Living Blossoms

+ It's been one week since I said goodbye to my puppy. In some ways it feels like I can't believe it's already been a week without her, but mostly the sadness feels like it's been inside me for a long time. I haven't cried much lately; just a few things set me off. (Like, the last Project 365 pic I uploaded to Facebook was of her, three days before she died, and when I saw that I lost it. Could it have been that recently that she was with me, giving me that cute but annoyed, why-are-you-taking-my-picture-again look?) I miss her.

+ I had a photo shoot today! It was just a TFP shoot, but it was great. The photographer is fantastic; I swear there's not one picture on his website that, even if it's not my cup of tea, isn't excellent. The makeup artist made my eyes striking, melding lilac and black. First we did some more normal headshot pics, with normal hair and no adornment of any sort, and then we went nuts with the photographer's "vision". I had a feathery black collar/choker thing with clear beads that hung down and they used seemingly an entire can of hairspray on my hair as I stood with my hair upside down, so it was crazy. This hair was even weirder than the hair I had for the magazine shoot, I think. But from the side it looked awesome. Even from the front I think it worked. And they added this little black viney flower thing that went from my hair to my forehead that was just awesome. He showed me some of the pics and they're gorgeous. I can't wait to see the finished ones! This shoot was very good for my self esteem. I came in and he and the makeup artist looked at me and said, "Wow. You have an amazing face." And then they examined me closer and declared me "perfect" and decided my face "has no flaws". (Maybe they like scars?) All through the shoot he kept saying, "Gorgeous. Just gorgeous." I've never had a response like that before, LOL! I would say maybe he just knows praise is a good motivator, but I really think he meant it. Which is good - very good, in fact - because he has tons of contacts here, and in Atlanta and Miami. So here's hoping someone at a big city agency sees these pics and wants to hire me. Here is the sign of a good photographer though: he used one camera, the natural light from the window, and the wall of his apartment as the backdrop, and seriously, you would think we were in an expensive studio with professional lights everywhere. He did use a background light eventually, to highlight my hair, but still. Clearly he knows how to get fantastic results in any environment. Anyway - as soon as I get the pics, I'll show them to you. I'm sure I will make at least one of them into an LJ icon. Oh - and Isaac went with me because the photographer was a Scary Internet Man, and so he spent 3 hours this morning enjoying our beautiful 75º weather on a second story balcony overlooking the St. John's River, reading a school book and occasionally petting a sweet gray cat who was chillin' out there too.

+ Grandma will be here Saturday night! I'm so excited! Although I can't believe it's been 5-6 months since she left. Holy cow. Mom asked if I wanted to go up to MI with her (she flew up and then she will drive Grams down), and I almost said yes, but I decided I didn't really want to fly up just to spend the next two days driving. Plus, now I get to have the action movie night for Isaac's birthday and go to the Beatles Rock Band party at AAAC's house Saturday night. Oh - and the whole photo shoot today thing!

+ I think I set a personal couponing record last night. A bunch of coupons expired since it was the end of the month, and I wanted to get some free/cheap stuff. I figured since I was going two places, I might as well go to another. I went to CVS, Target, KMart, and then later I went to Winn-Dixie and Publix! AND I went to Walmart first, but for a prescription, not couponing. I haven't added up the W-D and P details yet, but for the CVS, T & KM trip I got $111 worth of stuff for $20. It was fantastic. Never before have I gone to 6 stores in one night though! It was tiring, but exhilarating. Saving money like that is always exhilarating. And now we have 10 bottles of juice in the cupboards. That should last Isaac, oh, about two weeks.  ;o)

I was 13 years old. It had been a year since my family had returned from vacation to find that our 3-year-old epileptic collie had died while we were gone. Even though I cried the most about losing her, I was the one ready soonest for another dog. Our small town's animal shelter was just a few blocks from our house, so over that year I went there many times. There were several dogs that I liked over that time, but I could never get my parents to go see any of them. I guess they weren't ready.

One day I went there and there was a new litter of mixed breed puppies just a month or two old. They were all adorable, but the one that stood out to me was the runt of the litter. At first she tried to fight her bigger siblings to get up to the front of the cage so she could get attention too, but they kept pushing her out of the way. She went a few feet back, sat down, and just looked at me with her ears back.

I was smitten. That night I went on and on to my parents about this little dog, and finally they agreed to go with me to see her. When we went into the little room where you can meet the dogs and play with them, I sat on the floor. As soon as the employee put this little dog down, she crawled into my lap and laid down. Oh boy, was I  smitten. It was then that we noticed that her tail was kind of candy cane-shaped; it had a crook at the end. It looked a little silly, but we thought it was cool, and certainly unique. The employee told us that some other people had looked at her but they decided they didn't like that crooked tail. Their loss.



We took that little puppy home with us. We went through a baby name book, and one name stood out to us: Mandy. She learned things very quickly; she was extremely intelligent and loving. She loved to sleep on blankets and pillows, and especially had a thing for "caves" - under beds or desks or anywhere, really, where she had a roof.

She even helped me with school...


Legally she was my parents' dog, but other than that she was mine. It seemed like she knew that I was the one who had found her and rescued her out of that place where she had to fight for attention and never got to eat any cheese (her favorite food). She and I had a special relationship. When I went away to college my mom kept the door to my room closed, but often found Mandy sleeping outside it. When college breaks were coming up, I would tell my friends, "I can't wait to see my dog! Oh - and my family." When I got married and lived 3 hours away, much of what I looked forward to on weekends we came up to visit my family was that I got to see her. And when Isaac and I moved to Jax and got our own little house, we began having "joint custody" with my parents; they got her half the week, and we got her half the week.

She approved of Isaac the first time she met him...
We taught her new tricks when she was 8 years old, disproving the adage about old dogs and new tricks. She had quite the repertoire, including a jumping 360º spin. She never seemed to age, but maybe that's because her face still looked like a puppy's. People were always shocked to hear her age. I remember one time when a man asked how old she is and I told him she was 11. He said, "11 months?" I said, "No, 11 years." He was shocked. It was relatively recently that my mom and I noticed that she somehow looked older. And it was even more recent that we noticed she didn't jump on the couch or to peek out the window like she used to. At the end of last week I noticed she was having trouble walking. Things degenerated quickly. The past few days she could not even stand. She kept getting stuck in corners. It was terrible. After watching her in pain, trying to help her as best I could, carrying her places... we realized it was time to say goodbye. I couldn't stand the thought of making her wait another 24 hours in pain like she had been, so with Mom's brokenhearted consent (but at least she had come to see her yesterday), Isaac and I took her to the vet. We held her and petted her till she was gone. I've never had to put a pet to sleep before. I hope I never do again. I still can't believe she's gone. She's been my companion since I was 13 years old. That's half my life. She was with me when I cried about boys as a teen, always waiting eagerly and loving me when I finally returned from college, comforted me when I cried because I missed Isaac and my favorite aunt died and my brothers did stupid things, and she totally knew which day was Sunday because even before I got there to pick her up to take her to my house, my parents said she would perk up and be out and about more than usual. If we came over on another day and didn't take her with us, she would be so disappointed.

She was the best dog ever. People often say that and it's usually a bias thing that you can't fault them for. But I've heard other people with dogs say that they wish their dog was more like Mandy. Numerous people regularly threatened to steal her. She won over avowed cat people (several said, "If all dogs were like her, I'd have one!") and people who claimed not to like dogs. One Christmas we were with family at a hotel, talking out in the lobby, and Mandy was with us. The hotel clerk said, "Boy, I wish the kids who stayed in this place were half as well-behaved as that dog!" You couldn't not love Mandy. And that's what makes saying goodbye so, so hard.

I keep trying to convince myself that she's just at my parents' like every other time I haven't had her with me, but it's not working. I saw her go. I held her. Even Isaac cried... and he never cries.


To those of you who prayed for her in her last days, thank you. It means a lot to me. Please keep praying for me and my mom and the rest of my family though. This has been really, really rough day.