It’s rough when your animals are all in their “Golden Years”
Tonight “Stupid” sat on my lap and ate Amanda’s fresh cooked chicken. Our goal for the immediate future is just to keep her comfortable. The medication she is on will provide only temporary relief, so the next few weeks will be pretty tough.
Take today1-14-10
Stupid after her most recent vet visit...
It was early August 2000, and we had just returned from our vacation to Missouri to see Amanda’s Mom. I was finally starting to settle back into my post-vacation work routine at Southern States when I had to field a personal call on the work phone. It was Amanda, and she had a question for me. Over the next 15 minutes I told Amanda that in “no way, shape, or form” did I want another dog in the house. Rusty had been sick most of his puppy life, and the last thing we needed was some strange stray in the house making matters worse. But, as she would describe it, this pathetic old beast had wandered to her work… matted, hungry, and desperately needing a home. Was it lost? Chucked out of a car at 60mph? Who knows… regardless, I wasn’t having it brought back to my house.
Actualy, after some debate, she convinced me to agree that if no-one had decided to take that poor little dog with them, she could bring her home (if just temporarily). That night one of the maintenance men from her work agreed to take the dog home and share her with his family. A few weeks later he realized that he had bitten off more than he could chew because Molly was… well, she was Molly.
And that is how Molly entered into my life.
By the time Amanda brought her home they had already bonded… but don’t take that to mean that she ever really listened to either of us. One of my earliest memories of Molly is chasing her through the neighbors yard, catching her, and snatching her off the ground in full view of the neighbor’s entire family. Molly, uninjured, but not quite finished with her display, proceeded to howl as if I had twisted off one of her legs. Yelping and howling, howling and yelping… all the way back to my yard. (In the beginning Molly had a desire to roam, very little loyalty to staying with me., and poor eyesight…. so we soon learned that a leashed Molly was a locatable Molly) My early impressions were that she was easily excitable, bossy, and an aggressive “alertive” barker. Did a neighbor just knock on the door? Bark Bark Bark! Was that a car door slamming outside? Bark Bark Bark! Did a doorbell ring on the television in the next room? Bark Bark Bark! Are the trees swaying noisily outside? She was a far cry from the calm submissive “angel” we had in Rusty. Is it, God forbid, Raining outside!??? Bark Bark Bark Bark! Molly had brought with her many of the aggravations of owning a puppy.
But she was by no means a puppy. Molly was already aged when she found us. Her few remaining teeth were a rag-tag band of renegades on a daring mission to seek out strange new worlds (like under the coffee table) and boldly go where no cocker spaniel tooth had gone before. For the next few years we became quite accustomed to finding her kamikaze teeth all over the house. Take notes, there is no dog Tooth Fairy. If that was the case, we could have sent Molly to Yale with the money we would have earned off her mouth those first few years..She wasn’t just all “drifter” teeth and barking. She quite quickly became Amanda’s lap dog. She would follow her from room to room, and once seated, she would insist that she be placed in her rightful area… on the couch. It became easier to acquiesce than argue, and thus began her reign over the house. We were being manipulated, and we were powerless to resist her.(After all, she was adorable when she was getting her way.) Adorable and Quiet. You don’t want to experience the alternative.
Over time Molly warmed up to me, but it really did take years for her to come around to actually acknowledging my existence. She was perfectly happy to use me like a marionette who has the specific skill of using a can-opener, but other than that she really had no use for me. I’d let her out, I’d feed her, but she was always undeniably Amanda’s dog. (Which did have it’s perks… because I could say, without recourse, “Why is YOUR dog barking” just about anytime it was appropriate.)
I guess that started to change about 2 years ago. As she got older, Molly started recognizing the most efficient way to get things accomplished quickly, and that was through me. While Amanda loved Molly dearly, she did not allow the every whim of a 16 pound cocker spaniel to control every aspect of her day. Molly realized that wasn’t exactly the case with me. I had “sucker” written in dog language right across my forehead, and she knew it. She and I developed into quite an effective little team: As long as I did my job, and did what she wanted, everything was fine. As she aged, her vision started to fade (and I can relate) and her hearing started to go. No longer would she bark when the doorbell rang on TV, nor would she be too upset by the intrusion of UPS delivering a package (what’s that, more GSX-R parts?) She actually started to adopt Rusty’s demeanor… but she also started to become a little more antisocial. She didn’t always need to be on the couch, in the same room would suffice. She mainly just wanted to sleep, and occasionally eat, with a few occasional potty breaks.
In November of 2008, at age 16 (approx), Molly made her last trip to Florida. It was one of the last periods of her life where she really looked healthy. She always managed to stay trim, and had never really lost her ability to eat or get around. Over the course of those few days I turned my lens on sweet Molly and captured a few of the last vital images we have of her. If I knew then what I know now, I would have taken more. Winter took it’s toll, and by Spring I had already taken to carrying her off the porch each time she went out, and retrieving her when she was finished. In the mornings I’d pick her up onto her feet, let them get adjusted to holding the weight of her body, and then turn her loose to walk freely. She’d never climb stairs or jump off the porch without my assistance. We knew the time was growing near, but neither Amanda nor I wanted to accept it.
Pet owners who have gone through this often say that the animal tells you “when it’s time.” The truth is, knowing Molly as I did, I know she would never have been ready, and I also know that neither would we. Even now when I walk through the hallway into the bedroom, out of the corner of my eye I’ve seen her on her pillow at the foot of my bed. When I hear those slightly untrimmed nails tapping across the kitchen floor, I still find myself wondering which dog is up wandering the kitchen… but now I know it can only be Rusty.
I don’t honestly believe that I would have been a significantly different person if we hadn’t “adopted” Molly on that day in August more than 9 years ago. Maybe there’d be a few less stains on the carpet, and I might have had a few more mornings of uninterrupted sleep. She didn’t exactly steer the trajectory of this life, but I’m certainly glad she was there for the ride. Sleeping soundly in the corner while we figured things out. She was a good dog, and we loved her. I hope that as the sadness of her passing starts to fade, I’m instead left with vivid memories of all the things she used to do that made her unique, that made her Molly. Her little hop when she was trying to tell me that I was “getting warm” as to what task she wanted me to perform for her. The soft whimper in the morning telling me it’s time to get up. The adorable “Propeller Butt” tail wagging she would do at completely random times, and even her stress bark, (the one that had the predictable and distinct syncopation “BARK bark BARK bark”) I’ll miss her chasing the inside cat, and at the same time being terrified of the outside cat. We’ll miss her dirty looks and her sweet, dreamless slumbering at the foot of my bed. We’ll miss it all.
Has it really been 6 months since the warm spring morning when Molly finally left us?. Somehow it has. I’ve thought about her every day. I see her picture every time I answer my phone (it’s my current background). In all honestly, this “eulogy” has been sitting in the Drafts folder of my g-mail account for about 5 months, needing to be edited and posted somewhere. It’s a hard read, and I’ve avoided it because I get upset every time I get to the part that follows her trip to Florida. I’ll remember her last few months with a little more intensity than I would prefer, but even that period is a part of the “Molly” experience that I’m glad I was lucky enough to live first hand. It was luck that Molly found the Polar Plastics parking lot so many years ago. Both ours and hers. We were privileged enough to have her accompany us for a solid 10% of our lives, and we will surely not forget her. For those of you who read this and thought, “It was just a dog”… you’ve obviously never owned a dog like Molly.
Rest Well Molly, Good Dog
(Taken in November 2008, this is one of the last “healthy” pics we have of Molly.)
Amanda and I would like to thank Dr Horton and the staff of Angel Care Veteranary Clinic in Statesville, NC for making the last few months of Molly’s life as comfortable as possible. They were kind, compassionate, and very knowledgeable. We recommend them to anyone with pets (or even very homely children)
For some reason, Suzuki rejected my latest proposal to help jump start sales in North America. I guess my days of being a “Big Shot” ad executive are seriously numbered.
KarolinaVon and I put together this controversial little jewel about 2 months ago… just being goofy after a photo-shoot.
Just posted a video of a recent shoot with one of my favorite models, KarolinaVon. It’s kind of silly, and primarily a “behind the scenes” look at the recent set we shot for www.thegamergirls.com
Enjoy
I recently ran two track days at Virginia International Raceway aboard my trusty GSX-R 600 racebike. It turned out to be one of the best riding experiences I’ve ever had. Chris Sherrill and Dustin Leonard accompanied me as my pit ccrew/videographers…. here is the footage that we’ve assembled from the weekend.
Our last visit to CMP culminated in an off track, through the grass, bike mangling crash… so needless to say I was a little nervous about going back. Once I reassembled the Gixxer, I decided to take another stab at CMP and the dreaded Turn 14.
Here is the video blog that we made chronicling the fun-filled day:
Spent some time in Daytona last month at the AMA Pro Racing events… As always the trusty Nikon and the invaluable Flip were never far from my hands.
Mix a bit of my flair for grungy locations, with my penchant for telling stories, and add that to my desire to expand my “artistic” wedding portfolio…. and this what you get. The “Honeymoon Suite”.
Shot over a 12 hour period in a dank and nasty “no-tell” motel in Charlotte North Carolina, this series has been the collaboration of myself and several local models. Each model brought a “character” with them to the shoot, and we constructed a loose storyline around what each character would be doing in our series. Many thanks to Heather- “the bride”, Robby- “the groom”, and Mary Geraldine- “the skank”. Although not featured in this set, but featured in a series from the same day called “The Child is Gone”, Karolina Von also played an important role in orchestrating this shoot… (check out her feature in my previous post)
This series will also be featured in a new segment in my gallery section designated specifically for image series… look for that to debut late February.
(Look for a forthcoming “making of” video soon… featuring the cinematography of Nataniel Pierce (of Wish Photography) and C.J. “The Hippy” Steele…)
Recent shoot with Charlotte model KarolinaVon
This set is from a themed story-shoot we organized last weekend with several motels in Charlotte. Each model (some local, some not-so-local) had been designated a character to portray in our theme, with the entire shoot being held hostage by the funkiness of a dive-motel off Independence in Charlotte, NC (Our quaint and odoriferous location). The series of images I shot with KarolinaVon didn’t quite fit into the shoot-day streamlining our concept received… so I’m posting them on their own, separate from the rest of the themed shots.
More to come from this particular day of shooting, all very different styles and ideas… stay tuned (we’ll have an “Anatomy of a Shooting” video up within the next few days) and the themed image series will appear in the gallery section of this site shortly afterward.
Enjoy,
-Ty
As 2008 draws to a close, I decided to compile a video of my favorite images from the year. Most of the images are from my various shoots around Charlotte with local models, and some of them are from the years various travels (VIR-Virginia, Georgia and Florida).
Enjoy.