GDB Alumni Reunion 2017

Here are a couple of memories from when I attended the GDB Alumni reunion in Nov 2017. This was the first reunion I have attended and it was fabulous. SO MANY LABS AND GOLDENS. One evening everyone was mingling in the lobby and I was on a couch and I said that I never get to be around goldens so I wanted to cuddle one and Marianne said that I should ask a puppy raiser named  Mary if I could say “hello” to her golden in training Theodore. They were standing nearby so I asked Mary and she said, “Sure.” She is telling me about Theo’s progress and how well behaved he is turning out to be and I started talking to him and having a great time. I stopped petting and leaned back into my seat and started talking to Marianne about goldens and then I leaned forward and continued petting Theo, I leaned in really close to his fluffy face and said to him that I thought he was going to make a great guide dog someday. I started feeling all nostalgic about this pup’s future ahead of him. Suddenly Marianne says, “Did you know you are talking to Racer right now? Theo left a while ago.” We both busted up laughing because Racer was just sitting there all cute probably wanting to say, what do you mean I’m going to make a great guide someday?? Aren’t I already?!!

Racer loved getting to spend time with his puppy raisers. Marianne came with me to the reunion and we shared a room. Racer usually sits at my feet. Basically where his human is, there Racer is. One morning Marianne was at the mirror doing her hair and I was sitting on the edge of the bed putting on shoes and Racer couldn’t decide which of his humans he wanted to be near so he picked a spot on the hotel room floor that was exactly half way between us. It was approximated 6 feet one direction to Marianne and 6 feet the other direction to where I was on the bed. He just sprawled out right there and he probably assumed he would be able to keep tabs on both of us that way.

Shannon also helped raise Racer. Often a puppy will spend time at two different homes and that way they get to experience a lot of different scenarios and home environments. When puppy raisers team up like that then they can share the time and responsibilities needed to teach the pup and it works out well. For example one of the raisers might have young children so the pup gets to experience that and the other raiser might have cats and birds. One of the families might live in an apartment and the other family might live in a home with a pool in the back. One raiser might work in an office so the pup will go with them to work and the other co-raiser will be a stay at home mom and will be taking the pup to soccer practice and piano recitals. The idea is that these pups will grow up being all the more flexible if they experience a few different environments. After the reunion we got to go to breakfast with Shannon and visit with her at her home. Racer was so excited to see her and her familiar home and he remembered everything. It was great to see how excited he gets when he is reunited with one of his raisers. Shannon hadn’t seen Racer and me (besides photos) since the graduation in 2015. It was a great reunion. Racer got to pal around with Kahuna a nine month old yellow lab that Shannon is raising. Racer even tried to crawl in Kahuna’s crate, formerly known as Racer’s crate.

One last funny thing that happened was that Marianne had brought a fleece mat/bed for Racer to use at the hotel. The last night we had checked out of the hotel and were staying at Marianne’s new house. It was early evening and we were all visiting and relaxing with her family and Marianne looks over and she sees Racer who had gotten tired and didn’t know where he should go to sleep in this place   so he had found the mat that he slept on at the hotel but it was folded in half and leaning in a corner by the door. Racer had tried his best to climb up onto it and was trying to sleep. It was quite hilarious and from what I understand he was all off balance and teetering trying to stay on it, but what a good boy for finding a bed. We all started using the line, “nobody puts baby in a corner!”

I am really grateful for all the fun people I have met through GDB. Marianne and Shannon and other puppy raisers around the country, and all the trainers and instructors, and of course all the guide dog handlers and the pups themselves. It is a really great community.

The Racer

On the way to the bus stop a house on the corner in my neighborhood must have gotten new sprinklers because out of the blue they are on every morning now and shooting 6 feet in the air. Well ok, more like 5 feet 5 inches because I’m getting drenched from head to toe when I walk by in the morning. I could handle this ok if it weren’t for my dog running to get past them. Instead of Racer the marathoner he becomes Racer the 50 yard dasher! Racer does not like sprinklers. Oh and did I mention that these sprinklers are also on the corner so it’s right at a curb that we should be stopping at and while we are stopped I am supposed to then leisurely tell my dog that it is ok to proceed forward. Well my dog bolts past the downpour and never stops for the curb because how can he think about an insignificant thing such as a curb when he is trying to save us from a sprinkler attack. It is a residential street so there aren’t any cars around but seriously. It puts me in a precarious situation. I don’t really want to be sprinting towards a curb that I might twist my ankle on. So I guess from now on I will cross to the other side of the street before we even get to this street. It’s annoying to think that there is only 3 minutes during the day when these sprinklers are being a problem to a blind person and it is those 3 minutes that they are on. If the home owner picked any of the other 23 hours and 57 minutes to run his sprinklers it would be no problem.

 

 

“It’s what we’re all trying to do, right? Remember a time that was better. Re-create a moment of that memory as we let the crisp Coke bubble down our throats. Riding bikes on a summer day. Sitting on the curb and watching the streetlights come on. Playing in the sprinklers with a group of neighbor kids. We’re all trying to salvage a time when we dreamed beyond our reality and thought monsters were under our beds instead of peppering our family trees. We’re trying to harness those fleeting moments that turned our ordinary lives into something extraordinary. In the sepia haze of those memories, we are beautiful.” ~ Liza Palmer

 

Pet Smart

We recently went to the Pet Store to get a name tag for Racer’s Collar. The print on his old one was wearing off because we had forgotten to place the protective plastic covering on it. We stood at the machine as it was made and then we leaned over my dog to clip it onto his collar. Racer was standing very still as we hovered over him. Meanwhile a fluffy dog sneaks up and sniffs my dogs butt! Racer turns his head quickly to see who the visitor is. I imagined my dog saying, “excusez-Moi! Do you mind?” Nothing like a cold wet nose in your butt to get your attention. Before any of us could respond the dog and his human darted down an aisle. Racer I guess it was a drive by sniffing!

 

“You can never tell about a person by guessing...that's why language was invented. Otherwise, we'd all be like dogs, sniffing each other to find out where we stood.” ~Alice Hoffman   

Freudian slips or are you just blind?

When I was in my twenties and had some pretty good vision but had to start using a cane, I became friends with Kyle who had lost his sight from diabetes. He was the first person who I connected with who was totally blind and had a guide dog, well the dog was from the Seeing Eye to be exact. I would talk to Kyle about losing all of his sight and He said that when his vision was going there was a period of time when he had a tiny bit left but it just made him confused and he was relieved to just lose the sight completely. I couldn’t imagine wanting to lose whatever vision I had remaining. Honestly I feel at ease now that I am a total. I was constantly trying to figure out if I would be able to see something with this amount of light or that amount of magnification. I used to leave for work and freak out if I couldn’t find a magnifier that I needed to function. I was constantly trying to tell people what I could or couldn’t see. I had a software program that magnified my computer screen called zoom text and I would sit with my nose up to the computer. I was using Facebook then and when old status updates come up from years past I cringe because almost every post has a typo. Reading the “on this day” section of Facebook is supposed to be nostalgic but I just cringe. Today one popped up from 2009 and I had written that the weather put me in a bed mood. I am pretty sure I was trying to say bad mood. Then there was the time that I posted that I was attending a gluten free sexpo when really it was an expo. I am sure this was because of my eyesight and not Freudian slips although I have heard a joke that once you make one Freudian slip it’s just one after a mother. I was getting my under grad during this time of visual impairment so I bet I had some big typos in my assignments because spell check doesn’t get everything. I am not claiming that I never make typos now but since I use speech software on my computer I can catch misspellings better because it will read the misspelled word really strangely and my ear catches it. It’s unique to be on both sides of blindness. The times where I was clinging to a little bit of sight and now when I am totally blind. I can really see what Kyle meant and it’s ok. Even though I am saying all of this now I don’t think my earlier self would believe me on this issue. We only know our experience and I hadn’t gone totally blind then so I would never believe that I would feel this way. Also I am always thinking about the psychology of things, is this a way of coping with blindness? Here I am writing a post about how ok I am with blindness. I am open to that idea. Sure it is painful to not see photos anymore or not be able to enjoy an art show like I used to. I also can’t enjoy interior decorating shows. Is my brain telling myself that it’s not that bad to be blind so that I can handle it? Hmmm. Something to ponder.   

RIP Kyle. You went too soon. I miss hanging out with you and your sweet guide Toledo. Your kidneys and pancreas failed you and I don’t know why some people aren’t allowed to live a long life. When you receive a guide dog you are always thinking about the day when you might have to retire the dog but I don’t think people really think that it might be their dog that outlives them and their dog will be sitting so stoic, at their funeral, greeting their friends and family.         

A Walk With Racer

We went for our usual early morning walk and chose a route we haven’t done in a few weeks. We were walking along and Racer stopped which usually means there is an obstacle in our path, i.e. overgrown bush or someone’s lawn tools or anything people leave on a sidewalk. Sometimes he stops me though and it is just because he thinks it is time for a treat because he is such a good dog. It is up to me to figure out why he stopped.  I reach a hand in front of us but I couldn’t tell anything was in our way so I said, “Let’s go” and Racer immediately placed a paw on my foot. It was so super cute. I then reached up high and there was a leafy twig sticking out about to hit me in the eyes. He is such a good guide dog. He has improved so much. I don’t know if it is him that has improved or if I have improved my handling skills or if it is just that we are better in tune to each other. I love it though and these are definitely the good years right now so I want to document these great experiences so I don’t forget them.

Let Sleeping Dogs Lie

Racer has a nice bed under my desk at work and another one at home in the living room. In the corner of my bedroom though we only have a huge dog pillow for a bed and it started wearing out and got a hole in it so we went to the pet store to see what we could find. We decided on a fluffy bed and the price seemed too good to pass up. When we got to the cashier though he told us it was double the price of what we had expected because it had been put on the wrong shelf. I had already fallen in love with it and just decided to buy it anyway. The cashier told us if Racer didn’t like it we could bring it back. We got home and put it in place and it seemed way too over stuffed and puffy. Racer stepped onto it and wagged his tail and settled in. Good sign! I walked into the kitchen and started the microwave. I walked back to the bed and reached down to pat Racer but he was outside the bed lying down. I placed my hand on the new bed and said, “Racer, do you like your new bed?” and he stood up and got back into it. The microwave beeped and I went back to the kitchen to check on the food. I came back into the bedroom and once again Racer was outside the bed lying on the carpet. Hmmm, I sighed. My phone rings and my boyfriend says that he thinks the bed was too expensive and we should take it back and I agreed. Racer just wasn’t taking to it. Back in the car we go, and we find a bed that is more the same style of our other beds and it is 15 dollars cheaper so we get home and try again. Racer steps onto it and wags his tail, lies down and stays there. I go into my computer room and get online. Racer usually follows me into the office but he stayed in his bed. Good sign. After about twenty minutes he walks into the computer room to check on me and I finish typing and we both walk into the bedroom. I start folding clothes and he looks at his new bed and runs toward it wagging his tail and jumps on it greeting it as if it is a long lost friend that he hasn’t seen in ages. YAY! Usually in the middle of the night Racer gets out of his bed and walks over to where I’m sleeping and rubs his nose with mine and then runs back to his bed and falls asleep. I think it is super cute but it wakes me up and sometimes I can’t fall back asleep. The first night with his new bed, he stays there all night and never wakes me up with his nose. I do however wake up once during the night because I can hear him snoring loudly. He usually isn’t a loud snorer but I laugh to myself because I think he really is taking to his new bed. Success Finally!   

Purple Booties

We went to the Utah Arts Festival last night. We put on Racer’s cute purple disposable booties to protect his paws from the hot pavement. The temps were in the 90’s. We stayed in the shade the entire time and listened to music. We bought some food and I put a bowl of water down for Racer and after he drank from it he proceeded to lie down on the water. He didn’t exactly lay his face in the bowl but he positioned himself so that his neck was in the water. When we stood up, I felt his cold dripping neck and said, “What a good idea Racer.” He had stopped panting. Last year at the Arts Festival I remember hearing lots of people walk by us and say things like, “what a cute dog.” This year it was all about the booties. “Look at his cute purple mitts” “Ahh did you see those paws!” I think about twelve people stopped and asked if they could pet him and we told them no. We got the chance to educate people about why it is best not to pet service dogs. Bob said it was just funny to see people walking by and they would be frowning and then they would suddenly see Racer and his cute purple booties and a big smile would emerge. A couple of people asked if they could take his picture. Racer definitely steals the show wherever we go. He is our little celebrity.