I heart my cosmic family

Let me say this straight off: I love my family. I really do. 

But since I was a little girl, I've adopted people. I didn't always feel as though I belonged to the people I was related to. My childhood was kind of chaotic and unpredictable at times, and I didn't always feel safe. In fact, I felt down right alien - I was from another planet, and not many people understood my language. But there were a select few who did understand, and I would cling to them desperately - my life preservers on a planet I didn't fully comprehend. 

The problem with this practice, as you might expect, is that I am who I am; heart on my sleeve, all too loyal, and too ready to feel wanted - multiplied by 50 as a child. And I was hurt a lot as I flung my heart here and there. Turns out 5 year olds are not always the best judges of character. But I learned, and became much more discerning, much more careful. 

And 24 years later, I have a very wonderful, very amazing cosmic family. A family comprised of kindred spirits, parallel souls, and like minds. And they've stayed. These are not people that I talk to every day - I don't have to talk to them every day. They're just there, in my life. And when they need me, I'm there. And when I need them, they're here for me. They are my family, just as much as any of the people with whom I share chromosomes. 

I've been increasingly grateful for my cosmic family over the last few weeks. And I don't always get to tell them how much I love them, or what they mean to me. So I'm tossing this out into the cosmos. I'm grateful for you, you know who you are. I'm grateful that I'm lucky enough to share my life with you. To know you and laugh with you and stumble around with you in this dark room called life. Thank you for all that you do, and all that you are. Thank you for helping my world make sense, and for translating rough passages and mixed messages. Thank you for always making me feel valid and loved and appreciated. 

But most of all, thank you for finding me. 

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Lesbian Turkey Day!

Thanksgiving is my favorite holiday. Is it because of the food?? Absolutely. But it also has a little something to do with family. Thanksgiving is family. Not just blood family - world family. 

What? What's that? "World Family" sounds hoaky, cliche, and ultra lesbian????? EXACTLY. 

Let me explain.

This Thanksgiving, my family is away. Back in August or September, my Dad said, "Hey, I'll pay for you to go to Calgary or to Olympia for Thanksgiving, if you want." And I said, "Great!" And then I thought about it - Thanksgiving in Canada is in October - so no one would be off, and I'd just be celebrating for myself, and that's just awkward. Olympia was where I spent Thanksgiving in College - I LOVE Thanksgiving in Olympia. However, I wanted to be able to share it with my monkey (since it IS my most favoritest holiday - I was serious). And then, I started wondering who ELSE was around .... 

And I thought of my ex, Lara, who wasn't going to home to the Mid-West. Me, Liz, and Lara for Thanksgiving. Then I discovered my oldest friend in the world, Crystal, had no place to go on Turkey Day, and I invited her too. Crystal's NOT a lesbian, but she might as well be. On an off-chance, I thought of my good friend Josh, who's from Colorado, and doesn't usually go home for the Holidays. Would he like to come over too? Yes, in fact, he was! Josh - also not a lesbian. But he's funny, and he's been friends with me for a long time now, and he might as well be. 

Then, on Friday, Lara calls me. "Can I bring a guest to Thanksgiving?" Lara's been dating a woman in LA for a few weeks now, and I figured she could only mean Susan. So ... this Thanksgiving is going to be Me, my wonderful girlfriend, my wonderful ex-girlfriend, the woman she's dating, my oldest friend who might as well be a lesbian, and my friend Josh who should be a lesbian. 

THE MOST LESBIAN THANKSGIVING EVERRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

But all kidding aside, this is the very reason I love Thanksgiving. It's a transient holiday - a holiday where giving is the goal, and generosity is truly king. Christmas is wonderful, and likes to claim these things, but the commercialism that's invaded Christmas doesn't seem to make this true any more. Christmas is very much about family. Thanksgiving, is very much about giving whatever you can, to whomever you can. Don't have anywhere to go? Come over here! Share my turkey, let me cook for you. The best part, is that the meaning is in the name: It's the giving of thanks in as many ways as you can. That's it. And this year, it truly is. And that makes me so very happy!

This will ALSO be my first attempt at COOKING Thanksgiving dinner. It's going to be quite the experiment. Pictures will be taken. Let's just hope I don't burn the house down. 

I'll blog after the event - but I wish you and everyone at your table, whomever they may be, many many happy wishes.  

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Today, I found out that our family dog, Lady, has lymph node cancer.

She's 15 years old.

I took her to the vet this morning by myself, which felt odd for some reason. Perhaps because she's our family dog, and any decisions made on her behalf, I think, should be communal; tribal council style, if you will. At any rate, I felt ill-equipped and unprepared to handle any decision-making the vet threw my way. Thankfully, there really is no decision that needs to be made - at least not yet. Dr. Choo gave me a rough estimate on her life - about 6 months. He discouraged chemo treatments because of her age. He said we could expect her to have trouble breathing, eating, and going to the bathroom in the time to come. This was said to me in such a way to where he could have been telling me that I needed to brush my teeth every day, twice a day, and that cavities are unfortunate, but to be expected. On one hand, I appreciated his factual manner - it prevented me from bursting into tears in his office. On the other, I felt offended on my family member's behalf. Why? I have no good reason. Except that this family member deserves a lot of care and compassion. I think Dr. Choo felt uncomfortable. He called in one of the vet techs to be there when he told me, in case I did fall apart. The vet tech was probably more capable to deal with human reactions than the animal doctor. The only thing that I was able to focus on, in lieu of the emotions sitting like elephants on my chest, was a chart on his wall, detailing the different breeds of dogs by continent. I learned that one of my favorite breeds of dog, the Bernese Mountain Dog, is Swiss. I didn't know that.

Dogs get so little credit for what they do. The constant, unconditional love and care they give us, unfailingly, all the time. Dogs never disappoint. They never flake out. They accept us and love us for exactly who we are, and when the world seems to be falling apart, when stress and pain and worry and fear start to consume us - there's the world's best friend, sitting there, wagging her tail, putting her head on your knee, licking your hand. Lady isn't the world's best dog. She's done a lot of bad things in her life, and is hopelessly addicted to food of any variety. One Christmas, my sister gave me a box of Ghiradelli dark chocolate. We went to the movies (as we do every Christmas), and Lady ate the entire box, including packaging. Chocolate is poison for almost all dogs ... except Lady. My aunt freaked out, and insisted that we take her to the animal emergency room, who fed her charcoal, as a way to pump her stomach. I think that did more harm than the chocolate would have. To look at her, you wouldn't think she was the sneaky bottomless pit she is. At 85 lbs, she's the epitome of a black lab. She crosses her front paws when she sits down (hence her name), she sleeps about 18 hours out of every day. She has a fear of water from falling into the pool when she was a puppy. She loves going into the car. She looks ferocious and menacing, but will (and has) let burglars in, and welcome them with a panting smile, and a hopeful eye (humans = Gods of Food). She lets our alpha cat, Timon, lick her and cuddle with her, even though she doesn't like him very much. But for all of her faults, all of her many transgressions, I conjecture that there is no dog alive with half as much sweetness and patience as she.

I think it's really easy for us, as human beings, to slip into surrender when we hear something like, "Cancer" or "six months to live." At least I know it was easy for me. I had a good cry in the car on the way home. Until I heard a voice say, "She's not dead yet." I caught myself thinking about the future without Lady ... without her sleeping on her pillow, or laying in the doorway of my room. It's easy to take for granted that which has always been there, and even easier to assume that it always will be. But so long as her quality of life is okay, so long as she's comfortable and happy, she has every right to expect from me a joyful, loving friend. And as I think about everything she's given me in her 15 years on this planet, I am determined to change those thoughts to ones of service for her, and will continually strive to ask, and attempt to answer: "How can I be a better human to my dog?"

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Unconditional Love

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