Hello New World

I haven't blogged in about four months. My life has changed and shifted and turned and twisted. Right now I think I am living in the eye of the hurricane. My last post in December was so happy and hopeful. And not that everything that has happened to me has been bad. Some has been sad, some has been monumental and so much has been positive. But I quit blogging because I didn't want to write about my dog. But if I don't write about him I didn't think I could go on to anything else. If nothing else, writing should be cathartic, it is a way of moving on.

Without going into a lot of details, I lost my beloved dog, Gillie (Bubba) on New Years Day. This devastated my daughters, my niece, my son-in-law and myself. We are animal people. Our animals are our babies. Bubba was my shadow. When I was home, he would follow me from room to room, if I sat down, he would jump up and lay with me. If I laid down, he would get it just right so my feet were always warm. I talked to him non-stop and I know he understood every word I said to him. I told him I loved him - a lot - and I did. And he would look back at me and I knew he loved me. He told me so everytime he would come in a room, peak around the corner of the chair and run to me. He told me everytime when I was sad and he would come over and nuzzle my hand with his cold little wet nose, letting me know he was here for me.

Bubba was also Kate's best friend. If he wasn't with me, he was with her. We would sometimes vie for his attention just to see him go a little crazy trying to love us both. But if Katy sat next to me on the couch, or if I layed in her bed to watch TV with her, he would jump up and do his damnedest to wiggle into the middle. And we would crack up because he always got his way.

If I was gone he would go to bed with Katy, but the minute I came in the house he would race out to greet me then race up the stairs, jump on the bed and turn and wait for me to reach my room where I would find him with his eyes twinkling and his little pink tongue hanging out and looking at me as if to say "See Mom, I beat ya again!" The last year of his life I started to beat him as old age and arthritis took its toll. Or we would hobble up together after a long night of dancing. Niether one of us was getting any younger. We had stairs next to the beds so he could get up and down easier.

When I was about eight years old my best friend, Christie Collins, gave me a coloring book. It was called "The Pokey Puppy". On the cover was a little black dog with a smile on his face. I colored the whole book and can you believe that it is one of the few things from my childhood that I saved? I still have this silly coloring book 48 years later.

And my Bubba looked just like the puppy on the cover. It was fate that we had him in our family. Bubba was a Yorki-Poo about 24 pounds and came up to my knee's. And we were blessed with him loving us and protecting us and keeping us warm for 14 years. When we would come home, he would greet us at the door with a howl that sounded like he was being tortured, he would be so happy to see us. Then he would race to the treat closet and sit and stare at it because he knew he had been a good boy and he deserved a treat.

Two weeks before Bubba was killed (hit by a car) we had to put our Maine Coon cat, Simon, down. He had developed diabetes and several other ailments. He had weighed 26 pounds most of his life and he was down to 10. He was 15 years old. It was just a little too much for us to lose two of our babies in two weeks.

The house is so much quieter with out them. There is no more click-click-click of their tonails on the hardwood floor. Our one remaining cat, Ginger, our orange and white tabby spent several weeks looking for them. Ginger would wander from room to room howling. He became skittish and he was never a skittish cat. I watched our neighbors dog run right up to him. Ginger never moved a muscle. He just looked bored and the dog looked baffled. He turned from a cool cat into a needy cat. He lost both of his brothers and he doesn't know why. So now he follows me from room to room and has taken up the spot on the bed vacated by Bubba.

Then at the end of January, I lost my job. Reorganization. The bane of the American economy. I have worked since I graduated high school in 1972. With the exception of two short times where I stayed home and had my two daughters I have jumped out of bed at 5:15 and gone to work. And again, this is not a bad thing. I'm looking at many options including starting my own business. I am a firm believer in that when God does closes one door, another one opens.

But this time off is giving me the time to make some changes, create new visions, and new goals. I now spend my day looking for jobs. Who knew Craig's list had job openings, that blew my mind. I'm learning my way around the internet, I'm making contacts and I'm writing. I am taking steps to being an Entertainment Booking Agent. I bought my domain. I am setting up email to request gigs for the bands I am representing. I am creating press. I am creating templates and spread sheets. I set up business email, having business cards made, I went to Music Academy School to learn the music business, and I'm looking at web sites so that I will know exactly what I want when I start that creation.

And my life is happening. It is really happening, I know I am where I am supposed to be at this time and for that I am happy and grateful. God is giving me signs right and left. People are showing up in my life and giving me incredible gifts of friendship, guidance, visions, information and support. The sad, the bad, the happy, the positive and the mundane. But I just have to keep moving through life, creating life, processing life, experiencing life. As for all the above - Life Happens! Thank God! Thank Spirit! Thank the Goddesses!