Today, for the first time, we took Diana to the Blessing of the Pets at our church. As you may already know - because I've said it before - Diana hates cats. She really, really hates them.
She's a good dog with people. She has never, ever growled or snapped at a human, not even at my grandchildren when they were young and annoying - not ever. But she is vicious about cats. We were afraid that she would make trouble at the ceremony if cats were present.
We decided to give it a try today, and it worked fine. There were no cats there.
She did embarrass me twice. She pooped on the lawn, and I had forgotten to carry a plastic bag with me, but fortunately another person there had a supply, so I cleaned up.
Then came the real hurt. One member of our church had taken the trouble to make home-made doggie treats, darling little bone-shaped things that looked good enough for humans to eat, and probably were, but DIANA TURNED UP HER NOSE AT THE TREATS! How mortifying.
Anyway, now that God's blessing is upon her, I'm expecting great things. I'm hoping that she will obey us in the future. She has not for nine and one-half years, but Jesus has said all things are possible for those who believe.
Diana was found with an arrow through her leg and taken to the animal rescue folks. After the vet removed the arrow, and she was spayed, the local paper ran a picture of her on the front page.
Our previous dog, Rusty the Wonder Dog, had died of lymphoma about six months before, and when I saw her picture and read her story, I asked my husband if we could adopt her. He agreed, and here she is, nine and a half years later.
If I had a scanner, I'd show you the picture that was in the local paper of me picking her up from the vet. Since the newspaper had showed her looking for a home, they wanted to show her finding a home.
Grandmère, it's a blessing, not a personality transplant.
ReplyDeleteFor reasons I explained at OCICBW, The Wiener cannot go and get an official blessing. He has to settle for the blessing of living with his two boys, which I assure you, is all blessing for him. Of course, he does not think that is true when each Saturday morning he gets his eyes and ears flushed, anal glands expressed, washed with a medicated shampoo, and nails trimmed. Low maintenance, he is not.
Oh, btw, this morning I met with the head acolyte at St. Mark's in Seattle where we attend as I'm volunteering to help out in that area. So, at age 48, I'll get my first shot at being an acolyte. I guess better late than never.
ReplyDeleteMimi,
ReplyDeleteOur family of 6 rescued dogs and one rescued blind goat (tis true)says,"Way to go Diana!" Blessings on all of God's creatures.
KJ: I am, in fact, married to the world's oldest acolyte . Mr. J is 60 and is our "permanent" acolyte/crucifer in our parish! It is a relief not to have to worry that he will make faces or play with hot candle wax during the service as I had to when our two boys were growing up. He does nod off every now and then though. I just clear my throat very loudly from the pews and he wakes right up! The priest never even notices. You will do fine.
amyj
A blessed dog with her blessed owners. What could be better?
ReplyDeleteKJ, I am expecting a personality transplant. Are you telling me not to believe the Gospel?
ReplyDeleteCongratulations to you. I'm sure you'll do fine as an acolyte.
Take Amy's husband as an example. He's still going strong at 60, except for the occasional nodding off.
Amy, a blind Goat? God bless you for that. Diana is blind in one eye, due to glaucoma and cataracts. Her monthly medication bill for the glaucoma is quite high. No co-pay there.
LJ, sometimes we wonder about our "blessing", but commitment is commitment.
At one time we had six cats and one dog, all rescued.
Congratulations to Diana!
ReplyDeleteI have a cute dog story from church which I will tell either tonight when I finish my homework (Ugh - who says professors don't have homework? and under what illusion was Barbara Brown Taylor when she thought moving to a liberal arts college would be less stressful than the parish?! or maybe they're really coddling her at her place and she has a secretary and only one or two courses to teach every semester. We have three courses per semesters and no secretary.) or tomorrow.
Maya Pavlova is not going to go to our blessing of the pets next Sunday (we have ours on the Sunday after St. Francis Day). Too many dogs. Not that she doesn't like dogs. But she is very active and she would end up on the altar if she were out of her cat carrier, and that would not be a good idea. And I don't really want to impose being in the cat carrier on her for two hours with all kinds of other critters around.
So I guess I'll bring a picture of her to the blessing.
I'll be watching for news of the personality transplant. Alleluia thank you Jesus!
I'm sure that Diana feels very blessed.
ReplyDeleteBella and Gatsby and Jackson (all asleep on the couch right now, and Bella is snoring very loudly) feel blessed whenever I come home from Costco with a humongous bag of rawhide treats.
By the way, keep young Jackson in your thoughts. He was jumping off the back porch to chase a tennis ball on Thursday and he twisted a toe (I'm not making this up!)
No breaks, not even a twisted ankle, just a twisted toe.
They gave him some pain med that knocks him out. He doesn't like it.
But he is walking around with his foot in the air and making the biggest effort for everyone to know he is in pain.
It seems to be better today. It is just fine for walking and running when he wants to play but when I wanted him to get off the bed so I could make it this morning he held up his paw to show me it hurts. So he spent the day on the couch (when he wasn't trying to go play in the backyard).
He is a 100 lb baby.
He would appreciate everyone knowing how hard it is for him right now.
Alleluia! Thank you, Jesus.
ReplyDeleteJane, I hope you have a tomorrow. I want to hear the story.
hey! our dog service isn't until next week. which might be a good thing because it absolutely poured this afternoon.
ReplyDeleteglad Diana got blessed! (too) Scout could use something lately.
ReplyDeleteDiane, some of our parishioners were surprised that the blessing was in September, as October is the traditional month. Maybe something else is going on next week.
ReplyDeleteWe had very nice weather.
Dennis, I'll send up a prayer for Jackson's toe.
ReplyDeletePoor 100 lb. baby. Jackson reminds me of someone else who's been under the weather lately, an English priest.
Mimi, a very instructive example of one of the foundations of modern behavioral psychology, the Harvard Law of Animal Behavior: "Under carefully controlled experimental circumstances, an animal will behave as it damned well pleases."
ReplyDeleteYour faith leave me in awe and shame, Grandmère. As you cited "all things are possible," I was thinking, hmm, and my namesake (nasty man with occasional good points) wrote "all things are lawful but not all things are expedient." Somehow my warped mind conflated all this so that while all things are possible not all things eventuate. Still, I would not wish to dsh your hopes. It is scary enough splashing holy water on critters.
ReplyDeleteMay Diana demonstrate new graces, that you may be vindicated, she may be glorified, and the rest of us may be encouraged.
Rick, I do know some dogs who obey their masters, but we have never succeeded. It's not the dogs. We are the problem.
ReplyDeletePaul, possible, lawful, expedient - it all runs together sometimes, doesn't it?
I'll let you know how it goes. At the moment she smells nice, too, because Grandpère gave her a bath in honor of the solemn event.
We thought of taking the ferrets to the pet-blessing they do at the church down the road, but I worried about other pets and the wisdom of encouraging interaction. Depending on the size of the dog, a ferret either looks like a tasty snack or a scary predator.
ReplyDeleteA.
Hi A. I think Diana would take the tasty treat view of the ferrets. I don't trust her around any small animals. She has gone after very small dogs, too, but she was on a leash, And I could drag her away.
ReplyDeleteIn the first year of her life, before we got her, who knows where she was or what happened to her.
Who cares if it poops or nails cats, which, after all, is what dogs do, isn't it? At least it's a good Episcopal dog, unlike these "Anglican", re-asserter, dogs MP's patronizing this week - talk about putting the CANA in Canine!
ReplyDeleteThe local cathedral (Upper SC) is doing the animal blessing this coming Sunday evening. Feel I should go, partly to show the flag and partly because it's a benefit for the shelter from which I got two of my three hounds. Not sure which of the three to take, tho'. The youngest, a b/w pointer, is full of joy, but still far too boisterous for company and the oldest, a chow (all three are bitches), the only remaining dog that I have raised from scratch, is old, heavy, blind and pretty-well immobile - so much so that she'll probably need to go in a wheel-barrow if at all. Only the middle dog is really suitable, but the poor old one is definitely most in need of a blessing. Which to take?
Lapin, from my heart, I'd have to say, "Get out the wheelbarrow". However, expediency might dictate taking the middle one.
ReplyDeleteMimi, last Sunday, I mean 8 days ago, one of our fairly new members, who has had a difficult life the last few years and is rebuilding inside and out, prayed for someone called Stella who had just had an aneurysm and was paralyzed. (After the formal part of the Prayers of the People we have open prayers and folks pray for all kinds of things, from the situation in Darfur to relatives with cancer.)
ReplyDeleteSo yesterday, a week later, she prays in heartfelt thanksgiving for Stella who after having an aneurysm has recovered in nothing short of a miracle and is no longer paralyzed.
I go up to her (either at the Peace or at Coffee Hour, I forget; we are a very huggy congregation so the Peace lasts a while) and say, "I'm so glad about your friend."
"Well," she says, "it's actually my friend's dog."
Oh, say I, well, I'm still glad.
So later --that was definitely at Coffee Hour, that second Sunday sacrament of the Episcopal Church-- she tells me the tale, how her friend is not a churchgoer, but she is a believer, and she was very touched that we prayed for the dog (who we did not know was a dog at the time we prayed for her) and how she (the friend) believes it is a miracle that the dog got better this week. (Note: the dog is still a little weak on her legs, but she is clearly on the mend, according to our parishioner.)
What's doubly sweet is that on and off (but not for the last few months) we had a dog in the congregation named Stella, but it's definitely not the same dog. (We must attract Stella dogs, you think it is because Mary the Mother of Jesus has sometimes been called the Star of the Sea, Stella Maris? Our Congregation is St. Mary's.) She (the Stella we know -- we don't know the one for whom this woman prayed) is a fine Dalmatian and she would come with her human, a man of a certain age who looked like he had a story and had not had an easy life, and she would very sweetly and calmly sit through the liturgy, sighing occasionally during the sermon and only getting up for the Peace to walk around and greet people. I'm serious. We are a species-inclusive congregation and at one time we had TWO dogs coming regularly.
Now no pets come on a regular basis but our Chaplain (we're a university chaplaincy as well as a regular congregation so we have a Chaplain rather than a Rector) just got a pooch and has apparently been bringing him to work on weekdays the past week. We'll meet him this coming Sunday when we are having the blessing of the animals and all the pets will appear, and a good number of pet pictures. I'll bring a picture --or maybe I should bring the blog! As I mentioned already, I would love to bring the splendid Miss Maya Pavlova in the flesh (and fur), but I know she would end up on the altar, or in a tangle (albeit a friendly one) with one of the dogs.
So that's my story.
Sorry to be so long-winded. And speaking of long-winded, I think I have a troll on my blog, but right now I am being polite. However, if he posts one more long discourse on you-know-what-issue and stays anonymous, I shall begin to delete. The posts are in the comments section of the post of Bishop Curry's response to the HoB.
Oh and by the way, Lapin, I'm with Mimi on the wheelbarrow.
And Dennis, warm thoughts and blessings to Jackson. How's the toe today?
Diana is beautiful! Thank you for blessing us with the picture of her.
ReplyDeleteI hate to break it to you, Mimi, but I think the point is that the animal should be blessed as she is, rather than as a way of making her more pliable for her humans! Still, one can hope ....
Jane! What a story! It's worth a post on your blog, and here it is buried in my comments.
ReplyDeletePraise the Lord for Stella's healing. God loves and cares for all his creatures.
I should have brought a camera to the pet blessing, but as I've grown older, I don't take many pictures. I'd rather be in the moment without concerning myself with getting the best shot of the moment.
Who the hell is going to want all my pictures anyway? Of course, I don't get prints any longer.
I had a couple of trollish types visit a long ago post of mine, religious zealots, who were trying to convert me. They may have been the same person, but one of them gave him/herself a name. I answered nicely once, but did not answer the subsequent comment, and they stopped. I had resolved to delete if they posted again. I'll have a look at yours.
Mary Clara, I know we must love accept our dogs as they are, but one can hope.
Have you seen "The Ambivalent Bond With a Ball of Fur" in today's NYT? Not wonderful, but worth a look, if only to check out the horror of the halloween costumes linked at Petsmart. I long since quit "training" my dogs, beyond such obvious necessities as furniture and garbage are not for chewing, food should not be taken from (or, in the case of humans, left on) countertops, and newspapers - always left out "just in case" - not rugs, should be used in emergency. Commodes ARE for drinking from in my house (far less trouble) so the humans should be trained to leave them clean - which they ought to know in any case.
ReplyDeleteI've never had a dog that did not subtly adapt to human needs as it aged, while teaching me a few tricks along the way, whereas the only two dogs I have ever had that were formally "trained", one by me, one "acquired" that way, spent their entire lives watching humans, waiting for the next cue as to how they should react. Not, to me, a good trait.
I'll see if I can get the old dog to church on Sunday, hoping not to give myself a heart attack in the process as I cart her around.
That's a wonderful story Grandmere Mimi. I am glad you are kind to dogs. But, speaking as a canine, don't get your hopes up on the obedience thing.
ReplyDeleteLove,
Rowan
Lapin, Rowan, the truth is that I've pretty much given up on the obedience thing.
ReplyDeleteEvery so often, Diana gets out of the yard if we're not careful with the gate, and she will not come back until she's ready. All the ordering her back in is in vain.
She comes back when she gets thirsty.
She was always good about doing her business outside and not jumping to get food off counters and such. No problems there at all. In many ways she is a lady. She won't even eat if we are watching her. She waits until we go away.
" ....the truth is that I've pretty much given up on the obedience thing." Clearly an Episcopal dog?
ReplyDeleteClearly, Lapin.
ReplyDelete