Today is August 4th, a Thursday. Summer is almost over. I love the sunny mornings, the morning glories the birds. I love waking up to the sound of the ravens. They sound like they're fighting. I like to imagine that they're bragging to each other that they got a big treat to eat and they're going to share it with them. Then the other one comes along and says "yeah well mines bigger". They fly past my bedroom window, and from the living room I hear the little birds chirping and happy. And the little clicks the hummingbirds make as they dive bomb each other. They're so  small and sweet looking I like to imagine they're playing with each other. I've heard that they're message is "joy". I feel that when I see them. Sometimes I like to wear my tie dye tee shirt outside and sit or stand very still and let them come to my the red heart on the tee. I hope they get some joy from me as I do from them.

I used to sit in the kitchen and meditate. I told myself I was meditating the sun up. When I finished the sun was peeking over the houses across the street. The smell of nag champa incense and coffee warm my heart as much as my soul. It seems like I no sooner begin, than my little black poodle comes in and does her "downward facing dog" then puts her chin on the seat of my chair and gazes up at me. I think she's happy just doing that, because I make room for her to sit on my lap, and sometimes she doesn't want to, she just wants to gaze at me. How wonderful to be loved like that. She only requires some clean water and a dish of food, other than that she doesn't ask for anything. Except of course to go out to pee and poop. I love that little dog.

I took her camping with me the second year I had her. My family and I go to a place in the Shasta Trinity National Forrest, a place we love and our dogs run free. I've never taken a dog with me. i've been annoyed often enough by my families dogs. It seems since I was the only one with no dog, the dogs rolled on my towel, shook on me and my book, ran with their huge muddy paws across me, well you get the picture. So 2 years ago she and I went.  She's a poodle mind you. Not a foo foo girl, but a little lady none the less, my daughter Kim has a rhodesian ridgeback, the biggest white lab you've ever seen, and a bull mastiff. Not little dogs, big goofs. I love them all. My daughter Traci has a brown lab, a sweet girl, a pit bull, and now she has a crazy black lab. None of them are trained, but the black lab seems to be the only one that causes problems. So he's watched very carefully.

We were all on a sweet little beach called "Rattlesnake Beach", my daughters and their children and dogs had all swam across to the other side, a shallow area just on a drop off into some rapids that are swift, depending on the year and the amount of rainfall. This particular year there had been quite a bit of rain. I, in my wisdom decided to swim my little Bell next to me over to the side where the family was. I didn't stop to think she doesn't like swimming, she doesn't do it, she's little and she's not used to it. And she's skinny so she gets cold very quickly. Swimming in ice water is not her favorite thing to do.

We entered the water and she came with me rather than be left without me. We swam along and I heard her breathing heavy and I realized she was tired and couldn't make it. I started to take her back but when I turned around I realized the swim back was farther than if we just continued on.

I had lost quite a lot of weight that year and didn't have the body mass, or the muscle mass I had had previously. And I didn't take that into account either. As we got to the area where the drop off was the current was strong, and started to push me hard. I could have continued on but she couldn't. So I picked her up and she started to claw my head trying to get on top of me. I was wearing lap swimmer short fins, or I wouldn't have been able to keep going. I pushed hard and got us to the little rocks where we would sit. It's very shallow there.

Just then my family dove into the drop off and swam back. I also started back, Bell got in next to me and then swam on top of my head, she clawed my eyes, my lips and my face in her effort to get on top of my head. I held her above the water with one arm raised. But I needed two arms to get back to the shore. And with that I went down. I held her up above the water, but I clearly needed help. It's embarrassing for me to ask for help. But I had to keep my dog safe, so I yelled. Traci my youngest daughter was the only one that heard me, she yelled back as I started to go down for the second time, "Mom do you need help". I wanted laugh it off, I was ashamed of myself that I couldn't do it alone, but I said "yes", that girl moved fast, she flew over to me, I said "Take Bell" and she did. She got my little Bell safely back to the beach and I took my time getting back. No one thought it was a big deal, but it was. After that when i swam i let her stay on the beach or come in if she chose too . She never chooses to go into the water.