The year of 3 dogs!

In the summer of 1999 we acquired a small, young terrier from the Dogs Trust, they had called her 'Gypsy' as she had been found wandering at a site in Manchester after some gypsies had been moved on by the police.

We called her 'Sioni' (short for Sioned, not the masculine version, for those who speak Welsh!) and she shared our lives and our travels, our tribulations and triumphs, until June 2012.

By this time she was grey haired, and getting a bit stiff, but seemed ok otherwise, until she started having 'accidents'. She had always been a fastidious kind of dog - almost like a cat, and this clearly distressed her, and we realised something serious was wrong. After consulting our vet, she was put to sleep, and a post mortem revealed it had been the right thing, at the right time. We decided to be dogless for awhile, but fate had other ideas! Our landlord's sister in law, who worked with the RSPCA, asked us to give a little rescue dog a chance. She was a Shi Tzu/Poodle cross who had been returned to them for the 2nd time as a biter, but was young and pretty - maybe we could turn her around? I'm a sucker for a sob story.

 Peta/Martha came to stay for a while, 2 months or so later, she went back. She was indeed 'a biter'! She bit me at least twice a week over that period, without warning, and several times to the bone! This one was not going to be suitable for any domestic environment. Sadly, after a long period of assessment, she was put down. In a way, I'm glad for her, because, like most creatures who are not sane, she was very unhappy, and only getting more so.  Yet again, we decided on a dog free period!

We have a habit, when we have the time and the diesel, of making occasional trips to Burnham on Sea, in Somerset, for a walk along the beach and a good, old fashioned fry up at the Beach View Cafe (recommended, proper seaside cafe!) At the end of October we took our first dogless walk - and felt bereft, surrounded by happy dogs belonging to other people.  We talked - and talked, and finally agreed that we would be open to the idea of letting the right sort of dog into our lives, a small, older dog, in need of a caring home, that wouldn't need too much exercise etc.  The very next day a Twitter friend posted a picture of an elderly Yorkshire terrier whose mistress had died, and was pining in kennels. This seemed extraordinary to me, as she rarely retweets anything that isn't about sewing!! Having looked into it, we went to pick him up from Porthcawl the next weekend.

He is called 'charlie', though he doesn't appear to recognise this! Neither has he been trained to the lead or even think he's a dog! Dog food is an alien concept to which he turns up his nose, and his legs are very weak, we had to carry him alot at first! His skin was a mess, very infected, and he had to have infected lumps and his upper incisors removed shortly after he came to us, poor chap.

He's still got a way to go, but now he scampers up the steps into the caravan, and knows we are his people and that this is home! His digestion is still pretty erratic, and he's a plodder, rather than a marcher, let alone a runner! However, he is losing weight and getting healthier, let's hope this summer sees him enjoying life as he should!

Charlie came to us from http://www.jemimas-place.com they are struggling for funds at the moment, and they are very dedicated in their care for abandoned animals, so if you feel like it, please go to their site and donate, even a little bit!

This sporting life!

I'll immediately hold up my hand and state that I'm most decidedly not a sports fan, never have been, never will be, but - and it's a surprising 'but' to me, I have been entranced by the coverage of the Paralympics that I have watched.

The whole package of supporting a team, the astounding amount of TV and general media coverage of football (soccer!) etc leaves me with my mouth open in astonishment and bewilderment. I understand, in theory, the whole thing of being part of a group identity, part of a 'tribe', and the sense of security that some people get from it, and I can certainly see the business merits of encouraging that, and I'll admit to seeing that it can do alot for giving the disadvantaged support and the incentive to fight, and overcome, their disadvantages. However, this is all theory, and in my 61 years of life, I have never been able to empathise with this obsession - though I'll admit to a few obsessions of my own!

The people involved in the Paralympics have opened my eyes - not just the athletes themselves, but the myriad of support organisations, the spectators and families and even the media themselves have exuded such unalloyed and genuine joy, that I couldn't help but be caught up in it. The normal Olympics seemed, as with most professional sport these days, to be bedeviled with anger, bitterness, back-biting competitiveness and drugs and I was deeply depressed by the whole circus, not to mention the politics associated with it all. For me, it was a great relief when it was over and the TV schedules and media generally returned to their usual nauseating gossip!

I tuned into the Paralympics to give my eyes and brain something else to do while knitting - I often watch mindless daytime TV for that purpose, and am occasionally pleasantly surprised! The sheer delight in what they were doing on the part of the athletes was a joy, and their good sportsmanship, compared to the able bodied competitors, gave me hope for the world. Knowing that, in Chinese society, there was a long-standing discomfort with disability, not to say rejection of people so afflicted, I was overwhelmed by the way the Chinese people, as a whole, had cast aside their old ways of thinking and thrown themselves into supporting, and appreciating, the achievements of the 'disabled' competitors, and spectators too, was heart warming. This dramatic change in attitudes is an example to us all, and as someone newly faced with disability challenges, I found the whole thing deeply inspiring.

There were many inspiring stories, and many of the most prominent athletes will go on to follow in the steps of people like Tanni Grey-Thompson and become famous to a degree that would have seemed impossible to disabled athletes, and disabled people generally, only a decade or so ago. At last, we are starting to treat them as people first, and disability is only the door which has opened for them, to achievement in fields they might not have otherwise considered. For me, the image that will remain is the joy and disbelief on the face of 13 year old Eleanor Simmons when she won her race in the swimming pool - what race it was, her time etc, are all irrelevant, what matters is her joy in her sport and her joy in achievement, for its own sake - that, to me, is what sport should be about. Money, politics, fame, tribalism, to me, these have all corrupted sport and the Paralympics seemed, somehow, to have put them in their place, at least temporarily.