About every other week, around midweek, I receive pictures of 100+ dogs that need to get out of the shelter. These dogs are in a shelter in Kentucky that has been overflowing month after month, especially since the floods that devastated the area last fall.
Some are strays, some are surrenders, some are from hoarding situations, and some of their owners have died leaving them no place to go. Each time I receive these pictures, my job is to post them all over social media to try to find them fosters. If we can find a home for them to live in temporarily, we can get them here from Kentucky to Illinois, get them healthy, vaccinated, spayed or neutered, get them used to what life is like in a home, and eventually find their forever home. We recently adopted our foster who came to us in January. He is the absolute best dog ever and adopting him was the right choice. But that has meant that fostering other dogs has slowed way down. And each time I get sent these pictures my heart breaks. I want to do more to save them. I want to bring them all home. My heart generally thinks I could do this, I can handle more dogs. And my heart can. My brain… my body… my sanity… I’m not sure about. Every time I find a dog that catches my attention I send it to my husband and I tell him how this one will somehow be so easy! He always gets logical on me, and so far we haven’t had another foster since we adopted. I just received all the pictures and the same faces that haunted me from last transport are still there. “Sisters” who lived and grew up in the same home- Daisy and Gigi, 10 and 14. I can not stop thinking about them. Do I let my heart win? Or logic?
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My son’s special interest these days is chain reactions. He spends hours designing, building, testing, collecting data, reading about, and watching chain reactions.
He thinks in chain reactions. Though sometimes it is a lot, and things tend to take longer to do when it must be a chain reaction, I am in constant awe of the way his brain works. He builds marble runs that hit dominoes, that bump a toy bus, that hits more dominoes, that hits a box to trap a toy- stuff like that. Well today he came home from his grandparents’ house with a new book that his uncle found for him online. It’s called Rube Goldberg’s Simple Normal Humdrum School Day. And now we will live and breathe this book for… who knows how long. Each page is another chain reaction that helps Rube do something throughout his school day. He described each scene to me as I drove home, then asked me to read it to him when we got home, and now I’m listening as he explains each page to his dad before bed. He says he thinks some day he will be Kell Goldberg. Today was transport day for the animal rescue that I work with. In the messages that had been circulating throughout the week I was expecting that we were getting 7 puppies that were coming from Arkansas. They were all between 5 months and a year old and all were at risk for euthanasia.
Fosters were assembled and we were so fortunate to get them out of there in time to save their lives. I arrived at transport expecting 7 puppies. I did not expect that these 5 month old puppies would be 40 pounds! So instead of what I imagined would be tiny puppies getting baths in the sink, I helped harness and get collars for young, very medium sized dogs. Transport is one of my favorite things about rescue. It’s just magical to see who these dogs are the moment they officially have freedom. We get to unite them with their foster families, get the first snuggles, and then when their pictures come up again as adopted, we can celebrate too. It’s amazing to get to be a part of the journey for so many lucky dogs! “Come look at him!” my husband yelled from the other room. He was getting our youngest up from his nap, so I instantly became concerned when he lead with that.
I ran over to peer in, seeing stuffed animals and books carpeting the room. This is actually not a surprise though, and is kind of how it usually looks. In the center of the floor, with his pillow under his head, a blanket on his feet, and an open tube of Vaseline snuggled in his arm, he was sound asleep. OH NO. He woke up and was excited to see us. Immediately my husband and I began looking to find what he had coated in Vaseline. I crawled around the floor and rubbed the walls. He moved around books and inspected the dresser. Nothing. Somehow, for some reason, he opened the tube, but didn’t squeeze a single bit out. Well that was lucky! I hate that it isn’t just a normal thing to be taken care of when you’re sick as an adult.
I came home this afternoon and for the millionth time this season, I’m feeling really crummy. I just want someone to place a pillow and blanket on the couch and put on a show I like. I want them to put a box of tissues and a glass of water next to me and turn the lights down. Instead I’ll be making dinner for my family and playing and reading and getting climbed on. My 5 and 3 year old learned how to play rock, paper, scissors today, and it is hilarious.
In the car on the way home from preschool: 5: “No, you have to decide what you’re going to put when I say 3.” 3: “Okay, rock.” 5: “No! Don’t tell me!” Then as a drove I continued to hear, “1, 2, 3!” 5: “What are you picking?” 3: “Ummmmm pencil!” 5: “What?” *Uncontrollable laughter* Sometimes my worlds collide so hard that I feel
like I’ve been smooshed. The mama advocate meets the teacher advocate and my brain gets all jumbled and there’s no division. Being a teacher is hard. Being a parent is hard. Meeting all the needs and making tough decisions and making all the calls and coordinating everyone and doing what you think is right is just… can I say it again? SO. DANG. HARD. Having empathy and loving little people will burn you out. I’m feeling especially “smooshed” these days. I was running the dog outside before leaving to pick up kids and drive to an appointment, and on our back patio step was this yellow post it note, spotted with grease, (likely blown from someone’s garbage can) that said “In a ❤️”. At first I thought what an interesting thing to write. Not “I ❤️ U”, not “Lots of ❤️”, but “In a ❤️”. I tried to think about in what context a person would write this and imagine who the message was for. But then I got to thinking, the universe is weird and regardless of the original intention, right this moment, the message was for me. In a heart. What’s in a heart? What’s in my heart? The 100% absolute BEST intentions, always. So if I keep leading with that-for all of the needs and decisions and calls and coordination and doing what I think is right, if I always lead with my heart, I’m doing just fine. Holidays can be hard sometimes. Even something simple like St. Patrick’s Day can be hard. I want to make them special and memorable for my kids and start family traditions.
First of all… I am tired. I have very little energy to spend beyond the day-to-day and just trying to keep up. I’m low on time. By the time I get home from work and appointments and driving kids all around, it’s late and there are still other things to be done at home. Because I am a frequent user of online ordering and pickup for groceries, I browsed Walmart and Target with my grocery orders this week and neither one has much of anything for St. Patrick’s Day. I just wanted some green candy or something and neither place had anything. I’m thinking maybe I’ll make pancakes and color them green. Sometimes I see that other parents go beyond any amount of effort I can possibly give and I feel a little guilty. But I hope that my kids see that I show up in other ways, even if I don’t create an elaborate leprechaun scene for St. Patrick’s Day! When I walked into school today, I was greeted by my teaching partner standing outside of my classroom door, holding some copies for me along with 2 little backpacks.
Each backpack has eyes and what looks like a beak on the front, when buckled shut. There are little compartments inside and a couple on the outside too, to hold a million little treasures. They even have a chest strap across the front. I happily accepted the hand me down packs that she had brought me from another teacher friend in our building. As soon as I got home, I presented the new bags to my oldest kids- branding them as “new hiking backpacks!” I even advertised the fancy extra chest clip. After they fought over which color they wanted (both wanted pink) they put them on with giant smiles and played camping for the next half hour. Fast forward to finally getting everyone in bed and quiet and I was picking up the toys that were scattered around the living room. I opened the backpacks to see what they had packed for their adventures. B, 3 years old, packed socks, a dog toy, and a cat toy. K, 5 years old, packed a baggie of snacks. I can’t wait to actually help them pack for a little day trip this spring! We will probably leave the pet toys at home. I would love to blame it on daylight savings, but really, I think it’s more just the season we’re in. From the moment they got up this morning, all 3 kids have been extra cranky and clingy.
One kid demanded cereal for breakfast, another demanded oatmeal. The 3rd didn’t care so much what was for breakfast as long as I held him the entire time. So we had a double breakfast- oatmeal and cereal, to try to appease everyone. Of course after also deciding that the oatmeal MUST be topped with peanut butter, honey, and seeds, the one with all the demands ate only 2 bites and was done. It’s gone very much like this all day. Any toy someone has, everyone else needs it. Anyone petting the dog is in everyone else’s way. They all want to lay in the same spot or use the same pencil or look at the same book. So I was extra grateful for a visit from my sister to break up the morning. Will we make it to bed time?? |
Author5th grade teacher, wife, mama to my 3 magical babies, ally, advocate, doggy foster mom... just stumbling on. Archives
March 2022
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