decided.  As we hang on, moaning and groaning about the imbeciles who led us to this perilous position,  we watch impassively as  those same imbeciles will comfortably ride out the next year with a pay increase, private insurance, hefty retirement pensions, and a generous salary for life. After all, we are the people who so willingly elected them to rule over us, and we are the people who continue to let them rule with unlimited authority. We are the people who voted them into office so they could impose oppressive taxes and reckless deficits on us while they exempted themselves from the same conditions. It is a situation we have so willingly created.

Then I was young and unafraid,
And dreams were made and used and wasted.
There was no ransom to be paid,
No song unsung, no wine, untasted

      Our children will pay the price of our foolishness. And their children will pay, and on and on, but not to worry, for there has never been any intention of balancing the monstrously out-of-balance budget. We have been told by our government authorities that it is acceptable, even expected, to live beyond your means with no plans to ever repay your debt. We have been told that it is acceptable for almost half of our nation to live on government subsidies, to earn profit for doing nothing, and to have no accountability for the taxpayer dollars they receive.   So eat drink and be merry, if you can afford it , or if not,  just put it on your credit card or sign up for some free government stuff, for tomorrow's problems are not our own.

But the tigers come at night
With their voices soft as thunder
As they tear your hope apart
As they turn your dream to shame

     Besides, it's only the middle class, hard-working, average Americans who will suffer. The 47% who pay nothing will continue to receive in abundance, while the elite government dictators will enjoy their posh vacation homes, lavish trips, expensive luxuries and plush bank accounts at our expense, for it would be oh-so-foolish for everyone to have to pay the price of fiscal irresponsibility. We have been conditioned to accept these terms by the same politicians who have convinced us they are working for the people. In reality, they are working for their own self-aggrandizement, and like the emporer who wore no clothes, we close our eyes to the reality of the situation and have been convinced that we are too incompetent or stupid to see the invisible.

Do you hear the people sing, singing a song of angry men...

 But somewhere in the distance, hope flickers. A voice is sounding that has yet to be silenced, either by the liberal media or the impassive public. It is a voice crying out for change, for a better world, for accountability, for responsibility. It is a voice that is tired of passing blame, of delaying action, of ignoring the obvious. It is a voice that demands reason from our leaders, unity from our citizens, and the accountability of all men to pull their fair share.

Will you join in our crusade?
Who will be strong and stand with me?
Beyond the barricade
Is there a world you long to see?
Then join in the fight
That will give you the right to be free!

We were once a nation that prided itself on opportunity, on freedom, on the ability of every man to find success through hard work and innovation.  The muscle and strength of our country was built on the sweat and toil of a people who were proud to work and would never bear the shame of taking a handout that was not needed. We were honored to help those in need, but that help was better served by giving them a job rather than a blank check. Self-worth was preserved and dignity was restored when the hand was given to pull someone up rather than to hold them down. We didn't spend what we didn't have, and we didn't take what we didn't earn. Our leaders were public servants, not public leeches bleeding a nation into apoplexy. The Constitution was a document meant to preserve the freedom of the people, not empower an elite group of rulers to dictate oppressive regulations on the masses. We have deviated so far from the dream of our founding fathers that our country is hardly recognizable as the America of their visions, the land of the free and the home of the brave.  I close my eyes and dream that one day, we will become the great nation we once were.

 I had a dream my life would be
So different from this hell I'm living,
So different now from what it seemed...
Now life has killed the dream I dreamed...*




Lyrics from the musical "Les Miserables"
Music: Claude Michel Schonberg
Lyrics: Herbert Kretzmer
Based on Les Miserables by Victor Hugo