Goodbye, Maya

We will miss you. At a time when people all over the world are mourning the loss of family, human family, in this terrible pandemic, I hope I may be excused for writing a few words about this lovable, albeit needy and a bit crazy, red and white Irish setter who accompanied us for a little over nine years.

Maya was my walking companion, thus the name of this pretty much abandoned blog. I always maintained I got a dog for the kids, back when I could still call them kids rather than young women, but truth be told, I let myself be convinced to get a dog so I'd have company on my walks in the beautiful woods that surround us here in southeastern New York state. Maya was a great walker and seemed to live for our afternoon rambles. She would follow me around the house after I got home from work, letting me know I wasn't getting out of her sight until I fulfilled my part of the bargain.

Three weeks ago she got sick and we thought it might be a bladder inflection to which she was prone. Sadly, she had inoperable tumors on her liver. Our vet said she could live days or months, but we'd know when it was time.

Over these weeks she had good days and bad days. We knew by the bad days, when she just lay on the floor breathing heavily with her stomach bloated, that it wouldn't be long. Last Thursday, despite some down days earlier in the week, she seemed to get a burst of energy and enthusiasm and went on a long walk with her four best canine friends at her favorite walking spot, and even waded into the pond. Then she had a terrible Friday and Saturday, so much so that we thought she might slip away on her own. Still, she rallied a little bit yesterday and started following me around the house.

I had to go to the pharmacy, the only place I venture out to these days except to walk Maya, so I put her in the car and took her for a ride. It was raining and I didn't plan on walking her, but after picking up a prescription and driving around for a half an hour with her looking out the widow, I went to the waterfront on the Hudson River. I opened the door to see if she wanted to get out, and to my surprise, she did. Neither of us had our raincoats, but walk we did, in rain along the river shore. She even wanted to run after some geese and I had to grab her leash to keep her from trying to pick her way across the rocks to the floating fowl. It was a walk of less than half a mile and I could tell she enjoyed it, even if she was clearly tuckered out at the end.

This morning, though, if was clear she was suffering more than just the weakness and exhaustion she'd been having, and it seemed selfish to put her through that just to extract a few more days that were getting progressively worse.

I never understood that old adage "a man's best friend"—until now. Goodbye, Maya. I miss you already.

Snow Maya and Molly

In the midst of Storm Jonas, Maya and Molly tussle in the snow on the deck.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WfxXpd-_gNg

Cautious Maya

Recently someone told me they missed my updates on life with Maya. Sorry. Haven't had much to say over the last year or so. She's fine and we walk in the woods often and she's happiest when we do so with dog friends. Below is a clip of a recent outing. I updated this post to put up a higher quality version of the video.

Road trip Maya

Maya made her first road trip.

She's made various trip of an hour and a half when we've visited family and she likes car rides. So when Meche and the girls got it into their heads to dash to Boca Raton for spring break to visit some cousins, we decided to take Maya.

Maya was invited, anyway. Meche's cousin Henry has two dogs and said they would get along fine with Maya, which they did. They're both rescues, but Henry has had them for years and they're pretty mellow canines. Of course, Maya isn't, so most of the issues were hers: Destroying three screen windows the first time she was left alone, for example.

I wasn't all that keen on the trip but my options were to let them drive down themselves or go with them. As for Maya, she has been having problems with her leg most of this long, cold winter and it made sense for me to keep her under my care so as not to have a setback. She's been licking at her leg and paw and causing some nasty irritation. At one point it was infected because she broke the skin. It bothers her in the cold, especially with a pin running from her knee to her fused ankle. She’s leaving the leg alone right now so it looks nice and healed but she keeps at the paw. She has meds for inflammation and pain but I'll have to see how she does in the next few weeks with continued warmer weather in the North. Maya needed a tropical break as much as everyone else.

It certainly seemed on the ride down that everyone was indeed headed to Florida for break! And this wasn't even the infamous college spring break, as that is earlier in their semester. Minus the six years I lived in Peru, I have spent pretty much most of my life in the Northeast and this was a tough winter. Traffic from South Jersey all the way to Richmond was like one of nature's great migrations: wildebeests or monarch butterflies, or maybe lemmings. We left at 7 a.m. and didn't get to Savannah, where we had a hotel reservation, until 2 the following morning. That stretch was supposed to take about 14 hours, not 19, and those five hours were all lost before Richmond. Still, Maya did great.

In reality, everyone did great. It was a tiring ride down but once we were in Florida we had a great time. Maya got her first run on the beach and loved it. She completely avoided the water, though, unlike Henry’s chow-shepherd cross, which readily jumped into some crashing two- to three-foot waves to fetch a stick.

Maya also had multiple problems with the pool, from growling at the floating blowup pool toys to startling repeatedly at the bubbling of the filter to panicking when I decided to put her in to see if she might take to the pool like the chow. My bad. Maya is not a water dog. (She’ll walk in it, but not swim.) She did great off leash on neighborhood walks with our host's dogs, behaving almost as well as her companions, who regularly go for walks unleashed. She obeyed even when we encountered other dogs and I could tell she wanted to run ahead or across the road to make a new acquaintance. I had to emphasize the command "Come. No. Come!" a couple of times, but she didn't challenge me or get stubborn as she might sometimes when she just doesn’t want to be interrupted. Having dog mates helped keep her calm enough so she didn't bolt. I never have her off leash on the street at home and not sure if I'll try it, as the traffic isn't as mellow as it was in that part of Boca.

Maya was as good on the way back as she was on the way down, and even when we stopped in North Carolina for the night she crashed like everyone else. You’d have thought she’s taken a turn at the wheel.

Let's go, road dog.

Trail Kitsch

Walking in the woods, usually with the dog, I come across some fascinating bits of expression, which I term trail kitsch, though I haven't really found the term on Google, at least not as I mean it.

Trail kitsch is stuff deliberately placed along the trail or natural materials that are altered in their arrangement with some sort of artistic aim, albeit mocking or just nonsensical. Some of it seems to be very short-lived and I'm not sure if some people remove the objects out of distaste or if the "artists" are only loaning their art.

Below are a few examples of trail kitsch I've stumbled upon. All the photos, except the last two of Native American rock art, were taken with my iPhone 4s camera.

The Native American rock art from Arizona isn't kitsch, although I asked a guide about that at one of the sites we visited. He said that given the work ancient people would have had to complete just to get the materials they needed to do this art, it was unlikely it was casual, graffiti-like communications. Rather, it was created to signify something import to the people who did it.

Perhaps placing Gumby and Pokey there with the other toy figures in the rock diorama denotes something important to whoever did it, but it might as well be petroglyphs to me.

Someone is always rearranging this exhibit. It used to be more natural, involving balancing rocks of various sizes and shapes to make tiny formations, but lately it's been invaded by small plastic squatters.

No, not kitsch, but it was a lovely trunk.

Mother Mary (I think) maybe spoke words of wisdom but she didn't last at this broken down gate.

Maya scaring a devil head.

Not exactly kitsch, but couldn't resist. There used to be a building around this commode.

Heart in Sedona.

Rock tree, Sedona, Az.

Native American "kitsch" in Sedona, Az.

More Native American "kitsch" in Petrified Forest National Park

Video Maya

A still-wet Maya after an emergency bath following her discovery of something unidentifiable yet extremely gross to roll in.

I guess normal and not having much to say in this dog blog is a good thing. Maya continues to do very well, running through the woods and generally enjoying life. Her injured leg remains weak, but that doesn't deter her. It may have contributed to her falling into a pond today, but that's a good thing because she'd loped through a muddy patch earlier. By luck I met another dog walker who told me of a pond that I didn't know about. This was on the ridge, an area I don't go to much—mainly because its tick ridden—and so I'd never gone down the trail leading to the pond. Thing is, the other dog dove in to fetch a stick. Maya, I discovered, isn't a swimmer. She likes wading in water—or mud—but prefers to feel something beneath her paws, I think. She's not a retriever, please. She's meant for finding upland game. Still, on a sloping rock she tried testing the water and ended up dunked. I greatly appreciated not having to hose her off or give her a bath after our walk, especially since I had to bathe her twice in three days last week: once just because she was due for a scrubbing and then two days later because of her adventures with some disgusting rot in the forest.

Anyway, best to demonstrate how she's doing. Below are Youtube links to two videos of Maya. The one running in the yard is the more recent, about a month ago, before I finished setting up that plastic fencing as part of putting the lawn into intensive care. The lawn is looking a lot better, though Maya's space to run is greatly reduced for the time being.  The second video is in the woods before the spring burst forth.

Maya runing in backyard

Walking in woods

Slower going

I'm taking it easier on Maya in our walks these days, letting my reading of her set our limit. It has taken me a while to get a sense of her abilities with her repaired leg and sometimes the winter was rough on her. Before I went to Nepal in late February we were struggling with her because she was irritating her leg by licking it. She seemed insistent on doing so and had worn it raw. Putting antibacterial ointment on it seemed to help but barely, even with foul tasting gel meant to keep her from licking. Then I went away for two weeks and she stopped licking the hairless scar area and it got better, just plain pink skin.

Meche's theory is that since no one walked Maya while I was away, the leg stopped bothering her and she stopped licking at it. Well, she could have a point. When I wasn't home they simply let her run around the backyard when she needed or wanted to go out, particularly for an hour or two in the afternoons when the daycare urchins are asleep, and the leg problem healed.

Of course, I resumed our routine. Even though it snowed just before I got home and even the week after, if I recall now. I had to admit she tended to favor the hurt leg when was cold and was more prone to falling. One time a couple weeks ago, she took a terrible dive while straying off trail and perhaps thinking she was a full-fledged quadruped again. Then she limped back to the car, holding her leg up and askew so that I was afraid she'd re-injured it. Once home, she seemed to get over the discomfort and started walking on it again. So I cut back, not taking her out if it was too cold or wet and when we do go out, I've been keeping our jaunts shorter.

With the weather warming—albeit  a bit brisk some mornings—Maya is doing very well and this past week hasn't appeared particularly protective or conscious of her leg. It could be that the cold just gets to her. After all, she has a pin from her knee to her erstwhile ankle. Come on! Even the baby finger I broke in high school still reacts sometimes to certain raw weather. I've mentioned before the idea of getting her booties. Now I'm looking for them, though I found one thing on line that might be better: an insulated wrap with straps and velcro just for rehabilitating injured legs. That might be an option, or very high, tough booties. I don't think I need them right now but definitely well before next winter.

The other day we went out for only 1.8 miles, just shy of an hour, as I let her pretty much determine when she was done. We'd walked a mile up the mountain to the cross trail. From there either going straight or taking the left route leads to the peak and the right one loops southwest and then reconnects to the main trail. I took the right branch, but Maya wanted to turn around and head back to the car. She soon started tracking back toward the main trail—basically saying, "Hello? This way." I cut back through the woods and quickly rejoined the main route and Maya couldn't have been happier. She headed down that trail with homing-like enthusiasm.

I did detour her ever so slightly toward the end of the hike. She stood on the main trail and watched me—exasperated—as I headed off on a windy bicycle path into a stand of trees. Then she joined me. I have to admit she's really good that way. She regularly stops at trail crosses or forks or where side trails veer off and waits to see which way I'm going. All I have to do sometimes is point in the direction I'm going to take and she heads off. Hey, she's leading.

It amazes me how she stops, looks and then follows my directions—unless she disagrees. Like that detour the other day, when she just looked at me like, "Duh! What's this crap?" Thank goodness for limited short-term memory because as soon as she refocused (perhaps resigned herself), she set off ahead to lead the way back to the car again. Me, my dog and an infinite loop. Duh! What's this ...