Journey of Grief and Dog Parade

Today . I'm going to continue telling you about my journey of grief , but keep listening . I'm also going to share my experiences today with our dog , our dog Brownie , at the neighborhood dog parade . So it's going to end positively and it's going to be a good story . So I hope you'll stay tuned for the whole episode . And , again , I'm going to forego the intro and outro , the perky music . I'm getting to the point where I think I can bring it back . I'm getting to the point where I think I can bring it back , but right now my heart still feels heavy and so I'm going to keep it out for now .

An author , she's an American philosopher , and I found this quote on a friend's Facebook post , Lydia , who I've spoken about before and who is on her own journey of grief . I believe she's one of my listeners . I'm very grateful for my listeners and Lydia's been a listener . So hi , Lydia . But I found this quote on her Facebook post and I saw the end of it and it already captured my attention , but I couldn't read it at the time because sometimes it's just too much for me to take these things in . I'm promising myself that I'm not going to cry , or try not to cry today , so I went back when I was feeling braver and I read the whole quote and for me and as I've shared with you before , I've been on many journeys of grief . I've experienced many great losses in my life so far and I've become sort of I call it a connoisseur of grief because I've really tried to work through I laugh at myself when I say that , but working through your grief is such an important part of getting through life and it's such an important part of learning how to live fully , I feel like . And so , being a connoisseur of grief , I've really sought out what people have shared about their own journeys of grief , right ? So when I went back and I read this quote that she had posted because she was having a day where the loss of her mother about a year ago had really hit her and that's how grief gets you Some days you'll be okay and other days it hits you and you're not okay . So when I went back and I read this whole quote , I was like , oh my gosh , this explains . This explains kind of exactly how I feel about the loss of Dallas . It encapsulates everything that I feel and I know how I feel , right . But for some reason , reading it and having words to put to it makes it . Does it make it better ? No , it doesn't make it better , but it just it helps to . I guess it helps to process it right . I don't know , nothing ever helps , but because it's grief , it's grief . So I'm going to read this for you now and I hope that you'll really listen to it , but I'll also post it on my social media for the podcast , because I think it's so powerful .

When we lose certain people or when we are dispossessed from a place or a community , we may simply feel that we are undergoing something temporary , that mourning will be over and some restoration of prior order will be achieved . But maybe when we undergo what we do , something about who we are is revealed , something that delineates the ties we have to others , that shows us that these ties constitute what we are , ties or bonds that compose us . It is not as if an I quote unquote I exists independently over here and then simply loses a quote unquote you over there , especially if the attachment to quote unquote you is part of what composes who quote unquote I am . If I lose you under these conditions , then I not only mourn the loss , but I become inscrutable to myself . Who am I without you ? When we lose some of these ties by which we are constituted , we do not know who we are or what to do . On one level , who we are or what to do On one level , I think I have lost you , only to discover that I have gone missing as well . Let me read that last line again On one level , I think I have lost you , only to discover that I have gone missing as well . This is from Judith Butler's book Precarious Life Powers of Mourning and Violence , and that last line really sums up how I feel right now . I feel like I have lost my beloved Dallas , but I feel like I've lost myself in the process , and I think that this is such a powerful statement because I know that I've lost . Statement because I know that I've lost . You know you've lost . Sometimes you lose a place , right , you lose your place where you live , or you lose a business , or , because of that , you lose your community . So I just thought that this was a very powerful , powerful statement . Um . So thank you , lydia , for pointing that out for me and bringing it into my consciousness and everyone else's who listens .

Share photos with for Dallas , his caretaker , who was just such a wonderful man and somebody else who really helped me with Dallas and I wanted to put together some pictures of Dallas as a keepsake for them and a thank you , part of a way of thanking them for their help . And I've really struggled because I started off looking through some pictures I have just hundreds of pictures of Dallas and I wanted to go and get them printed up . I got the frames , get them printed up . I got the frames and I can't finish it right now and I feel so bad because I'm kind of just stuck . And I was talking to Bill about this and I mentioned how I feel and he was very kind to me . He said don't worry about it . When it's right you'll finish it . There's no hurry , and I was really happy that he'm at .

I guess when I fell a couple was it three weeks ago , two weeks ago , I guess it was three weeks ago . My knees still hurt a lot . I have a lot of edema in one knee but I'm managing okay . I was really distracted and now my way of getting through is to be distracted and to have distractions to keep my mind occupied , and so today's distraction was going to the quote-unquote dog parade up at the park that we have here in the neighborhood . Every year there's a dog . They call it the dog parade , but it's like an event for all the neighborhood people . In our canyon I think we have about 700 homes here and we have a very active neighborhood group that they've formed . I don't know how long ago it was , but every April they have the dog parade and so people come out with their dogs and they have what they call a dog parade through the park . They line us up and you walk your dog through and all the dogs . It's a social event for the people as well as the dogs . There's an agility course and there's a competition for tricks . So I took Brownie today because I'm usually not up and around early enough most years to go , but this year I was up and feeling good because my whole schedule's changed . Because of my work schedule I'm usually not a morning person , but it's a pretty day , it's not raining , and so I thought , you know , we'll go and check it out and see what it is .

Brownie's not been the most sociable dog , can I say , since we got her . When we first had her she was very wary of strangers . She was initially good with other dogs , but then we had an incident where when we lived in the apartments there was a big Samoan dog that got loose from its owner and I think it was trying to play with her but ran over , kind of attacked her . I couldn't see Brownie anymore and she was yelping because she was buried by this you know , 100 pound dog . She's 14 pounds and so since then she's been very wary of big dogs , scared of them and that's , you know that's hard . So she , she , you know I didn't know how that would go , but she did really good . She , you know I didn't know how that would go , but she did really good . She , you know , interacted with the dogs that were her size . She was a little wary of the bigger dogs .

There was like a Basset hound , there was a Greyhound , there were some labs , there was a big fluffy dog I don't know if it was a snickerdoodle or a I don't know what you call them anymore but a big , or maybe it was a poodle , mix Poodle . I guess that's a snickerdoodle , right ? Is that a snicker ? Am I thinking of the cookie ? I don't know . Anyway , a golden doodle . Anyway , big dogs , and nobody was aggressive , which was good . They had cookies , dog biscuits , so that kind of helped .

So we did the dog parade . She wore her little security t-shirt . It says security on the back . Everybody got a kick out of that . And then I thought maybe we were a shoe-in for the costume contest because there was only two dogs that were wearing costumes . They were dinosaurs , but I didn't realize there was another one with a bandit mask on . So we didn't ace the costume contest but we didn't do the tricks , because we don't really do tricks very well , although she does give us a hug when we ask her . But I thought the pressure of competition would be too hard on us .

And then they called our name in order for the dog parade and they said do you want to do the agility contest ? And I thought the agility course . And I thought now , going back to my terrors about PE class in school , I was not the most athletic and you have to realize I've had knee replacements . I don't run really . I mean , if there was a tragedy I wouldn't be able to run for my life . I could slowly jog perhaps .

But I said , okay , we had tried out part of the agility course when we were waiting around for things to happen and there's like a hoop thing to run through . There was a jump to jump over , like a little horse jump . And there were the flags . You know the eight flag stands to run over and Browning really wasn't having any of it . But I said , okay , well , you know , we'll go for it . And we , we did manage . I'm not sure what our time was .

The there was , the MC helped us with the hoop , I had a cookie in my hand which helped a little bit and we , well , I'll just say this there were dogs that did worse than we did . There were dogs that did worse than we did . So there you have it . So they gave out the award . They have awards . They gave out awards for certificates for best costume . We didn't win that . They gave out awards for best , oh , for the dog parade . We didn't win that . We don't know how to heal very well . So , yeah , uh , and they gave out awards for the tricks , I think , or for the anyway . Then I didn't realize . So I figured you know that the whole competition was rigged for people that knew . You know that we're the most popular in the neighborhood . But then they gave out certificates for best overall and to my surprise , in Brownie's amazement , we won second place . So yay , yay , brownie . So she's very proud of herself . At one point she did get tired and she started to jump on my leg which meant Mom , I'm tired of this , please pick me up and hold me . So she was like this is way too much socialization and interaction for me . I'm just tired of it . But she's very cute and so she did really well .

So even through it all , I tell myself that I'm thinking about my grief , even through it all while I'm at the park . But I know it's a good distraction and so I'm distracting myself and I know that's good . I guess it's good . I don't know . I can only take it one step at a time . I feel like I could sit in a dark room and watch Terms of Endearment and other sad movies . I could definitely find some sad dog movies . I could probably watch Old Yeller and what's that one about ? Some old dog movies , right , like the Purpose of a Dog or the Dog's Purpose , or oh , the Purpose of a Dog or the Dog's Purpose or something like that , or Runaway Dog , I don't know . I could sit there in a dark room and watch movies like that all day and just sob my heart out . But oh , and definitely no horse movies . But I just I don't know , I'm not sure where that would get me .

We did hear , thanks to a friend of mine . She texted me the other day and she sent me a link about some abandoned horses that were confiscated by animal control about 75 miles from here , about 75 miles from here , and you know we're a big rescue family . So I did look at the information and I found the Animal Shelters Facebook page and they have videos of them . They were all confiscated . Over 60 horses and 40 dogs were confiscated from the same owner . They were neglected and skinny , so they're up for adoption and I did send an

Update on Weekly Activities

email .

I tried to call but I don't know , not sure how I really feel about all that , but Not sure how I really feel about all that . But Bill was asking me well , what would happen and what would we do , and I said let's just see if they respond . First of all , one step at a time . I can't look too far down the road , but anyway , that's all I've got for today . Folks , I think that's pretty good . Um , the dog park , the dog parade , the dog agility course has left us feeling triumphant and a little tired , but we did get some good fresh air and next week I hope to share with you some more good news . I hope that you have a good week and thanks for joining us . I hope . I hope you have a good week . All right , take care .