The Best Therapist Has Four Legs, Fur, and a Wagging Tail

About four months ago, on November 1st, we welcomed a new member to our family. She’s a blonde Lab/Husky/Shepherd mix, or that’s our best guess. We named her Kona.

After T-Bone died in April, I didn’t want another dog. We aren’t getting any younger. We’d gone through losing two dogs and both times it broke my heart. John’s only comment was one sentence, a quiet, “I just can’t picture living the rest of my life without a dog.”

One of our top reasons why we had dogs was for security. T-Bone had a big bark. Whenever John traveled, I felt safe with T-Bone (and before him, Lucky) in the house. Suzie the dachshund, who we pet sit during the week, keeps an eye on things when she’s here, and she’s a fierce little barker, but as much as we love her, she’s not our dog.

So, we got a security system installed, with sensors and motion detectors everywhere, codes that need to be entered, remote access, the works.  We know it works because we regularly set it off. But, a security system isn’t dog, and it was pretty lonely around here without T-Bone.

In August and September, I flew to Hawaii to help my family who were having some serious health issues. It was a sad time.

My parents’ next door neighbors have the cutest black Miniature Poodle. She reminded me of Kimo, the Poodle I grew up with. Every time Sophie saw me go in or out of the house, she bounced up on her hind legs at the chain link fence between our yards wagging her tail like crazy to greet me. I couldn’t resist reaching over the fence to pet her. She cheered me up.

Her owners, or at least the husband, had told my sister a few times that they didn’t want their Poodle. They were more into their Labs. I was looking for some happiness and figured what the heck. I asked the wife if they had been joking before or if they’d let me take her back to Washington. Absolutely not. She was insulted that I’d asked. Her husband slunk back into the house without saying a word.

When my daughter heard the story, she teased me and gave me the nick name Cruella DeVil, the dognapping villainess in 101 Dalmatians. The whole thing made me realize how much I missed having a dog.

Back in Washington, at night while everyone else watched TV, I’d be online looking for Lab/Shepherd or poodle mixes at rescue shelters. I would read descriptions of dog after dog, watch videos of them, and find out how close they were. I kept an eye on shelters from the Washington/Canada border down to the Oregon/California border. I bugged John, “Look at this one. What do you think?”

He ribbed me a few times, “I thought you said you didn’t want another dog.”

It didn’t stop me. I was shopping for a mid-sized dog, who was no more than 3 years old. After about a month of looking at PetFinder, I found Hadu. The pictures of her were a little fuzzy, but she looked like she’d be a good fit. She was white and gold with a happy looking face. 

The description said:  

ABOUT HADU

I am about 9 months old.

I currently weigh about 58 pounds.

I came to the Grant County Shelter as a stray

I get along with other dogs, cats & Kids

And, she was right here in our town! I emailed Puyallup Animal Rescue and said that I was interested in Hadu. Sally answered that they would be showing Hadu and some of their other adoptable dogs on Saturday at a Petsmart near us. There was a pending adoption for Hadu, but if they didn’t claim her by 11:00, Hadu would be available.

Even though she was promised to someone else, we decided to go and check her out.  Maybe Hadu’s other possibility would fall through. Maybe we wouldn’t like her when we met her. Maybe there would be another dog there that we’d like. The new dog would have to get along with two cats and a dachsund. This was kind of a big order. It was all up in the air.

When we first saw her, she was calmly lying down between two crates.

A high energy Chesapeake Bay Retriever was on her right and a loud barking Lab/Pitbull mix was on her left. They didn’t faze her. That was a good sign. She barked once and it was a big, deep bark. That was a plus.

Sally let us take her out of the crate and walk her outside. She looked great! Her hips looked strong and sturdy—a good indication that she won’t have hip dysplasia which shows up sometimes in German Shepherds. She had a spring in her step. I was worried about the pink on top of her nose. Was it a scar? No, it’s pretty common with huskies and it’s called a snow nose.

The 11:00 deadline came and went. Now she was available if we wanted her. We went home and thought about it. We called Suzie’s owner and asked if she could bring Suzie over to see how they’d get along. We also called daughter Sarah who was on her way home from visiting her boyfriend 1-1/2 hours away to see if they were close enough to come and meet Hadu.

We all met. Hadu actually pranced and frolicked on the leash when we took her out again. Suzie was just fine with her. Hadu had plenty of love to go around to all of us. We unanimously approved of Hadu. The shelter approved us. After a flurry of filling out forms, buying a crate, food, toys, etc., we took Hadu home and renamed her Kona which means Lady in Hawaiian.

"Hadu" in the PetSmart parking lot.

When I looked over her paperwork, she was 9 months old in September when she was found in Grant County which is in central Washington. (That paperwork lists her as a Greyhound/Lab mix.) Later in September she was taken to WSU in Pullman (Whitman County). Their veterinary school spayed her. I like to think that even though she’s listed as part Husky (UW’s mascot), she’s part Cougar (WSU’s mascot) because they took care of her for a little while.

In October she got more vaccinations in Moses Lake (Grant County again). Then she came to Western Washington (Pierce County) and was fostered by Sally. A vet in Eatonville listed her as a Shepherd mix. She had hundreds of traveling miles under her collar for such a young pup.

It showed one morning when John took Kona with him on a quick trip to the grocery store. When he loaded her into the truck, she seemed dejected like “oh, this again,” and laid down on the floor in the backseat of his truck with a heavy head. Later when he pulled back into our driveway and led her back into the house, she was elated. We think that’s when it clicked with her that she was finally home.

Kona is still very puppy-like and learning how things work around here. She is eager to please so she’s easy to train.

She is finding out what is acceptable to chew—her ample supply of toys, and what’s NOT--our shoes, which I’m pretty sure she considers fragrant delicacies, or the vinyl tablecloth that I put under the Christmas tree skirt.

Uh oh. I wasn't supposed to shred this?

She started out not barking at all, but is barking more now that she knows this is her territory and she follows Suzie’s barking cues. She got out of the yard twice but didn’t go far, and we fixed the fence immediately. She gets along well with Suzie and one of the cats. The other one tolerates her.

"The girls" relaxing together.

She has not had a single potty accident in the house, which is good, but makes me wonder. Sometimes she’s flinchy around people who come to visit us, but we think she will become more confident as she matures. She may have been treated roughly before the shelter took her in. 

While out on a walk one day, a former democratic state representive who lives in our neighborhood tried to pet her and she shied away. I joked to John that maybe Kona is a republican.

She is a proud graduate of PetSmart’s beginner obedience class and is now enrolled in the Intermediate class. 

Her biggest obstacle in class is that she also goes to play in doggie day camp there once or twice a week so she spends the first 5-10 minutes of obedience class trying to get into doggie day camp to see her friends.

Kona hauling it in Doggie Day Camp. 

Kona romping with her friends in Doggie Day Camp.  

 It was kind of embarrassing when we called her to come and she ran right past us, and through the aisles of the store to get to doggie day camp, but we had to laugh. Everyone else sure was.

Her personality is exuberant and a little kooky. She’s learning how to hold that 60 pounds of enthusiasm in check a little more when she greets you instead of jumping on you like you’re a swimming pool she’s diving into. She’s gangly, but a good athlete and shockingly fast. Maybe she IS part greyhound. We are really glad that she’s part of our family, and she makes no secret of letting us know that she is very happy to be here with us.

Laura Keolanui Stark is smiling at another wagging tail in the house. She can be reached at stark.laura.k@gmail.com. 

Christmas Flow

     As I write this, there’s a steady rumbling hum coming from the street in front of my house. It’s the wrap up of some neighborhood excitement that has nothing to do with the holidays other than sprinkling a little more stress on them.  

     I spent most of Monday wrapping presents and stuffing packages to be mailed on the post office’s busiest day of the year. After hours spent wrestling with packing tape, foam peanuts, my computer and printer to print mailing labels, I came up for air and was finally loading the packages into my car to chase our mailman who usually comes around 4:00. That’s when I heard a soft, tentative knock on the front door.

     I barely cracked the front door to keep our pets inside. A city worker told me that there had been a major water main break on my street so they had closed the road in front of my house and turned off the water.

 

    When I fully opened the door, I saw the whole ugly panoramic picture—debris that made the street look like a dried riverbed, buckled asphalt, blinking workhorses blocking off two ends of our street, a sinkhole big enough to comfortably swallow a car, and yikes, Sarah’s car parked directly across the street, mere feet away, from the sinkhole!

Buckling road

     

Sinkhole when it was still small.

I fished her car keys out of our bowlful of keys and hustled out there to move her car into the safety of our driveway. When I asked one of the workers if he knew who called it in, he said that he didn’t know. He giggled a little and said it was like a geyser going off when they got there. I felt kind of stupid that something so big was going on right outside my door and I was totally unaware of it caught up in my package wrapping flurry.

     I abandoned my Christmas package mailing plans and shifted gears to “survival mode.” We had two cases of water bottles on hand for earthquake preparedness. Check! I squeaked my car out of the garage past Sarah’s car and followed the workers’ advice—hugged the curb on our side of the street because it was hollow under the other side, to park up the hill outside of the “danger zone.” Check! Then I texted John and Sarah the news and told them to plan around it. Check!

     It’s always a little shocking to realize how dependent we are on things we take for granted—like clean running water for drinking, cooking, cleaning and showering. It made me thankful that our electricity and gas were still up and running.

     That night, John and I went out for dinner to celebrate our 35^th anniversary, and then dropped the packages off at the post office. Afterwards, we parked up the hill just in front of the Road Closed sign and walked home past houses twinkling with Christmas lights.

   On the way, we saw the workers draining water from a fire hydrant and I asked them if that meant the water would be coming back on soon. They said it would be back on in the morning. The city would have to test the water to make sure it wasn’t contaminated with bacteria. We’d have to boil any water that we were going to consume until the tests came back on Wednesday.

    Back hoes, dump trucks and other massive equipment dug and moved asphalt and dirt around under intense lights so bright it looked like daytime. Men stood inside the sinkhole that was so deep we couldn’t see the tops of their hard hats. They worked until 11:00 that night. 

     Tuesday morning all was quiet except for the kids walking and gawking on their way to and from school.  The sinkhole was roughly filled in along with a second one that had caved in at our neighbors’ driveway across the street. The road right in front of our house had some deep ruts grooved into it from the dump trucks. Even though only six houses were directly affected, our street is a through street so it usually gets a fair amount of traffic. The quiet of the road being closed was kind of nice and it was entertaining watching a Fed Ex truck getting around the barricade.

     Yesterday, Wednesday, a cheer went up in our house when we got the notice that the water was safe to drink again. Hurray! No more brushing teeth with bottled water! Tap water never glistened so beautifully!

      This morning, Thursday, I was just going to take a sip of my tea made with filtered tap water when the rumbling and backup beeps of heavy equipment cracked the morning quiet. I threw on a pair of jeans and a jacket, and ran outside to wave down one of the construction workers who was wearing a UW sweatshirt, “Can I move my car out of here real quick before you get started?”

This is where Sarah's car is usually parked.

     He was really nice for a Husky (probably because he doesn’t know that I’m a WSU Coug) and said, “Sure!” Then he halted a massive asphalt melting machine hooked onto a 

dump truck and helped direct me backing up around it.

Road building in front of our driveway.

     My car’s parked around the corner now so I can get out of here if I need to, although there’s plenty of Christmas preparation work to do here at home.

    Mr. U-dub told me that it would probably take a few hours to get the job done. He lied. Friday we were hauling our garbage cans around the corner to be picked up and carefully weaving our way around the blinking work horses to get in and out of our driveway.

Obstacle course.

 

   Looks like that will be the routine at least until Monday. It’s going to look great and return our lives to normalcy when they’re finished. I can tell that they really have a sense of pride in what they’re doing. It’s an unexpected gift from the City of Puyallup.

Laura Keolanui Stark is looking for excuses to NOT do the things she SHOULD be doing for Christmas. She can be reached at stark.laura.k@gmail.

Portland Road Trip

          My husband John was going on a business trip to Portland, Oregon on Monday and I tagged along. When we arrived in Portland we stopped for a dim sum lunch at House of Louie in Chinatown. It was recommended to us years ago by a guy pumping gas into our car. Afterwards, we checked into our motel where I picked up a brochure about Fabric Depot, and then dropped John off.

While he was at a scientific conference, I discovered and explored one of the largest fabric stores in the US. Over the years, I had visited Fabric Depot’s booth at the Sewing & Stitchery Expo in Puyallup. This was my chance to see their actual store. It was “meant to be” since Fabric Depot is located at the corner of SE 122^nd Ave. and SE Stark Street. My I-phone navigated me to the right spot.

I wasn’t prepared for the full impact of this store when I walked through the doors. For the first time in my life, I was overwhelmed by a fabric store. One and a half acres of fabrics stretched as far as my eyes could see and beyond: 11,000 quilting cottons, 2,000 home decorator fabrics, fashion and bridal fabrics, notions, crafts, and yarn! There was a huge sale going, 20% off of most of the fabric! Where is a girl to start?

       Three rows in, I started loading bolts of batiks into my basket. A lady walking by on one of the main aisles glanced over at me and said, “I’ll take one of each.”

       "Exactly!” I agreed.

       “But I don’t know where I’d put them all.”

        I laughed and said, “I’ll think of something later.”

        She asked if it was the first time I’d been to the store. I guess that was obvious. I told her that I am from Puyallup, and to clarify added, near Tacoma, Washington. She needed no clarification. She knew Puyallup because she’d been to the Sewing Expo. My instant friend interviewed me on the spot. Was I a beginner quilter? How long had I been quilting? Do I belong to a guild?  I guess I gave the right answers because then she gave me a quick tour of the store.

         She taught me a quick lesson that she’d learned recently at a seminar showing me a non-slip 2” ruler and telling me to sort scraps into lights and darks as you go so they’re ready for future quilts. Then she pointed me to a window to sign up for Fabric Depot’s email. That way they’d notify me of even bigger sales—40% off, send coupons, and of course I could always shop online. She apologized to me because she’d already used her 35% off coupon or she would’ve given it to me and then she left me to my own devices.

         

I had truly hit the mother lode! When my basket teetered at its top capacity, I carefully pulled up to the cutting table. The lady cutting my fabric was also helpful and while she measured out the yards of gorgeous, name brand fabric we chatted about many things. One of the topics we covered was a detailed debate about the usefulness of a Kindle. She just about had me convinced to abandon paper books and go digital.

         At the checkout I watched the discounts come off. There was an additional hidden sweet discount---Oregon has no sales tax, compared to 9.5% in Tacoma. My bags fit in the trunk of my car with room to spare.

         I turned right around and went back in to their Outdoor sale. My tour guide friend had advised me not to miss the bargains out there—50-60% off—especially if I was looking for fabric for quilt backing. My basket wasn’t overflowing for round two, but I did get some goodies. One was a fabric that my quilting buddy, Carol, and I have been looking for everywhere. I texted Carol, who said she’d only been able to find it online in Canada. That bolt got an honored place in the basket.

Mystery fabric found!

          At the cut table, that gal told me that celebrity quilters from other countries shop at their store on a regular basis, buying up massive amounts. I could see why. She told me to come back in a couple of weeks for the 40% off sale. I think I’ve got enough fabric to hold me for quite some time, but I can see a yearly pilgrimage in my future.

           My phone rang breaking the spell. It was John asking where I was. I had told him I was going to Fabric Depot and then Powell’s bookstore. I had totally lost track of time. I think I was in a fabric bliss time warp for three or four hours!

           The rest of the trip paled compared to my Fabric Depot field trip, but for those of you who aren’t fabric addicts, here are other highlights of our trip to Portland. Following the fabric frenzy, I met John at Lloyd Center, a mall near our hotel. There’s an ice skating rink in the center of it. We watched three young ladies wind up and land lutz’s, toe loops, and other jumps. They made it look easy. I wouldn’t be surprised to see them in the Olympics. Olympian Tonya Harding learned to skate on that rink.

The next morning we headed toward Powell’s City of books, looking for breakfast along the way. We were early enough to find street parking and lucky enough to find Blue Star Donuts on the corner just steps away.

The inside was all white, sleek and contemporary. The counters were filled with customers, eating donuts and sipping coffee. There was enough of a line for us to have time to make up our minds. I asked for a Key Lime/Lemon filled donut and John got a Blackberry filled donut covered with peanuts. Mine was as light as a cloud. It was perfection.

After reading their huge chalkboard sign about the purity of their ingredients, it was easy to understand why their donuts rated at the top of my donut list. I’m a bit of a donut connoisseur.

         After our breakfast of champions, we set out for Powell’s City of Books. We’ve been there many times before and it’s just not a complete trip to Portland without stopping at Powell’s. 

     They aren’t kidding when they call it a city. It takes up an entire city block with over a million volumes on their shelves. We were two of the 6000 people who stop in each day to buy or browse for a book. What is it with Portland having these massive book and fabric stores? Seems more Texan to me.

Skimming the titles stacked up to the ceiling is one of the major reasons I’m still balking at getting a Kindle. It’s hard to teach an old book shopper, new tricks. I’m notorious for getting lost in time in bookstores and libraries, but there was another place I wanted to visit before we headed home.

        We lugged our Powell’s book bag back to the car and made it back with minutes to spare before our 90 minutes parking expired. The shop right in front of our car was named Cacao Drink Chocolate. I’m always up for chocolate. This shop had chocolate from around the world, including the best premium solid chocolate bars from only small producers, as well as select chocolate from the best local chocolatiers and North American makers. They also had house-made drinking chocolate.

        The “barista” helped us order. I was going to get a medium sized drink, but she said that most people just get a shot because it’s very rich. I chose a Traditional Cacao Premium Cinnamon Drinking Chocolate, and John got a shot of Cacao 5-Spice Premium Drinking Chocolate. As I opened the car door I finished the thick, almost pudding-like shot and told John that I needed another one.

         I walked back into Cacao Drink Chocolate, ordered another shot and asked the lady what I needed to buy to reproduce that Cinnamon Drinking Chocolate at home. She set me up, and also told me how to get to the Rose Garden, our next Portland destination.

         The International Test Rose Garden is not far from downtown. It sits high up on a hill above the City of Roses with Mt. Hood in the distance framed by skyscrapers and roses.

   

       The garden is the oldest testing ground for new roses and was started in 1917. More than 10,000 different varieties of roses cover 4.5 acres. It was peaceful and serene strolling through the grounds.

It seemed that each rose we saw was more beautiful than the last.

         It was time to start the two and a half hour drive home. I’d looked at the map and the route to I-5 seemed straightforward—go over the Burnside Bridge and then hang a right onto north I-5. John’s I-phone didn’t think it was that simple. It kept re-calculating us in circles. I was trying to get my I-phone’s GPS going. We were frustrated. John veered onto a side road looking for a place to pull over and study the map to get us back on track.  

         That’s when I looked up, cue weird music, and saw a pink building sporting a sign that said Voodoo Doughnut. “Pull over here! Voodoo Doughnut is famous! I can’t believe we found it by accident!”

It was a hot Tuesday afternoon and the bakery was almost empty, amazing because we could see how they had bike racks set up to weave long lines of customers through, past the poster of Johnny Cash that said “Cash only.” So, there we were, ordering doughnuts for the second time in one day.  We left with a dozen, including Portland cream doughnuts, toasted coconut cake doughnuts, bacon maple bars, and the weirdest one a Mexican hot chocolate doughnut that was really spicy.

We did finally find I-5, but I felt much better knowing that if we didn’t, we wouldn’t starve with that pink Voodoo Doughnut box safely stowed on the back seat.

People make fun of Portland for being a throwback, hippie kind of town that’s hyper environmentally conscious. In fact, there’s a show on IFC named Portlandia that is dedicated to poking fun at Portland, and I’ve been guilty of taking a few jabs myself, but . . . truthfully, I really liked it there. Everybody was genuinely friendly and I felt comfortable with the Portlandians. Recycling is second nature to me. Besides, what more could I ask for? Possibly the largest fabric store AND book store in the US, no sales tax, a chocolate boutique, rose gardens, Mt. Hood, and doughnuts, Portland sounds good to me!

Laura Keolanui Stark is settling down with a good book from Powell’s and a cup of premium hot cinnamon chocolate. The doughnuts are long gone! She can be reached at stark.laura.k@gmail.com.