Guest Blogger!

Dear Millie,

It has been over a week since I saw you for the last time.  When my lady took me out to pee, I was so happy to see you!  I'm sorry that I got so excited...you know I have that tendency to jump all over you, tangle up our leashes and squish you a little bit. But you are so tiny!  I can't help it that I've been growing so much.  And also my people are pretty calm.  I mean there's the occasional apartment tennis game or when my people clap their hands and I run the combine through the living room, but other than that, it gets kinda boring and I get excited to see another of my own species.  You know what I mean right?
How do you like living in San Antonio?  Too bad you have the Spurs and we have the Mavericks.  Do you still use the little crate I gave you or do you have a lot of room to run around in the country now?  I don't think I have ever been to San Antonio but I know for a fact that I love to run around.  I hope you meet some other cool dogs at your new home. Maybe a big strapping Mastiff! Or, maybe not.
Did you see that new leash I was wearing? My man got it for me. Honestly Millie, tell me what you think!  When he brought it home, my lady laughed!  Did you think it was silly?  I am growing up after all.  Should I have a leash that has a string of faux hot dogs on it?  With all the "Weiner" jokes on the internet from that dumb politics man, I don't know if I should be making such a statement, you know?  My man thinks it's funny, I know it.  He told my lady it distracts me from chewing on my leash, which, as you know, is virtually impossible. I guess it's not too bad though.  The Fake Franks give me something to nibble on while my man gets his shoes on. That can take awhile!  He won't let me chew those for sure.  He talks about 'vibrams' and 'barefeet' all the time, whatever that means.  But with the landmines other people's dogs leave behind at our apartment, he needs some kind of shoes, right?  Not that you or I ever left any messes around! LOL!
My lady came home the other day with shopping bags.  She NEVER goes shopping!  My man brings me things most of the time.  So I didn't get my hopes up but suddenly there was a familiar squeak!  She bought me a soft squeaker toy!  It was (yes, was...I have already very effectively destroyed it!) a small brown animal that looked like a cross between a dog and a porcupine.  VERY tasty and such a gratifying noise! White fluffy stuffing everywhere!! LOVED it!  Not only that though, she finally bought me REAL bowls for my food and water.  I mean, what? I've been here for like 8 months!  Don't you think it was about time for that?  Using the green people bowls they use for their weird food was a little humiliating.  Be thankful you never had to see that.  But the new bowls are gorgeous!  Light blue and brown, ceramic, big enough for my jowly snout! When my lady put them down on the floor I went right over to check them out. What a surprise I got when I saw that there was a biscuit at the bottom of the water bowl!  Ooooh, it looked so good, but Millie, I tell you, I almost drowned trying to get to that bone!  My man and lady laughed and laughed until I realized the joke was on me...the bone is part of the bowl!  Embarrassing!  I did get some satisfaction from the fact that I made an enormous puddle on the kitchen floor that my lady had to mop up.  With MY yellow towel.  Oh, well I guess it's the thought that counts.
Well, I'd better get going. I have a lot going on today...I see that I have some fuzz still left on one of my tennis balls, gotta get to that.  Then I have an important date with the cool tile floor in the kitchen. It's been over over 100 degrees for days here; I can only imagine how hot it is in San Antonio!  And after I spend awhile looking out the window at the parking lot, I think I'm going to get a Kong filled with almond butter and cookies.  No, Millie, of course not the people kind, she only makes those for people!  I have my own.
I miss you already!  Try hard not to make a mess in the living room like that last time I saw you!  Oh, boy was your lady mad!

Chow!  Haha!

Love, Bella Merriam

PS  Here is a recent picture of me destroying a squeaky chicken. With the dumb faces they put on these toys, who wouldn't want to chew them off?! BTW,  those green bones my people get me are really keeping my teeth white aren't they?

PPS.  One thing you can be grateful for...since you moved you don't have to deal with that Basset Hound in the next building...she is not very friendly! And with how looooong it takes her to go around a corner, you think she'd be a little more humble!

A Father's Day Toast

Forty years ago this September, something tragic and immensely impactful happened, to me and my entire family.  The ripple is still spreading, even all these years later.

Forty years ago, I was 6 years old.  My parents had moved quickly when growing their family...by age 6 I already had 5 younger siblings. My parents had known each other their entire lives, but had been married just 7 years.  My Mom stayed at home with us, which is what most moms did then.  My Dad was a gifted mechanic who worked both as an employee and on his own.

After dinner on September 22nd, 1971, my Dad kissed my Mom and headed out the door to help fix a friend's VW Beetle.

He never came home.

Details remain murky to this day...no specific cause was ever determined...but the long and short of it is this; my Dad was at the wheel as he and a friend headed home after repairing the car.  The Beetle failed to negotiate a curve and struck a huge tree.  My Dad was killed instantly. A brief lifetime, 27 years, snuffed out just like that.

A ripple had begun.

I was of course young, we all were. I remember a few details of that night as they impacted me, but most of what my Mom felt I couldn't fully comprehend until I was much older.  However, I can tell you this with clarity;

My Mom did not cave in.

She somehow found a way to keep going, to continue parenting, and to find herself.  This necessary new version of Ann, now a widow at 27, with six small children, figured out how to soldier on.

Some time much later, my Mom's good friend Jeanne convinced her one night to go out for a drink or two. And it was here that the ripple continued.  For it was that night, in a nightclub called The Dial Tone, that my Mom met the man we now call Dad.

He was oh, so young!  Celebrating his 21st birthday! He and my Mom caught each other's eye somehow.  Those details belong to my Mom and Dad alone.  I just know that a ripple brought them together that night. And that night changed my life...all of our lives.

I remember meeting Eric (as I called him for several years).  I came home from school one day and he was there.  I had never seen a man with a ponytail!  It hung halfway down his back.  His beard was reddish and bushy. I remember showing him some of my toys.  I remember liking him.

I don't know much about their courtship.  I just know that I remember very little of my life that didn't have him in it.  I know that he made my Mom so happy...she just lit up when he was around. I know that, thinking back, it's incredible that a 21-year-old guy would take on the responsibility of six small children when he decided he couldn't live without my Mom.  I know that I love him very, very much.

Losing a parent at such a young age is a defining event.  The key is, what is the definition?  What path to take? What ripples to follow?  I could have had a completely miserable childhood; welfare, bad influences, neglect. I could have become a victim.  I didn't. What started with a horrendous circumstance has rippled forward with a positive outcome.  I lost my biological Dad, but, sad as that was, I am in many ways a better person today for having my 'step' Dad in my life.

The ripple that began with my DNA is what makes me me. The ensuing ripples that began with meeting my Dad as a little girl contribute greatly too.  I'm so grateful for the traits I share with my biological Dad...I'm handy with tools, I love to go fast in any vehicle, I have his brown eyes, big smile and sense of humor.  I am doubly fortunate to have had a Dad to grow up with...one who is so mellow and peaceful, gives the best hugs ever, introduced me to the joys of antique cars and flea markets, and helped give me and all my siblings a profoundly blessed life.

I raise my glass today! To the Dad I lost long ago and to the Dad I've had the privilege of knowing and loving for all these years.  Happy Father's Day to two exceptional fathers, from one very lucky and grateful daughter.

Cheers!

With so much love and gratitude,

Pamela Jean

Decisions

Last summer, an enormous ripple was set into play when LeBron James made "The Decision" public.  He made a big spectacle of his choice to move to another basketball team.  The ripple was immediate and huge. The decision to switch teams, in itself, was a no-brainer in my opinion.  He wants to win an NBA championship.  The chances he'd do it with his previous team, the Cleveland Cavaliers, were slim. In order to achieve his personal sports goals, he had to make a decision. He decided to 'take his talents' to the Miami Heat.  Here's where the ripples diverge.

On the one hand, you have a man who needs to decide what to do career-wise.  Just like any other bread-winner, a lot of factors go into such a choice.  What would be best for his family?  What would be best for him personally? What would he leave behind? The choice he makes here would ripple throughout his family's lives for the duration of them. In this case, at least on paper, he chose well.

On the other hand, you have a superb athlete with aspirations of super-stardom. He sees that sports give him a relatively short window in which to achieve championship level play. LeBron wants to see his name listed among the greats of this game.  He wants championship rings on several fingers.  His skills fully support that thinking; his team's capabilities did not. This decision also rings true, on paper.

LeBron the man, for all I know, is loving life in Miami.  Hopefully his family is too.  I have no idea of the financial particulars of his new contract but I'm sure his family is being very well provided for. "The Decision", at least in this direction, has started a series of ripples that make sense for them all.

LeBron the basketball superstar, however, is still, one year later, recovering from the ripples he put into play with  "The Decision".  With his choice to broadcast his career move on live television, he turned many a sports fan away.  His shameless self-promotion started a flood of ripples outward that quickly reversed and swamped him.  His now former team felt betrayed. The way the Cavaliers played in the wake of LeBron's 'defection' certainly reflects that ripple.  His home city and state also felt let down...everything from burning his jersey in the street to achieving new heights of creativity with anti-LeBron signs when the Heat visited Cleveland reflects that ripple. A man previously admired not only for his basketball skills but for his personality and on-screen presence was shocked to find himself hated. That last ripple had to be a hard one to swallow.

"The Decision" = Diverse and Widespread Ripples; not all of them positive.

We all make decisions, from the miniscule to the all-encompassing, every second we're awake.  From what to have for breakfast all the way on up to deciding if our country needs to go to war, we are deciding. Choosing. Opting. And rippling.  "If I have a donut for breakfast, the ripples will be..."  "If I don't save enough money to retire, the ripples will be..." "If I engage our country in war, the ripples will be..."

The key here, of course, is in the awareness.  To some degree, the ripple can be controlled, if you make a decision with awareness and thought.  "A donut will make me sleepy and starving by 9:15...not to mention chubby...not a good option...not a good ripple."  And so on.

To take it further though, and certainly more importantly, how will the decisions we make impact others?

There are some ripples that simply can't be predicted.  When you make a decision, sometimes there are miserable ripples set into motion, one that you didn't want or anticipate. Ripples that can cause pain.  I'm sure LeBron was completely blindsided by the backlash from "The Decision". I am pretty sure that he didn't intend to infuriate and ostracize his fans.  As the ripples have faded some, he's recovered some ground. It's been over a year now.  Just look how far the impact of that ripple has traveled.

All of us have made decisions, choices, that have rippled poorly, whether on us or on those we love. Whether the choices have been naive, negligent or just plain stupid, it happens and it sucks.  It's a part of life to learn and grow by falling down and getting back up again; by making mistakes and hopefully learning not to repeat them.  The pain we feel or that we unintentionally subject others to is hard to accept.

But we can go forward, by starting our own new ripple.  If we've made poor decisions, ones that have caused pain, we can vow to avoid those mistakes going forward.  If we've been impacted by the ripple of someone else's poor decisions, we can also find a way to send out our own ripple.  We can start a fresh line of thinking, one that's focused and positive.  We can control how we act and react so we don't perpetuate an inadvertently negative ripple.  We can start our own flow of positivity, create our own ripple of thoughtful awareness, so that we know in our hearts that we aren't intentionally swamping anyone with the effects of careless actions or negative thoughts.  

We can decide.