Life Happens!

Just when you think everything is cooking along all right life happens!

Before I tell you the story, here is another small painting I did called "Supplicants". It's 8" X 10" and is $45 and in this one I layered strips of canvas and extra gesso and crackle paste to give me some texture then dribbled and dabbed Quinacridone Gold and Pthalo Turquoise - a favorite combination. It looks and feels old to me-even ancient and the imagery felt like it could be a call to a sacred site, so I enhanced it with a little mettalic gold.

So on to the story. Who would have guessed at 9pm on Tuesday night as we all began to go through our end of the day routine - take the dogs out for their last duty call, feed the fish, brush our teeth and settle the dogs in with their end of the evening "biscuit" which in our family is a carrot chunk since our dogs need to lose some weight that all hell would break loose! Keir, my bi-black Sheltie in an acrobatic leap, amazing in it's gymnastic grace, snapped up his own chunk of carrot and then midair grabbed Delilah's chunk and swallowed it whole. Thank goodness it didn't get lodged in his trachea or I'd be very sad right now instead of just very tired.

After frantically calling to our vet on call for emergency advice on what was happening (choking? or retching? or what?) and another vet in Tillimook, Oregon many miles away, we connected with Dr. Daniel Cameron and he had us check if Keir had a pink tongue and whether we could see the stuck carrot and then advised us to go to the DoveLewis ER Vet Hospital in downtown Portland, Oregon - a 2 and 1/2 hour drive (though it only took us 2 hours that night). They are open 24 hours a day and all weekends and provide emergency as well as intensive care. This veterinary hospital is caring and endowed with equipment and personnel and were able to x-ray Keir and test to find out where the carrot was lodged and then perform an endoscopy which entails putting him under anesthesia and snaking a camera to the chunk and in our case pushing the carrot all the way into his stomach from where it was lodged.

John and I grabbed short naps on their benches in the waiting room while we waited for the operation to be over. We got to the clinic at midnight and left at 4:30 in the morning for home, but we left with an alive Keir and very, very thankful there are such places to get the help for our family. Our heartfelt thanks to you DoveLewis!!!

It has taken us 2 days to get some sleep. On Wednesday morning when we got back from Portland - a 3 hour drive making the many stops for coffee/tea we had to make, we layed down to sleep but couldn't sleep more than 2 hours so we got up and went about our daily business. Today, Thursday, we crashed big time sleeping 12 hours straight then added a 3 hour nap mid-day and seem to be doing better today. Keir has recovered from the anasthesia and appears to be fine following the fiasco. Though his esophagus was abraded a bit and he's getting medicine for that, he's eating soft food and following me around like normal now and I cherish every minute of this!

Back to painting tomorrow I hope. Hug your pets tight and love them while you have them!