happy & healthy

"one of the most sublime experiences we can ever have is to wake up feeling healthy after we have been sick." ~rabbi harold kushner

i have just returned from visiting with lucy's surgeon where i learned that she is 95-100% healed. woo hoo! she is cleared to return to normal activity though she should ease into "tearing around the yard or beach." oh...bummer...looks like "normal activity" will have to wait....

as i was giving my thanks to dr. maraglit she bent down and said to lucy, "good luck, lucy. i wish i could be your full time doctor, but i can't. you are simply one of my all time favorites. i love you." after that tear jerking speech she set her sights on wil and called him "the cutest thing i have ever seen." as you can imagine, i hugged her and walked out of the building puffed like a peacock.

welcome back to health, lucy! now...please, for the love of humanity, stay that way.

independence

ah independence. sweet stuff. jess is reminding us all to celebrate for the right reasons so with that base covered i am going to take a different slant on things.

for the first time in 6 weeks lucy is INDEPENDENT of her cast. her leg looks gnarls barkley gnarley and she is going to have a couple of cool scars to take to show and tell. the doc says she's 75% healed and is thrilled with her progress. up next...longer walks (15 minutes) twice a day and a final check in three weeks. woo hoo! i feel thrilled for her but more so for us that we don't have to wrap her leg up every time she needs to go out. let freedom ring!

here is our gal lucy with one of her surgeons (notice how YOUNG she is....could've/should've been me) after getting the cast off. lucy is looking asian for reasons unknown.

from the higgins house to yours....happy 4th! celebrate freedom and all it means. and jess is right - think especially about those who fight to give it to us.

PS: GO SOX!!!

welcome home lucy!

we brought lucy home yesterday and our house feels whole again. the surgeons were thrilled with the outcome of her operation and were glad to send her home a day early. she looks a lot different than she did when we saw her on monday - brighter eyed, less pain, tail wagging again. she hates her cone but will have to wear it until her bandage comes off because the nurses caught her trying to remove the bandage herself. oops. she walks well despite the cast and we were assured that she would experience a full recovery in about 8 weeks.

thanks for all the well wishes! we are so happy that she's home!

lucy

sunday night while visiting friends in PA lucy was hit by a horse and buggy. she came out of nowhere in what we assume was an attempt to chase the horse and, having no real experience with horse and buggies, misjudged her target and was struck by the rear wheel of the buggy. her right front leg is broken, her left paw is wounded and swollen but not broken and her chest and body are bruised and sore. she was treated sunday night in PA and we brought her home yesterday to our vet in NJ which is one of the best in the northeast. she is currently in intensive care and will undergo surgery today to repair her leg. it is important to note that she will fully recover and should suffer no long term side effects.

it goes without saying that we love lucy so much and that this is difficult for us. we feel very lucky that her injuries, while serious, are minor. it could have been much worse and we are so grateful that it wasn't. we pray for her speedy recovery and hope that she'll be back making friends with squirrels and licking us all to death in no time.

we love you lucy!!!!

top 5

wednesday night while watching american idol i told ryan that we needed to think of a new top 5. it's been too long. ryan didn't have his thinking cap on...in fact, he was asleep...so i had to do the thinking for both of us....again.

in all honesty my brain wasn't working too well either. it had been a long day and i was ready for sleep. i started looking around the room to see if anything would inspire a new top 5. i didn't have to look very far. curled up between us on the couch was our very own lucy lu. there are thousands of reasons to love lucy....here are only a few.

top 5 reasons we love lucy

1. lucy doesn't look like any other dog

in an age of designer dogs and purebred pets (not that there's anything wrong with that!) lucy has a style all her own. her appearance is so unique that people always stop to ask us exactly what kind of dog she is. we usually say that she's just a mutt...just lucy...and it makes us happy every time.

2. she is living proof that the journey IS the destination

regardless of where we're headed, what we plan to do, who we plan to see, how long we plan to be there...lucy is excited to go. she makes every adventure exciting and greets the world with an open, willing, joyful heart.

3. she faces her fears head on

lucy has never liked the water. when we got her she was deathly afraid of the garden hose and took the long way around puddles on our walks. after her knee surgery in january 2007 she needed to swim as part of her physcial therapy. not only was she afraid to swim but she was unable to swim. ryan and i bought her a life jacket (hilarious), strapped it on her and threw a ball into a little pond near our house in MA. she did not want to go in after that ball but she trusted our crazy cheers and made her way in for it. we kept this up weekend after weekend until she could swim without the life jacket. she now takes a running leap and flies into the atlantic ocean to fetch the ball. she is an impressive swimmer - strong, fast and determined - and has a blast riding the waves.

4. she loves wil

i was nervous about lucy's reaction to wil when we brought him home from the hosptial. lucy was my constant (and on many days only) companion during my pregnancy. when ryan moved to NJ in february she kept me company. when i moved to NJ last july we spent all our days together taking walks and playing ball. i wasn't nervous that lucy wouldn't like wil but that she'd feel replaced. turns out...she doesn't feel replaced at all. she loves wil and layed down at his feet (literally) when we brought him home. she has been so gentle, so patient and so loving toward him. our only complaint is that she'd like to lick him to death if we'd let her. i suppose that's not a big complaint in the scheme of things. we know they will be great friends when wil is older and we will be glad to have someone to share our ball throwing duties.

5. she loves us

lucy is a loyal, unflinchingly constant, gentle, loving friend and companion. she loves and lives with utter abandon...in the moment, for the moment, unconditionally. she causes us to stop daily and share love, show love, receive love. it's not something that we always remembered to do before her and it's a wonderful lesson. without her our life would be less interesting, less funny and less unexpected...although we might have more room in bed but, hey, nothing is free.

we love lucy...she's our brown-eyed girl and we are better for having her in our lives.

lucy's big day

there's been a lot of debate over the past three years as to what kind of dog lucy actually is. we usually answer "mutt" but opinions are like, well, a**holes, and everyone's got one. we've heard dalmatian (huh?), entlebucher, swiss mountain dog, beagle and pitbull. more than likely, she's a combo of the latter two, beagle & pit.

no one denies that her body is shaped more like a pitbull than a beagle. add her shape to her muscles and gait and you'd think that pitbull was more dominant in her than beagle. however, watch her hunt something down (tennis ball, rabbit, squirrel, buried bone) and you quickly notice that her body may be pitbull but her mind is mostly beagle.

which brings us to today.

we have a small family of baby squirrels living in a tree on the side of our house. there are three or four babies and we see them roaming the front yard for food off and on all day. this morning i looked out the window and a huge black crow was trying to carry off one of the babies. i ran outside yelling at the crow who, in turn, flew up to the wires above and squawked at me. as i was walking back up the driveway i realized that the little squirrel hadn't gone far. i came inside, got my camera and took a few pictures. cute little guy!

later in the day as i was unloading groceries from my car lucy was wandering around the driveway. i saw her get a line on one of the baby squirrels and run after it. surprisingly, it didn't run and it faced her without fear. at first i thought it was going to attack her but as events transpired i came to realize that the squirrel was playing with her. they played in our front yard for 10 minutes or so before i made lucy come in because i was definitely afraid that the squirrel would attack me or wil. of course, it didn't seem to mind us because it was focused entirely on lucy. (and lucy on it!)

after lunch, on our way for a walk, lucy again spotted the little guy/gal. she ran over to the tree and it ran up the tree and then down and they began chasing each other around the base of the tree. at one point, the squirrel even rolled on it's back and began playfully batting at lucy. if i hadn't seen it with my own eyes, i would never believe it.

lucy lived a dream today - she got up close and personal with a squirrel and, hey, maybe made a friend for life. judge for yourself!

ps: i will not have my feet held to the fire over the fact that she isn't heeding ONE command i give her. there was a squirrel there for goodness sake!

shrimp & grits casserole

last friday we hosted our friends heather & alistair for dinner. heather & i share a love for southern food and southern cooking. their 4 year old daughter lily loves shrimp and, in my opinion, EVERYONE loves (or should love!) a casserole. so, we had shrimp and grits casserole featured featured in the december 2007 issue of cooking light. if shrimp, grits and casseroles appeal to you...give it a try! you won't be disappointed.

after dinner, overcome by the good vibe and camaraderie, lucy decided to show heather some love. if you've ever met lucy, you know this was VERY out of character. just ask denise...or mom...or ryan...or anyone really.